In his sermon, Scott Brown discusses the design of God for families, emphasizing that families are meant to care for one another, including taking care of elderly parents. He highlights the difficulties in our current culture, such as the breakdown of the family structure, abortion, and divorce, which have led to a lack of caregiving capabilities. Brown also addresses the reasons parents may be reluctant to be taken care of, such as not wanting to be a burden or give up their independence. The economic challenges of caring for aging parents are also touched upon, as well as the importance of the church in preparing families for this responsibility. Brown urges listeners to reconsider the role of families in caring for aging parents and to turn to God's design as a guide.

When we encounter the subject of taking your parents into your home, taking care of your parents, we're confronted with the whole design of God for the world that He's created. And there's so many aspects of that design that include, you know, how we should think about this subject. You know, for one, God has put people in families. There is the design of life that needs to be considered. God puts people in families and there are many purposes of putting people in families.

You know the psalmist says he takes the solitary and put them in families even single people should be In a family in some way and there never should be a person That's really without a family and in the family of God There's an opportunity for every single person to have a family if they have a broken family or or no family at all. So the structure of the family takes care of many many things and what I want to give you a number of points. I want to talk about the design for the taking care of parents, the difficulties. I want to talk about the reasons parents are often reluctant to be taken care of. I want to talk about briefly about the economics of the whole thing, the travail that can can come upon those who attempt to bring other parents in with them, the sanctification and the preparation, those are seven points.

So I want to just begin with with the design. The design of God is that He does put people in families. He's designed a world where it's you, your son, and your grandson all the days of your life. And He gives longtime care and protection to his people through the family. It's the basic unit of care and protection in the world.

Of course the church is another fundamental unit of care, but the family is so uniquely structured to take care of those who are getting older. It really helps us think through why it is in Christianity that the strong take care of the weak. This is one reason, Because sometimes people become weak and when people are aging they become weak in many, many ways. Mentally, physically, sometimes spiritually, But God has designed the family so that there would be the strong always there to take care of the weak. One of the great tragedies of our our culture is is that we have because we have so you know despised the whole principle of being fruitful and multiply we have we have pretty much destroyed the caregiving capability of the family in America and almost there are very few And there are very few people that have families that are intact enough to even take care of the rising generation.

When you abort, you know, 50 or 60 million children, what you have done is you have aborted the caregivers for the rising, for the aging population. And the care structure for the aging population simply does not exist in America today because we've destroyed the fabric of society. By destroying the family, by hating children, by despising childbearing. What we have done is is that we have created conditions that will probably end up causing the mass extermination of an aging population in America. It's already happening today in ways that are socially acceptable as people are neglected and they die in what, in many cases, are death camps for the aged.

But the reason is because we've despised God's laws and we have we have not built strong families and so we don't have the strong who are even there to take care of the weak When you add to this a whole culture of divorce which is so destroyed family economy, family wealth, it's taken the energy of the family and dispersed it abroad into really to a morass of depression and dishonor and even hatred because no one, no family is left without enormous scars when divorce enters that family and enormous relational problems that end up causing such division in families that they're not able they're just not able to pull together to take care of one another and so and so you know this this comprehensively difficult problem in America is upon us and it's going to really really increase. It's really interesting you know the baby boomers, my generation, you know were screaming you know free love, do your own thing, don't have children, you know abortions are just a fine convenience. And now, and now they are, my generation is going to reap a whirlwind of judgment for what they did. And we'll see that unfolding in the coming years.

It's just beginning to happen now. The next 10 and 20 years will show enormous social changes and difficulties. Can the healthcare system even absorb this? Well most people say absolutely not, even from this vantage point. But why all these problems?

It's because the design of God has been rejected, that God has created families to take care of one another all lifelong. He gives a husband to take care of a wife all her life long. He gives a family the responsibility to take care of the older generation and to take care of everyone in the family. So we start with with the whole issue of design because that's really the heart of the problem and that's and that's how we have to always sort of recalibrate ourselves by going back to the design of God for the family and seeing the various roles and how they function. I want to talk about the difficulty of this.

