Today on Bold Steps with Mark Jobe. We're learning how to raise up the next generation.
And here's what the Bible says. When you honor, whether you're a teenager or whether you're a 20 year old, or whether you're a 13 year old. Success and longevity are the byproducts of honoring your father and your mother. What is the opposite of that? Short life and a lot of failures.
Welcome to Bold Steps with Mark Jobe. Mark is president of Moody Bible Institute and the senior pastor of New Life Community Church in Chicago. I'm Wayne Shepherd. Over the past two days, we've been learning about authority and how parents have the power to bless their children. And today, as we move forward, Mark is going to be explaining how our willingness to train up the next generation shapes the future and their destiny. Our series is titled When
you Believe Everything Changes. And if you have your Bible, turn with us to Ephesians chapter six. Mark titled this message The Power of Royal Parenting. And it starts right now.
Jesus authority came through the submission to his God given authority, and because he was in submission to his authority. He had perfect authority. There was never a time where Jesus prayed for a person that was sick that he did not get healed. There was never a time where he touched a deaf man that did not receive his hearing. There's not a time where he touched a leper and the leopard wasn't clean. There's not a time when he
expelled the demon that a demon didn't go. Jesus had perfect authority, but he had perfect authority because he was in perfect submission to the authority of his of his father here on earth. Therefore, because he learned perfect submission, he also had perfect authority. You will never learn to lead unless, first of all, you learn to follow. You will never have authority unless, first of all, you place
yourself under authority. That's why the Bible talks so strongly about the need to obey and be under the authority of those that God has placed over us. I started pastoring this church when I was 21 years old. That's way too young. But I believe that there's some lessons God had to teach me before I started pastoring that I needed to learn about submission and authority. And unless I had learned those lessons, I don't believe I would
ever have had the authority to lead. I was 21 and leading and leading people that were double my age. I was counseling marriages and I wasn't even married. I was I was, you know, ministering and preaching, But, but, but part of the lessons that I had to learn was the lesson of submission being under authority. And I remember specifically in one instance where this lesson had to be taught to me very strongly and powerfully, not through my parents, but through another pastor, a church that I
was at. And, um, where a pastor, I thought, asked me to do something unreasonable at the time. I my hair was sort of the hair of the day. It wasn't super long, but, you know, it was kind of a little bit long. Can you still imagine that? So me with long hair. Okay. And the pastor had asked me to teach a class, and the pastor asked me before I taught the class, he asked me to cut my hair. And I remember I was kind of ticked at it, like, you didn't ask me how my spiritual
life is. You didn't ask me if I feel qualified. You didn't ask me if I was praying. You just looked at my hair and you want me to cut my hair. Inside of me, that little rebellious like, who is this guy going to tell me to change my style just because he has short hair? Dresses in a suit and tie all the time. And so I made an appointment with him. I said, I'd like to talk to you first before I cut my hair. I'd like to talk to you. And I got Ahold of his secretary.
And his secretary says he'd be happy to talk to you after you cut your hair. And I was like, okay, that's. That's it. Bunch of hypocrites. Legalistic, carnal. I'm out of this place. I'm like, building my own case. I can't believe that what they're doing. I'm not going to teach that class now. I'm not going to do anything like that. I was in college at the time. I went to my dorm, told everybody there like, he told you what, man? You should leave that church. Forget that church. I'm like, yeah.
Have you ever felt the conviction of the Holy Spirit? I'm building my case. I'm talking about that. And no one was there. No one was talking about. I felt this sharp conviction of the Holy Spirit simply saying submit. Submit. He's your spiritual authority right now. If he would have asked you to do something hard, you'd have done it. I felt the conviction in my Holy Spirit so much. I felt such conviction, the Holy Spirit that that day I went to some guy on the floor, another college student.
I said, grab your scissors. Cut my hair. He did never grew back after that. Nah. Just kidding dad. I went back and I said, you know what? I did that, and I feel like God spoke to me at that moment about. I didn't agree with it. I thought it was, but. But God spoke to me at that moment. What God was trying to teach me is a lesson on obedience and submission. Because you can never have authority unless you
learn to be under authority. Listen, listen, young men, if you're a teenager right now and you're 18 years old, listen, you will never be able to lead your household unless, first of all, you learn to submit to the leader of your household. One day you will have a family. One day you will have kids, one day you will lead a household. And you're never going to learn to lead. Unless first of all, you learn to submit. And listen.
