The Building Blocks for the Family part 1

Amen. As always, enjoy that worship. It's a very simple but profound song. "Lord, I want to be a Christian in my heart. Lord, I want to be a Christian in my home." I think that's a very fitting prayer with what we're going to study as we're studying God's design for the family. Let's not just look at this as sermons or information. Maybe let's take this to our prayer closet. Let's pray over what we're studying. Maybe through it all our heartbeat would be this prayer in song.

"Lord, I want to be a Christian in my home." We could take what we're studying, apply it, let the Lord change us, and I think that this would glorify Him and also glorify His church. Now take your Bible and turn back to Genesis chapter 1. Just have your Bible open there to Genesis 1. Like I said earlier, we're going to look at chapter 2. We're going to look at a few verses in chapter 5 as well. Don't be intimidated. It's easy for us to go from chapter 1, chapter 2, chapter 5, and we're not going to look at too many verses. Before we get started in the message, I do want to pray over what we're looking at.

Not just this morning, but I want to pray over the series. I said earlier in our scripture reading, we're going to take six to eight weeks and look at this subject of God's design for the family. I just want to commit this to the Lord, and then we'll get started. So let's pray. "Lord, it is good to be here this morning. It's good to be here in worship. It's good to sing songs to you. It's good to praise you through song. Lord, it's great to have the privilege to open up your Word and just share with your people what you've been sharing with me and what I've been studying all throughout the last week or so.

Lord, I just want to commit the next few weeks to you and ask you to help us as we're looking at your design for the family. Lord, I trust that what I share will be what we need to see. Lord, as the pastor that you've appointed and call to be the pastor of this church, I just trust that what comes to the surface throughout my prayer and study will be what we all need to study, what we all need to learn, and also what Lord needs to correct us and mold us. So Lord, we commit these weeks to you and we commit this study to you and we commit this message to you this morning.

And I pray God that when we get through it all in the days and weeks and even years to come we will see you building strong Christian families in the life of this church. And we ask all these things in Christ's name. Amen. Now I think I've been announcing the past few weeks that we are starting this series on the family and I'll be calling this series God's Design for the Family. That'll be easy for you to remember. Now in all that we study for the next few weeks, I don't want us to look at the world's design for the family.

I don't want us to look at man's design for the family and I don't even want us to look at an expert's design for the family, even if it is a Christian expert. Well, if that is the case, where are we going to look? You know there are a lot of people that have a hard time if they don't look at what an expert says. Isn't that right? Well, where are we going to look? If this is God's design for the family and that what the series title is, then we must start with God. Think about it. We must start with God. If this is God's design for the family, we must start with God.

And listen folks, there are only two sources of information in the world concerning the family and what the family should be. God in the world. Either God is the source for all that we would study or the world. And this might not seem necessary, but it is very important for us to see. We must go all the way back and start with God. Otherwise, we run the risk of starting off wrong from the beginning. Well, if we're going to see what God says about the family, well then where do we go? Where do we go for instruction? Where do we go even for correction? Well, I think that's obvious. We must go to God's Word. We must go to the scriptures.

Now, right here, some of you will be tested. I want to call you to a place of being very serious and being very sober. Some of you will be tested and you desperately need to be tested here. This will test some of you to see if you really believe the scriptures and what I mean by that specifically, this will test you to see if you believe in the authority of the scriptures and the sufficiency of the scriptures. The authority of the scriptures, meaning this, you will submit to the authority of what God's Word says. It is authoritative in all matters pertaining to life and death. And then also it is sufficient.

We don't have to have a man's opinion. We just go straight to the scriptures because we find God in the scriptures, so we submit to the authority of God in the scriptures and the scriptures are sufficient to teach us and to correct us in all of these matters. But a question, in this study, if we discover, if we see something that God says about the family, about marriage and your family doesn't add up, my question for you is this, will you change? Will you change?

If you see something in your family, in your marriage that doesn't line up with what the scriptures say, will you see it as sin and will you change and work hard to repent and change? I think I've shared this story with you that just resonated with me as I was studying and preparing this week, especially yesterday. I remember vividly all the stories my granddad used to share about his years, not just growing up, but his adult years. Many of you know that he saved his nickels and dimes. I've shared this story and he bought a piece of property in the 40s.