There are so many problems that surround the subject of having your parents live with you. Part of the problem is just simply reclaiming the hearts of our fathers to encourage them to participate in the way that God has structured the world. And the way that God has structured the world is so displeasing to the consciousness of most grandfathers and grandmothers that they have a very difficult time even understanding how this could be good. That's a big problem. You know it's it's hard to teach an old dog new tricks and the older generation is not very excited about moving in with their children.

Almost everyone thinks it's strange or even an abuse you know to have adult children and parents in the same house. It's amazing to me how godly things are thought to be so strange and are actually despised in the world. It's because we've moved so far away from the biblical doctrine of the family and so we have a generation that just can't even relate to this. Now you know the word grandfather doesn't even appear in the Bible But the concept is seen throughout the Bible whenever you see the phrase our fathers, when you see the phrase honor your father, grandfathers are implied in that. And so, you know, in order to try to win the older generation to a more biblical view of the world, we just have to recognize there are so many social pressures.

There are so many things in their conscience that have been arguing against this for so long that it's that's a very very difficult thing for them to do. You know there are There are all kinds of grandparents out there. There are grandparents who are wasting their lives, just completely wasting their lives on golf courses and in motor homes. And it really is a tragic thing. They're divorced from their families, and they're divorced from the church.

This is an enormous tragedy. And we've created communities for this where, you know, once you pass 55 years of age, You can go live in your isolated society where there are no children. Children are banished, they're not welcome, and old people can just go and they die alone. There's so many lonely grandparents who are by themselves because of the cultural pattern. They just kind of suck it up.

They don't realize what it could be like. There are lonely grandparents because of a culture of child prevention. They're lonely because they didn't have any children or they had one or two children and those children are on the other side of the world. And so you know there are all these difficulties that are presented when you bring this subject up. You have, you know, you have an entire generation of grandfathers who either are now or will be subsidized by the state.

That's how they're going to spend their senior years in state subsidy in a state-controlled economy. And in a condition like that, most of them don't understand how completely contrary that is to Scripture, that God has created the family, not the state, to take care of the aging. The departures from biblical Christianity are so enormous when you just say the word grandfather or grandmother. Because loaded in that term are all kinds of sins of our culture and deprivations of our culture and really harmful conditions, particularly for those who are getting older. But God built an infrastructure where the family takes care of the family.

This is the way that God has ordered the world so that there is care. And so when we reject the commands of God for our families, it has consequences far beyond just the moment of the rejection of those commands. It's really important that you as parents teach your children the function of the family according to Scripture so that they know, or else you will have no one to take care of you. You may be one of those lonely grandparents who dies in an institution financed by the state with limited funds and the inability to actually take you to the end of your life because it's just a little bit too expensive to keep you alive because it costs a little bit too much money to sustain you and the insurance companies have their rules you know. And so there's just a flood of difficult issues that come upon us when we consider this whole question of your parents living with you.

You can trace all of it down to a rejection of God, And that's why today the family doesn't even figure into the equation of the care of grandparents. And that's why grandparents have such a difficult time to even conceive of something so strange when actually it's something that God has arranged. So those are some of the difficulties. I want to talk about Some of the reasons that parents are reluctant and I'm just going to talk from experience from talking to my own parents now, I I have parents who have a biblical worldview and but it was even difficult for them to consider to come and live with us and And I'm just going to give you the reasons that they struggled, the things that they struggled with before they came and lived with us. I'm going to list several of them.

Number one, we never want to be a burden. How can we come into your house? We'll be such a burden. Have you ever heard that before? It seems to me anyway when I talk to people, That's right near the top of the list of the objection.

Number two, we don't want to infringe on their privacy. Number three, they need to raise their family without our being there. Number four, we want our privacy. Number five, we want to do our own thing when and where and why we want to do it. Number six, we don't want to give up our independence.

We're still able to take care of ourselves. Number seven, we didn't want to give up our things and our familiar surroundings. Number eight, you have your life and we want to live our own life. Number nine, we have other children what about them? How do you choose?

That's a difficult one. Number 10, how will two women operate in one house? Number 11, how will we lead a useful life under someone else's roof? Number 12, we will have to make all new friends. We don't have a problem making friends, but do we want to start all over again?