I am convinced it was shortly after that, not too long after that, a couple of years after that, I find myself, at the age of 21, pastoring a church. But I am convinced that I would never have started pastoring at that young age unless I would have. I would have proved that test or or or gone through that test of learning what it meant to submit. The Bible says that rebellion is like the sin of witchcraft. It gets into your soul and it starts eating away.
To obey is better than sacrifice and to hearken than the fat of rams. That's why it is the parent's responsibility to begin to teach children the power of obedience. Because ultimately, when you teach your children to obey, it will serve them in the rest of their life. They will learn to lead sooner. They will lead better. They will take authority sooner. They will begin to have influence
at a greater age. If you if they don't learn now, when they become heads of households, their life will be out of control because they've never learned to be under the authority and submission of someone that's over them. Amen. Children. Obey your parents in the Lord. What does that word in the Lord mean? Ultimately, it means that when you submit to your parents, you're not submitting to them, but
you're submitting to God. You cannot be rebellious toward your parents and in right relationship with God, because whatever you do to your parents, ultimately you are doing to the authority that God has set above you. You can't say, well, I don't respect my parents, I don't obey them. But me and God, man we're tight. No no no no. You're tight with something. But let me tell you, it's not the Spirit of God. It may be some other spirit,
but it's not the Spirit of God. Because when you learn to you, you say, well, I've had this conversation with a lot of people. They say, well, I don't think my dad deserves my respect. I just had a conversation with someone after our first service. They said, you know, my dad was a womanizer. My dad treated my mother wrong. I don't see how I could respect my dad for what he did. Listen, I know some of you have dads or mothers that necessarily weren't the best in the world.
But here's the thing when you obey them at this age, you're not obeying them because they deserve to be obeyed by their character. You're obeying them because you're trusting God to work through them, not trusting that they are worthy, but that God is worthy and has placed him in a in a position to bless you. Are you tracking with me? You say, well, pastor, I don't understand that. Well, do you remember King David? King David in the Bible God said, you will be king one day. And he
put king. Saul was still king over him. And King Saul was a jealous, egocentric maniac that was looking to kill David. But David respected the authority of Saul and said, I will not touch God's anointed. I will not lift my hand. I will not kill him. God raises and puts down. And because David submitted to Saul, God raised David up at the right time to be the leader of a kingdom, because he learned to respect the position
of authority that God had placed him on. The same it is in our life as well.
You're listening to Bold Steps with Mark Jobe. A message he's titled The Power of Royal Parenting. You know, Mark, parents aren't the only ones who have the power to shape and change lives. We all can be an encouragement to others if we take the time. And that's something we're hearing from listeners.
Yes we are. And by the way, we just want to say we love hearing from our listeners. Thank you for reaching out, sharing your stories, testimonies, faith questions. We read them all on a regular basis. I pray over the prayer requests that come in. Just yesterday I was doing so and so. It's encouraging to hear what's going on in your life and how God is moving through this program as well.
Well, let me take a moment and share with you a letter we got in response to a recent message you gave. This listener says, before school began this fall, I was asked to do something more special than just our typical prayer for the children and their families. I knew exactly what I was going to do because God was stirring in me the importance of blessing my children.
After listening to pastor Mark, just as he demonstrated blessing his children, I brought my children with me in front of the families of our church and bless my kids. I spoke to the parents and grandparents about the power of their words and the importance to bless their children and grandchildren. I was amazed by how many people were brought to tears, but how they needed that affirmation as
a child but never received it. Your one message has had a ripple effect, not just in my family, but in many families now because of this one bold step. Thank you for what you are doing to create a generational impact in families so that God's love overflows into the lives of children and hopefully for years to come in their children's children.
Wonderful, huh? I love that testimony. And if you're a parent out there, I just want to encourage you with the power of blessing. As this listener has said, there's something compelling about you putting your hand on the head or the shoulder of your sons or daughters and just speaking what you see in their lives. In fact, we did that recently at a chapel with all the seniors here at Moody Bible Institute that were graduating.
