Helping Our Children Feel Loved by God
00:00:00.000 | (upbeat music)
00:00:02.580 | - Welcome to a new week on the Ask Pastor John podcast.
00:00:08.120 | We have a big week ahead as we come up on Easter.
00:00:10.760 | And today we're joined again by our friend Ray Ortland,
00:00:13.420 | author and senior pastor of Emanuel Church
00:00:16.200 | in Nashville, Tennessee.
00:00:18.200 | Ray, the Ortland family has a long and wonderful history
00:00:22.240 | when it comes to fruitful gospel ministry
00:00:24.200 | and marriage and parenting.
00:00:25.680 | Those three categories come to mind
00:00:27.120 | when I think of the Ortland family legacies.
00:00:29.400 | Gospel ministry, marriage, parenting,
00:00:32.280 | which is an astonishing legacy to watch from a distance.
00:00:35.820 | And we talked about marriage earlier in episode number 559,
00:00:39.600 | and we will talk gospel soon.
00:00:42.560 | Here I wanna talk about parenting.
00:00:44.680 | Some people will know your dad,
00:00:46.280 | he was a wonderfully gifted preacher and pastor,
00:00:49.160 | and his influence on a young John Piper was profound.
00:00:52.360 | Pastor John shared that story in episode number 172
00:00:55.680 | of this podcast series.
00:00:57.640 | In what ways did your father impact you as a child,
00:01:00.800 | and in turn, what did you seek to instill
00:01:03.440 | in your three sons and daughter when they were young?
00:01:06.880 | - Well, let me just paint the picture of a moment
00:01:08.800 | with my dad that's very dear to me.
00:01:10.720 | We were in the front yard, I was 10 or 12 years old,
00:01:15.240 | I forget, and we were, I guess, doing yard work.
00:01:18.640 | And whatever the context was,
00:01:21.020 | I can't pull that up in my memory,
00:01:22.720 | but he turned to me and he looked me right in the eye,
00:01:25.880 | in the middle of our conversation,
00:01:27.760 | and he said, "You know, bud, before time began,
00:01:30.880 | "God chose you."
00:01:32.960 | And I think my eyes got real big, you know,
00:01:35.000 | and I thought, really, in my heart, I thought,
00:01:36.560 | "Oh, come on, you mean God Almighty in heaven,
00:01:39.980 | "way back then, thought of little tiny me,
00:01:42.300 | "and I felt so loved?
00:01:44.080 | "I felt loved by God?"
00:01:46.240 | It filled my heart with wonder,
00:01:47.640 | so that years later,
00:01:49.720 | when I heard about the doctrine of election,
00:01:51.960 | and some of my friends with whom I was dialoguing about that,
00:01:55.320 | they had difficulty with it, they resisted it,
00:01:58.000 | I had no problem at all.
00:01:59.440 | I thought it was wonderful,
00:02:00.640 | and it was obviously biblical,
00:02:02.280 | because my dad had really helped me years before,
00:02:05.760 | in a moment of theological education
00:02:08.320 | that I didn't realize was that.
00:02:10.060 | He helped me, at level of my heart,
00:02:12.480 | to feel the love of God in the doctrine of election.
00:02:15.760 | But when Jannie and I raised our kids,
00:02:19.880 | we just decided, sometimes parents treat parenting
00:02:23.600 | as if it's some kind of death sentence.
00:02:25.400 | I mean, we loved it, we decided to love it.
00:02:29.760 | And, Tony, we just thought through,
00:02:32.160 | what kind of environment are we going to create
00:02:36.920 | for these precious children,
00:02:38.760 | as their most formative experience,
00:02:41.080 | to give them the best start in life?
00:02:43.520 | And we just had a conviction
00:02:45.320 | that the glory of the Lord is ultimate reality.
00:02:48.760 | I thought of Exodus 33, Moses prayed,
00:02:51.480 | "Please show me your glory."
00:02:53.600 | And the Lord said,
00:02:54.440 | "I will make all my goodness pass before you."
00:02:57.940 | So, ultimate reality is the glorious goodness of God.
00:03:01.840 | And we just wanted to create a home environment
00:03:04.360 | where our children would find that easy to believe.
00:03:07.960 | We tried to inload joy and sincerity and tenderness
00:03:12.960 | and love and wisdom and gentleness and laughter,
00:03:16.840 | with discipline and boundaries too,
00:03:18.440 | because that's part of God's goodness.
00:03:20.200 | And I don't know how successful we were in that effort,
00:03:22.640 | but that's what we tried to do,
00:03:24.040 | because we just believed that ultimate reality
00:03:26.800 | is not darkness and despair,
00:03:28.360 | but just the glorious goodness of God.
00:03:31.600 | - Well, based on what I see in your kids,
00:03:33.160 | I think you and Janie pulled this off by grace, of course.
00:03:36.040 | Thank you, Ray.
00:03:36.880 | And I mentioned the critical role your dad played
00:03:40.280 | in John Piper's life,
00:03:41.520 | and Pastor John shared that story
00:03:43.640 | in episode number 172 in this podcast series.
00:03:46.720 | The episode is titled,
00:03:47.600 | "How Do I Motivate My Church for Ministry?"
00:03:50.680 | You can find it in the Ask Pastor John archive
00:03:52.700 | at desiringgod.org.
00:03:54.960 | Go to the site, click on More,
00:03:56.840 | and click on Ask Pastor John,
00:03:58.760 | and there, search for episode number 172.
00:04:02.920 | Tomorrow, I wanna ask you, Ray, more about church culture,
00:04:06.560 | and specifically of the toxic dangers
00:04:08.800 | that threaten the unity of the church, namely gossip.
00:04:13.000 | I know you have put a lot of thought into this,
00:04:14.660 | and it's a very real issue faced by congregations,
00:04:17.440 | and we'll address that tomorrow on the Ask Pastor John
00:04:20.280 | podcast.
00:04:21.120 | Thanks for listening.
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00:04:24.540 | (upbeat music)
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