Hey, these are really major questions that I'm pretty sure almost every parent has to struggle with when they consider moving in with their children. And you know they're all pretty deep questions. These are the questions that my own parents had to grapple with before they came and lived at our house and they had to reconcile themselves to each one of those. You know my mother says that you know when she came to our house she while it was her choice you know to come and share Deborah's kitchen she did go through a time of sadness having to give up her kitchen and you know all the knickknacks and tools and things like that and she didn't have to give up all the tools you brought him in but I you know there's just a change involved and my mother ruled over her kitchen you know for many many years and now and now there's you know kind of a shared rulership there and and it was it was a difficult here's what my mom said she wrote this to me, one day I sat in the kitchen and bawled and bawled Bill came in and was puzzled so I told him that he was going to be able to take all of his things but I couldn't take my kitchen which was my world.

Let me tell you those tears were for naught because it's wonderful not being in charge of a kitchen. So it was it wasn't so it wasn't so daunting you know in the final analysis when when when everything finally happened. Let's talk about economics. It's very, very expensive to live in these nursing homes. Three to eight thousand dollars a month that's what it costs and you know it's you know you know family Inheritances are spent there.

Is that the best thing to do? Is that really the best thing to do with family wealth? When it yeah, the answer is absolutely not it's not the best thing if you get if it can all be avoided You know the assisted living centers the Alzheimer's units, I mean these are these are very expensive places. They tap into resources when God has actually appointed a family to provide those resources. You know the whole matter of inheritance is really brought into this whole thing.

Children should share the responsibility for taking care of their parents. That's why in Scripture, you know, the law of primogeniture where the firstborn was given a double portion of inheritance. He was given a double portion of inheritance so he could bear the burden of taking care of the parents and the other siblings if they ran into hard times so that there was where there was more responsibility more resources were given but it was just a recognition that inheritance was part of the the resourcing of financial difficulties in the family and also aging parents. And you know we've we've really ignored that whole principle of primogeniture where the Son gets the double inheritance. We don't understand inheritance, we don't even know how to think biblically about it we don't know what understand the purpose of it we have such an individualistic culture that doesn't include other people mine is mine there's really not much sense of hours you know in a family and you know it's it's it's important that we recover, you know, certain principles that sort of lead us into a place where there are resources to take care of a family.

One of the things that I'm just coming to realize in my own family is that I really do not need to have funds for Deborah if in the case of my death. If I died today, I've got three families that will take her and take care of her for the rest of her days. My wife, If I died today penniless, Deborah would be fine. But there's a reason. It's because we have children who understand this principle and they can't wait.

They can't wait for a day like that. Because they're thinking differently. The reason they think differently is because they have learned the doctrine of the family. They understand the function and the purpose of the family so it's just natural for them And so we have to start thinking differently in terms of economy, in terms of responsibility. So I mean we could we could spend a lot of time talking about the economic challenges in a situation like this, but let's just recognize that God has invested in the family an economic function that really was meant to replace this whole state-run system, this whole network of hospitals and care units.

Some of them are necessary, but they're certainly not all necessary, and it's the comprehensive nature of it that's so disturbing, because the natural default for every family is their parents are going into a rest home. That's the default. And when that is the default, you have a culture that's in collapse. You have a culture that's rejected God. You have a culture that has no grasp of the family and the importance of it and how blessed it is.

You know when God created a family He created a lifelong care center for people. A place where where the commitments, the Covenant, the bonds are so strong that that there's always care there. What a blessing that what God has done. So that's economics and the whole matter of inheritance. Let's talk about travail.

When grandparents become immobile, You know, immobility can go on. I've seen it go on for more than a decade, and children have exhausting and almost impossible physical demands upon them, and it's very, very difficult. This is sort of the travail side of it. And I think we've all known people that have had very, very difficult situations. And the stresses on a marriage, the weariness, A children can become weary in it and so they're you know the systems the family are also challenged in times like that.

It sort of locks down the mobility of a family. I know a family that didn't travel for many, many years because of a mother that needed constant care. And it limited their social reach. It limited the experiences that they wanted to bring to their family. It was hard.

It was really, really hard. Sometimes grandparents become mean and nasty and they, you know, dementia and Alzheimer's disease and all kinds of things, they can, it can border on the demonic, you know, And they can be dangerous. They can actually be physically dangerous. So you know most Alzheimer's suffers, you know, enter into very vile, defiling, inappropriate speech in your home. What are you gonna do about that?