I heard about that at.
The very end. We said, I want you to come and just pray blessing over them, but also speak into what you see in their lives, what you see in them. And you know, Wayne, so many times we don't see what other people actually see in us because of insecurity, doubt, fear. And so there's a lot of power in words, of blessing.
Well, thank you for sharing that bold step with us, and we'd love to hear how you have taken a bold step, and we'd love to pray for you as well. Connect with us online at Bold Steps. Org Or you can give us a call and leave your message on a recorded line. This number is (312) 329-2011. 312329 2011. And of course, you're always welcome to send us email. The address is bold steps. Again, we thank our listener for
that bold step story. Now let's get back to today's message from Mark on the power of role parenting.
Now, the only exception is this that ultimately you're submitting to the authority of God. So if your parent or if your boss or if your pastor, if your government leader or anybody in authority or principal at a school ever asked you to do something that is contrary to the rules and laws of God, then you can say no.
If your parent asked you to lie, cheat. If they asked you to do something that is sinful, then you have the ability and the power to say no because ultimately you are submitting to God, just like Peter did. When the governing authorities say you cannot preach Jesus anymore. Peter said, who shall I obey, man or God? So ultimately, no one can ever ask you to do something immoral. No one can ever ask you to violate or do
something sinful. You have the ability to say no. But on other issues, there's the issue of submission to the authority that God has given us. And then it says this. Listen, it says honor your mother and father. And by the way, he's quoting one of the Ten Commandments, because in Deuteronomy. In Deuteronomy chapter five, verse 16, it says, honor your father and mother as the Lord your God commanded you, so that you may live a long life, that it may go well with you in the land of the
Lord your God has given you. Paul quotes that again, and he says, listen, SIM. Honor your father and mother, which is the first commandment, with a promise that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy a long life here on earth. There comes a time in your life where you go from obeying your parents
to honoring your parents. If you're out on your own and you're 30 years old and you have your wife and you have your own children, you're financially independent and your mother comes to you and says to you, you need to obey me. Then you need to say, mom, I love you, but I don't have to obey you, mom. I honor you, but I don't have to obey you. There's a difference between honor and obedience. Honor means that you consider respectfully what they say. You weigh what they say.
But there comes a point in time where you actually just honor them, but not obey them. Listen, guys. Listen up. This is important. I know some of you are mama's boys. You get in a little fight with your wife? You call up mom and Mom. Guess what? My wife's not just understanding me. I just nags me and you say, oh, mijo. I told you all along she was going to be that way. You come over to mama's house now. Let me make you a little carlito, and I'm gonna, you know,
just snuggle up on the couch. You don't have to put up with that nagging wife. You just come over here. Listen, mom. He's got a family. Don't give him a couch to sleep on. Don't let him. Don't tell him he can stay at your house for a week. You make him go home and deal with his wife. Because that's his family, not that's his family. He needs to go home. He needs to go back to his wife. He needs to deal with the issues of his wife. And listen, man,
you your responsibility. You have a woman in your life and your mother, you honor, but your wife is the new woman in your life, and she takes priority in your life. Because the Bible says when you marry, you leave, you cleave, and you become one. Okay. Gotta settle that right now. But you honor. And here's what the Bible says. When you honor, whether you're a teenager or whether you're 20 year old, or whether you're 13 year old, when you honor the Bible says it's the first commandment with
a promise. What is the promise? There's a two fold promise, number one, that it may go well with you. In other words, that you may have success in life. And number two, that you may live a long life here on Earth. Success and longevity are the byproducts of honoring your father and your mother. Success and longevity are the byproducts of honoring your father and your mother. What is the opposite of that? Short life and a lot of failures.
