“21 Tenets of Biblical Masculinity”

This is a simple and yet, thought provoking book based on the Word of God.  Pastor Jerry Ross of Blessed Hope Baptist Church in Jasonville, IN has done a tremendous job of studying the Scriptures and very practically laying out principles that every man who bears the name of Christ should be, not just familiar with, but immersed in as a way of life.

Covering topics such as; developing a strong work ethic, learning biblical leadership, seeking Godly counsel, engaging in excellent speech, defeating the sins of the youth, and many more….Pastor Ross has provided every parent, pastor, teacher, adult a treasure trove from which to draw upon when it comes to raising and mentoring the next generation.  There is nothing in this book that is new as every principle is based on sound biblical interpretation and application.  However, I fear that for far to long we have ignored these timeless truths given to us by God and we are now reaping the consequences.

Really, I could go on and on about this book, but the truth of the matter is that you need to read it for yourself.  I will be reading it again very soon and intend to create my own study guide to use in the future with my own sons and with other young man that I have the opportunity to work with.

If you are not familiar with Pastor Ross’s writings, I strongly urge you to visit http://www.stayinthecastle.com.  Here you will find several other books/booklets that will help you, your family, and your ministry.  I have a few other of his books and look forward to reading them as well.  If you have read this book, please leave me a comment and let me know what your thoughts were.

Until then, God bless!!

Waiting On God

And it shall come to pass, that before they call,
I will answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will hear.
(Isaiah 65:24)

The God that is with me on top of the mountains is the same God that is with me in the valleys.  He has promised He will never leave me nor forsake me.  He is the same yesterday, today, and forever!!
Yesterday, at 7:45 in the morning, my wife assembled my children in the living room because we needed to pray.  We were facing a difficult situation, and quite honestly I was a little bit discouraged.  A few minutes before, I had told my wife that I did not want to take matters in to my own hand, but I wanted to see God “deliver us.”  She said that we shouldn’t take it into our own hands, but leave it with the Lord. So, the five of us gathered together to pray and we laid our burden at the feet of the Lord.
Thirty minutes later, my wife called me from the church academy to let me know that God had answered our prayer, and that it had been answered several hours before…..we just didn’t know it. Before calling me, she want to each one of our children and let them know what God had already done.  Speaking with our son, James, he said, “Really, that was fast.”  Cate then let him know that God had answered the prayer before Daddy had prayed. His eyes lit up with amazement, as he said, “Wow, really. That’s cool.”
How precious it was for my wife to have that moment with each of our kids and to show them that our God is a personal God who delights to work in the hearts of men and to answer their prayers.
I’m thankful that I did not take matters in to my own hand.  You see, if I would have done it my way, I wouldn’t have a testimony to share with others, and my children would have missed out on an opportunity to see God work in their own lives.  Let us not run ahead of God and miss out on what He’s doing.

A Special Breakfast

After a very long week coupled with an extremely long day, my wife got to sleep in this morning.  Shortly after she made her way out of bed, the kids came to her and sent her back to bed for a few minutes.  A short while later, our daughter came in carrying a baking pan with a lovingly prepared breakfast just for Mommy.  What a special treat for her as she sat there eating MY pumpkin spice waffles 🙂

The Tracing Of The Scriptures

Recently, I felt impressed by the Lord to spend some time meditating on and studying in the sixth chapter of Deuteronomy.  I have always liked this passage and how it laid out the parental responsibility of indoctrinating our children with the Word of God. After several minutes of meditating on the following verses…

I had broken them down into four commands and “diagrammed” each one with a keyword assigned to each command. (Yes, those key words were alliterated :)) During the next hour, as I just pondered the commands, the Holy Spirit was doing a work in my heart concerning my responsibilities as a father towards my children. In the next four posts, I am going to share some things with you that the Lord has and continues to show me in His Word. The four key thoughts that we will look at are the following: The Teaching, The Talking, The Tethering, and The Tracing of the Scriptures.  However, this not the order that we will look at them. As is indicated by the title of this post, we will first look at “The Tracing of the Scriptures.” The last command reads like this, “And thou shalt write them upon the posts of thy house, and on thy gates.”  Here, God is commanding the people of Israel to write, or, to trace the Scriptures.  Tracing the Word of God is a very important thing for every Christian to be involved in doing. When it comes to memorizing Bible verses, the writing out of the verses is considered to play a key part in the process.  In his book, Homiletics from the Heart, John Goetsch writes…

          “Get some cards and write the verses out on those ‘memory’ cards. It doesn’t matter what size yo use – it depends on how good your eyes are….Writing the verses out on these cards is the first process of memorizing…There is great value in writing verses out in long hand. God commanded it to be done in the Old Testament.”

Goetsch goes on to quote two passages from the Old Testament. The first is the same one that we are already studying.  Recalling the other passage is what really stick out to me during this time of study.  In the seventeenth chapter of Deuteronomy, in the eighteenth verse, we read the following, “And it shall be, when he sitteth upon the throne of his kingdom, that he shall write him a copy of this law in a book out of that which is before the priests the Levites:” The Kings of Israel were required to hand write their own personal copy of the first five books of the Bible, the Pentateuch.  There is no doubt that such a task would be a time consuming endeavor, especially for one who was charged with the responsibility of running the kingdom of Israel. Yet, this was the order that God set before “His anointed.”  God wanted His man to be very familiar with Him and His Word, if he was going to lead the children of Israel.

With these thoughts in mind and recognizing that in the context of the sixth chapter of Deuteronomy, God was speaking to parents in the raising of their children, I began to ask the Lord how I could practically apply this command.  After praying about it for several days and discussing it with my wife, I sat down with my children and laid out before them a new project that they were going to begin.

Our children are 10, 6, and 5.  Every day they two younger ones write three verses from the book of Proverbs in their journals.  The oldest child writes six verses each day. In less than a year the boys will have written the book once, and our daughter will have completed it twice.  At this point the plan is to stay in Proverbs for a few years. I believe that this will help them to become very familiar with this important book.  Praise the Lord that this project was not met with a single complaint. Instead they have all jumped in wholeheartedly and been very excited.

After I explained everything to them, I did add a bonus. If they write out their verses each week faithfully, I will add a dollar to their savings (Multi Purpose Training). We will split the dollar between their long and short term accounts. I did this to reward con

sistency and faithfulness, not to bribe them to do the work.

These are a few thoughts on “The Tracing of the Scriptures.”  I trust that you have been blessed. Let me know of any ideas that you come up with.