I mean there's some real challenges, there's real travail. I don't, I don't, I don't, I really don't have all the answers for that. I think that's something that families just have to somehow grapple with in the custom situation that's been delivered to them. What are the rules and the principles? Well I know what the principles are but I don't know what the rules are because it's very very difficult.

You know there's the whole matter of sanctification. Well in my own experience with my own parents it's been as blissful a situation as anybody could dream of. I have the sweetest parents in the world. They seem to be getting sweeter by the day. You know, I always thought, you know, maybe they would turn a little bit more sour, you know, the older they got.

Not so. Quite the opposite. Well that doesn't happen like that all the time. But often, you know, having parents in your home provokes you to sin because of their sin. And there's a work of sanctification through spiritual warfare that takes place as a result of bringing your parents into your house with you depending on their whole disposition, their spiritual life, or just what's happening to their bodies as their bodies are beginning to fail and various parts of their psyche and their physical being begin to fail and they sometimes change and they're not the same people they were before.

How do you deal with that? I mean the only way you can deal with this is by having an understanding of the gospel of Jesus Christ and to apply the gospel in situations like that. Somehow you have to understand, you know, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. How love covers a multitude of sins. You may wish they would die.

You may be tempted to become bitter, but at the same time, what is it for us but to honor our father and mother, to cast all our cares upon God, and to recognize that He who began the good work will complete it even in a dark day. And I've talked to enough children who've had their parents in their homes to know that there can be really dark days. And I know some of you have experienced some of those things. Let's talk about preparation. My view is that the church is really not prepared for the tidal wave of elderly that will need care.

The state is certainly not prepared for it, but is the church prepared for it? Are the families prepared for it? Let's be really serious for a minute. We must make sure that our families become prepared for this and shepherds need to be coaching, instructing their flocks as to how to deal with this problem because this problem is going to come upon them really soon. And so, you know, how do you learn what is pleasing to the Lord in the taking care of your parents?

You first have to understand the design of God in the family and how the responsibility is structured and how it's spread out. You have to understand that. Children need to grow up understanding that. And you know, my opinion is this, that the church is the only institution in the world that will be able to rescue from these death camps the church is gonna have to be prepared and I don't I don't know what all the answers are but I know this that it's already happening that there is extermination taking place in some of these rest homes do you think it's do you think it's going to taper off I don't believe it's going to taper off I think it's going to accelerate and the church is going to be standing in the midst of this culture of death we launched the culture of death in 1973 in our own time and the churches have going to have to be prepared to deal with this aging population I expect that the church will be protesting I expect the church will be bringing people out of these death camps into their homes I expect that will be happening you Will we be required to do that?

We're rescuing children through adoption, but what about the aging population? There were many in the church that stood by in Nazi Germany while people were being exterminated. Does anybody think that that could happen again in America? I think it is happening again in America right now. And we've gone through several decades of dampening the conscience of the American public so much that they don't care when you put someone to death before their time.

And so preparation. I think the church needs to be prepared for this. We have to build strong families for this, we have to understand life and death, we have to understand what genocide really is, and we have to also be prepared to pay a price in our own families for this. So those are my points, the design, the problems, the reasons parents are reluctant, the economics, the travail, the sanctification, and the preparation. You know, We live in a culture where there's enormous social change in this area, and we should be ready as a church.

So I don't know if anyone has any questions or thoughts. I'm not the expert on this at all. I've just had to grapple with this in very easy circumstances myself. Sure. Scott, when you say we must, the church must help families to prepare.

Fill in a little bit more. What do you mean by helping to be prepared? I mean it begins with doctrine, it begins with understanding how God has structured the world and creating families that are consistent with the way that God has designed families. That's absolutely the first part of it. Families have to understand that they have a role.

They need to understand that the state has usurped the role of the family in this. That there really is a sort of a jurisdictional violation that's taken place. It's taken place on so many levels. This is just one of them. So families have to completely revamp their thinking about what it means to be a family.

That it's a lifelong care center that begins with a baby and ends with a senior citizen who can barely talk. Like that's where it is. I mean here's another thing. You know you who have aging parents, you know, what if your children treated you the way you're treating your aging parents how would that be we need to consider that because our children are probably going to take care of us the same way we took care of our own parents in answer to your question there are a number of a number of things that I would add to what Scott is saying here. Our desire was to have both of our parents with us until the Lord took them.