Failure and a short life. You say, well, pastor, I really want to live long and I want to live healthy. I'm taking all these multivitamin pills, and I'm watching my cholesterol, and I'm I'm. I'm eating. It's not butter, pastor. It's like synthetic stuff with no calories. And I'm trying to work out. I'm glad I believe in fitness. I want you to be healthy. But listen, how about honoring your mother and your father? Because that will add longevity to your life and success to your life as well. It's
one of the Ten Commandments. It's one of the words in Scripture. And I don't care how old your father and mother are. You honor them. How do you honor them? You call them up, you let them know they're important. You listen to them, you say, well, all they talk about is the good old days and complain about. Hey, you listen to them and and and you honor them, and you respect them, and you talk to them, and you help them out. Why? You honor your father and
your mother. You don't treat them as well. They're just old people that don't. No, no, no, they're your mother and your father. The older they get, the more respect they deserve to have from you and the grandkids and the great grandchildren. One of the worst fallacies of our nation is the degradation and devaluation of elderly people. I was impressed when I went to China how they uphold and venerate and value the elderly. We live in a society in which the elderly pretty much are set aside,
as useless to society as inconveniences to everybody's life. God forgive us as an American society. The Bible talks about honoring the elderly, listening to them, valuing them. And I hope that sons and daughters, if you're in your 50s and your 50s and your parents are in their 70s, or you're in your 60s and your parents are in the 80s, I hope that you're inviting them over to eat. I hope that you're listening to them. I hope that you're going out of your way to make that sure
that they're doing okay. I hope that you are giving them some honor in their life. I hope that you're giving them some dignity in their life. I hope that you're talking to them in a way that they feel valued and respected and not thrown aside or pushed aside. I hope that that's part of what you're doing as an adult child of some parents that are getting elderly because that honors God looks upon that and that pleases the heart of God, and it flows in blessing to
your life, success and longevity to your life. Amen.
We're learning about honor and the promise of God found in Ephesians chapter six. You're listening to the Bible teaching of Mark job, and this is Bold Steps. Well, right now we've got a special bold step gift available for our listeners. It's a book titled envy a Big problem you didn't know you had. I love that title. It's written by our guest, pastor Mike Fabares.
Yeah. And by the way, many of you are familiar with pastor Mike because he's on the radio. He's written several books. He's a graduate from Moody Bible Institute and actually on the board of directors as well. And so love pastor Mike and his ministry. I was thinking about this topic of envy and how oftentimes we just don't consider ourselves envious. Pastor Mike, if you were to help someone self-diagnose whether they have envy, what would you point to? What should they be looking for?
Well, I would start by saying, are there any people in your everyday world that you just find yourself erring on the side of being critical when you really shouldn't be and you think, well, why am I not happy applauding their success? Right. This is hard, but we need to look at the people that we are critical of.
And if you look hard enough, you often find it's because I really envious of what they get that I don't have what they've accomplished, that I haven't been able to accomplish that, that they make so much money, so much more money than I make. There's a lot of reasons that we, um, just spring into gossip and criticism and just talking behind people's back in a negative way, and usually we can start to realize what's happened is something really between me and God. It's really not between
me and them. Mhm.
Pastor Mike. Our envy and jealousy interchangeable.
Not really. Um, there's a kind of jealousy that's appropriate in the Bible, right? God says he's a jealous God in Exodus 34. There's a time for you right to rightly in your marriage. Be jealous if there's something threatening that relationship. But envy is always seen as something wrong in Scripture, and we're never to envy anyone. And what envy is, is taking a jealous feeling when I have
no right to feel jealous. And now I start to have a a bitterness toward that person for accomplishing or achieving or securing something that I haven't been able to. And Jesus tells parables about this. You've got to be careful in your own heart to guard your heart against this kind of envy, because it is different than jealousy, because sometimes jealousy can be appropriate.
That's great. So there you have it, pastor Mike.
Fabrice, we would love to get this book into your hand. It's called a big problem you didn't know you had envy. Thank you, pastor Mike.
Of course. Thank you.
And we will send you a copy of his book when you make a donation of any amount to support bold steps. Just call us at 800 Moody. That's (800) 356-6639. Or if you like, you can give online at boldsystems.org. Or you can send your financial gift in the mail. Our address is bold. Steps 820 North LaSalle Boulevard, Chicago, Illinois 606 ten. And please remember, it's because of the generous gifts from listeners like you that we can offer
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you won't want to miss it. So be listening Friday for more bold steps with Mark Jones. Bold steps is a production of Moody Radio, a ministry of Moody Bible Institute.