Years of prayer. And that was not a prayer that the Lord answered in the way that we had hoped. I begged my father for ten years, an entire decade, to live with us and he refused. Now He's not a Christian and that was one of the reasons he didn't want to live with us My father is an alcoholic and he didn't want any breaks put on his life. So that was one thing I even told him I promised him there was a house for sale about two or three acres away from us I told him I if you move into that house I will help you dig a moat around the house and you can keep the drawbridge up and just put it down when you want to see us.

I said, if that's what you want to do, we will help you do that. And I was dead serious. I said, you can put a flag in the front yard and just put it up when you want company and put it down when you don't. We'll stay away, but we'll be right there because he lived in another city. And the Lord took him and we did not have that blessing.

And we had my mother for nine years, and it was an extraordinary experience. And I cannot thank the Lord enough for it. It nearly destroyed my wife's health. When Scott says it's not easy, It is not easy. And it was because it wasn't just...

If I'd had my mother the way we knew my mother before she had dementia, it would have been fun. But that isn't the mother the Lord gave us. He took my mother's mind and many of you were here in some of the years that we had her. And so it is a great, a great blessing but when Scott says it's hard sometimes It is unbelievably hard. Dark days, days when you weep.

This is not easy. It really is a great difficulty. But to prepare for that, and we were just having to learn as we were going because we didn't know anybody else doing it, is you do have to learn some things legally. You've got to find out what legal responsibilities are in your area because there are a lot of laws that apply to the agent. And if you don't know them, you can actually get in a lot of trouble with the local government.

Number two, you need to know some things medically if they have issues. If they're in good shape and they're healthy a lot of times, here take an aspirin, you know, we'll do it. But when you're dealing with someone like we did who has a horrifying, a horrifying nightmare disease that robs their minds in front of you. You have to be prepared to do some things medically. Myra was actually getting to the place where she was being injured regularly trying to take care of her.

And you have to learn some things about how to administer medications or or get help. So these are these really are. There's a lot of things and you can do that. I have been praying about how to start preparing the congregation for the very thing that you're talking about. You also have to know things legally, you have to know things medically.

There was one other thing I was going to say. But you've got to have someone, if you're dealing with someone that can clothe themselves, that's one thing. It was my own mother, so clothing her was a difficult aspect for me. And I could not in any life the Lord has given me, have a better help for my mother than my wife. And the strain on her was enormous.

It would be difficult to express when you're dealing with someone whose mind is dissolving every day and the creativity, the prayers that we put into this, the crying out to the Lord, let her stay with us. It's just the most difficult decision in my life was the day I had to say we literally can't, we can't do this anymore. I would have had to live in the house every day all day because she'd become dangerous. I mean, they're funny moments. I mean, my neighbors would call and, you know, eight o'clock at night and say, Oh, by the way, your mother's screaming for the police again, you know, and You have to learn to laugh at some of those things.

They're not funny when they're happening. But these are the kind of things that can happen. So you can have wonderful experiences with parents that are in good shape. And you can have real nightmares, but even the nightmares are sanctifying. The Lord is with us.

He was with us every single moment. He was teaching us. I mean, we were sometimes every week having to change how we did things, taking all the knobs off of the stove. You know, we would find, my mother, you'd got the place to where she would rub toothpaste in her face because she thought it was her makeup. You know, I mean, you just live with these kind of things.

So I cannot encourage you enough to do it. But you do need to know legally what's going on. And it's good to know what's what's not only not only what's going on for what you're responsible for, because you can end up with D. C. F.

In your in your life taking your parents away. You need to know medically some things. Oh, yeah, if you you mistreat elderly people in our in our nation in our state right now, I mean, you can have D. C. F.

On the door just as fast as if someone turns you in from abusing your Children. So medical and the other thing is, is preparing for inheritances. You know, if you have to understand where your own state handles those kinds of things, so that you can care for them the proper way, if you don't have the personal funds to be able to take care of them when these mounting medical tidal waves come. Just the cost of things like wheelchairs and all of that can be remarkable. So We didn't like having to work with the system that we were in, but in God's mercy, He gave her to us for nine years.

And if we could have come to any other conclusion, then... And I can at least say in answer to our prayers, we did not have to put her in a nursing home. We're one of the few places in the nation that within driving distance has a memory care community and they treat them very differently. They don't just take them and drug them up and dump them in a bed. I mean they really care for them in entirely different ways.

So there are a lot of dynamics in this and no one should have a romantic idea about this but they should have biblical ideas about it and do everything that they possibly can. So Medicine and legal are absolutely crucial when you're making those preparations and financial. That was the other year. You really have to learn some things about economy, about how to handle them if they're no longer able to handle their own money. There are a lot of tricks that you have to deal with with the government when you all of a sudden are handling your parents' money.

So there's a lot to learn and a lot to look forward to, but you really do need to be preparing. You need to be thinking what will you do if they're in good shape? What will you do if there's one or two of them? What will you do if they are healthy or not healthy? These are very serious matters.

And some of us here are already beginning to deal with that. You should be praying for Laura that she's praying about dealing with her father. She lost her mother last year, and now her father is beginning to descend into the abyss of Alzheimer. So those are some of the ways that you can prepare. Scott, I have a mother that's 86 and she lives by herself in a run-down mobile home that's falling on her.

And we've offered to let her stay with us. She refuses, she wants to die in her dilapidated home. How do I continue to honor her? I don't want to say her wishes because I don't want her to die in that place, but how do I honor her in a Christian way with the attitude that she had. Oh boy.

That's why God gives you local church elders, how's that? You want to ask some guy 1500 miles away to answer a question? No. No, that's a really fantastic question. I mean, I am not sure how you do that, you know.

You know, what are your alternatives? You know, there are only about three alternatives here, right, one is you can just let things go. You can take her against her will out of there, but you probably actually can't legally, right? Legally, it's a real barrier. I don't think, I.

You have to look into it. Yeah, there'd have to be, I mean, she would have to be declared incompetent for that to happen do you want to do that to your mother you know I I don't know you know I I mean I I'm serious I I mean I I think being really close to these elders in your church to work through the really thorny questions. I really don't know what you should do. I really don't. This is on you.

How would you, can you say something about how to balance as a husband and father being the spiritual leader in your home if you bring your parents into your home how to honor especially a father either father a father-in-law who may be a believer but has theological differences yet they are in a biblical hierarchy above you and yet you are the spiritual leader of your home and your family how to honor them in that situation right no that's that's that's a really good question that you know brings up the whole matter of jurisdictions and authority. You know, if you bring your father and mother into your house, you know, you don't become the head of your mother. Your father is the head of his wife. And so that, you know, that authority remains. At the same time, you know, you you are the authority over your household.

So the governing of your household, you know, remains intact. And so the head of a household has to govern make the rules of that household and everyone in that household you know is is really required to honor that authority when there are differences you know you just have to work them out, you know, what it depends on what kinds of differences They are what you know what the scope of them the seriousness of those issues It just really depends on what those are you know on the one hand it you know it's it as Jeff Jeff story makes very clear sometimes the gospel divides families and gospel divisions and families are appropriate so and we shouldn't we shouldn't think that a gospel division is some some ungodly thing that's happened to you because we're God promises that that this that that that the gospel will divide families and set a father against his son and all that well Scott couple questions number one from a perspective of a mother and father who are who are well, should should the encouragement be for their Children to remain close even as they marry to stay close in proximity.

That's question one. Another question would be what? What are some thoughts that you may have regarding a mother and a father who are unwilling to move either close or to move in and and you uprooting your family to move close to be with them especially when you see that they do have need of care. Yeah I mean those those are really really complex questions that I don't I don't know how blanket answers, you know, can really fulfill those. You know, you know, I think it would just The answer to that question would probably require the answer to 50 other questions and knowing a lot of the nuances.

You know is it ever appropriate for children to uproot and move near their parents? Sure. Because Is it required? I'm not confident it's required. So you know is it is it ever right for children to move away from their parents?

I think it can be right for children to move away from their parents. Is it is it always the wisest thing? Maybe not in every situation. So I just think there there are lots of nuances and qualifications that that that I mean that's a really important question those are things those are some of the really thorny issues that you have to deal with and they're not easy at all how many other children are there how far away is it I mean there are just all kinds of issues that have to be considered. I just wanted to say that I took care of my mom, or my children and I did, for about 15 years.

And she was bedridden, probably the time she had Alzheimer's. I was a single parent. I was teaching school during this time. And I can say nothing, but it was a wonderful blessing to my children and me. And we had, I can tell you so many stories funny stories things that happened From me getting you know a glass of orange juice poured in my hair because she was upset with me but it was it was nothing but good.

I mean, I look back on it, I want to write a book on it almost because it was fun, it was funny, it was an experience. My kids learned to care for my mother. I'll give you, I try to think of a story. One time I took her to the doctor and she was in a wheelchair and so my sons could lift her into the wheelchair in and out. I couldn't.

She weighed 116 pounds. And so my son put her in the wheelchair and then put her in the car and I took her to the doctor and then when you get to the doctor they'll, you know, take her out of the wheelchair and then put her back in the car. But then when I got home I had no sons. Because they had gone, they didn't realize I was going to get back so soon. And so, I looked at her and I thought, you know, it just can't be that hard to pick her up and put her in the wheelchair.

I went and got the wheelchair out of the car and brought it down to the side of the road. Where I was parked, you couldn't see the wheelchair. And I was parked, So she was on the side next to the house. It was kind of on a hill. And so I brought the wheelchair up real close and I went and I put my arms around her.

And I mean, it's just the second she got off that seat she went right down you know I mean she couldn't walk or anything and I did not have a strength at all so she was sitting on that little like three inch ledge across the bottom of the of the car And I couldn't leave her because she had just fallen out of the car. And so, but I stood up. I sort of braced her and I stood up. And other cars were going up and down the street. And I was like this.

And everybody was waving back at me. And that went on, I know, two, three hours. And I thought, you know, I never knew this community was so friendly. And I could just go story after story with that type of thing and what my kids learned and they learned to be compassionate and to take care and so I just look back on it as a wonderful experience. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. Amen. Lunch time. Okay.

Okay. These are all very thoughtful questions. I appreciate your questions. I appreciate your bailing out, Scott, and giving Stephen and me the blessing of answering hard questions. They are hard.

And brethren, I can tell you, some issues you can give a blanket answer. And sometimes you just have to say, we will pray with you, we will read, we will study, and we'll do everything we can to find a biblical answer for what you're facing. But all of this I trust, if it is done nothing else, is to stir each of you up and awake, you need to realize. We do have responsibilities toward our parents, biblically, and how each of us approaches those and applies them may by God's providence end up looking very differently. But we want to do absolutely everything that we can to honor our parents.

If I could give you one brief example, Pastor Martin gave a remarkable example once of bringing an in-law in to live within their home. And he was a godless man who smoked and they had to they prayed they looked for every opportunity to encourage him they cordoned off one room in the house and said you can smoke outside or in that room. And that's it. But they worked with him. You know, they blessed him.

They honored him. He would swear they would do everything that they could, you know, not to become angry. They would speak to him with grace, always seasoned with salt. They would care for him when he was sick, and in time he was far more open to hearing the gospel truth. And it was a great challenge for them to bring a just an outright unbeliever into their Christian home.

Is that a command of Scripture? Well, no, not in that sense, but This was how they believed they needed to honor this particular in-law. He was a father-in-law. So he would go in and actually, in time, Pastor Martin had to care for him in ways that, of course, no one else in the house could. Brethren, these are really tough things to do, but they are very blessed as our sister has shared.

And for all the challenges that we had with my own beloved mother, I wouldn't trade any of them. I wouldn't trade any of them. I found out my own weaknesses and I found out what prayer, how God would answer prayer in remarkable ways, both for me and for Myra. So these are things that we'll be praying about and in the future we hope to have more discussion about this very thing. I can encourage you to go to Ed Payne.

Ed Payne, he's got three websites. Google Ed Payne, Dr. Ed Payne, and he has done a great deal of writing from a biblical perspective on medical ethics and he has a great deal, he's got a treasure trove of information about doing things for your parents. He's been very helpful to me over the last couple of years as I've had to make difficult decisions for my mother. So let me encourage Dr.

Ed Payne's information to you. That being said, we have lunch waiting for us. Matt King, would you please give thanks for us. Thank the Lord for our food and for the blessed time that we have had.