And when he bought that property, there were five sharecropper families living on that property. It was the end of what we would call the sharecropper era. In those old places, he used to tell me where they lived, who they were, and how they lived, what they did, and many of them moved off as their children moved off and had more opportunities in life. Got education, they came back and got their families, got their parents. But there was one family that stayed. They never had children. I never heard their last name. I just always heard about Hayes and Peggy. Hayes and Peggy.

My granddad used to talk about how poor they were and uneducated and he used to say, "You know, those folks really didn't live. They just existed." But he told the story as they got a little older. Hayes got sick and he put him in his car and he drove him all the way to the hospital in Centerville. And he said that he went to the doctor and the doctor gave Hayes some medicine. He came home and he put the medicine on the mantelpiece and he got in the bed and died. He used to tell that story. He used to talk about how sad that was. But see, for us, the question is this.

If our families and if our marriages do not line up with what we see here in the scriptures, will we submit to the authority of the scriptures and adjust our lives to what God's Word says, to what God says? Or will we just take the medicine and put it on the mantel and die? Because if we ignore what God's Word says, we embrace sin. If we ignore what God's Word says, we embrace sin. We embrace rebellion. And sin and rebellion against God's Word always brings death. It always brings death.

Now, in what we're going to study, there will be many details that we will get into, but I want us to see that everything that we're going to look at really are going to come under two broad and basic things. First, what constitutes the family and then second, how the family should function. All that we will study, all that we will learn will fall under those two broad topics. What constitutes the family and how the family should function in our day and in our time. Now, most of you remember, will remember that this year I did not cover Mother's Day and Father's Day from the pulpit on those particular days.

And although I will not be exhaustive in dealing with the family and marriage and children and mothers and fathers, I will cover Mother's Day, I will cover Father's Day and more. So maybe that will get me out of trouble for not covering those holidays. So, in the series, we're studying God's design for the family and we're going to look at what he says about the family. And to do that, we must go to God's Word because that is where God speaks, that's where God instructs in all matters pertaining to life and we must go all the way back to the beginning. That's why we're in Genesis 1 and 2.

We're going all the way back, all the way back to the very beginning, even in chapter 1. So I want us to take a look at chapter 1 and I'll be a little rough and tumble here. I want us to get the big picture of what is happening in these scriptures and then we're going to read a few that we will use throughout the message. Now, if you look at your copy of chapter 1, you will see the six days of creation, isn't that right? On the seventh day, God rested. We see the first day starting in chapter 3, or excuse me, verse 3. "Then God said, 'Let there be light,' and there was light. And God saw that the light was good." That's day 1.

"Then we see day 2, then God said, and then we see day 3, then God said, and then we see day 4." Verse 14. "Then God said, and then we see day 5, then God said." See, I'm just zooming through each day of creation. "And then we see day 6." Let's read verse 24 on down to verse 28. "Then God said, 'Let the earth bring forth living creatures after their kind, cattle and creeping things and beasts of the air after their kind, and it was so. And God made the beasts of the earth after their kind, and the cattle after their kind, and everything that creeps on the ground after its kind." And what does it say?

"And God saw that it was good." There were many times we see after the creation, God would say, "It was good. It was good. It was good." But notice, there's enough time in day 6 for God to continue in this creative work. "Then God said," verse 26, "let us make man in our image according to our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the sky, and over the cattle, over the earth, over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. And God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him.

Male and female he created them, and God blessed them, and God said to them, 'Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and rule over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the sky, and over every living thing that moves on the earth.'" Now I want us to move over into chapter 2. I will explain to you in just a moment the difference in chapter 2, chapter 1, the creation account of man, verse 7, "Then the Lord God formed man from the dust from the ground, and he breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living being." And then over in verse 18, "The Lord God said, 'It is not good for the man," that's this man, he's created, "It's not good for the man to be alone.

I will make him a helper suitable for him.'" And then we see verse 19, a little shift, "And out of the ground the Lord God had formed every beast of the field, and every bird of the sky, and he brought them to the man to see what he would call them, and whatever the man called a living creature, that was his name. And the man gave names to all of the cattle, and to the birds of the sky, and to every beast of the field." And this is really sad here, but for Adam, there was not found a helper suitable for him. Really in the original language, it says there was not one that corresponded with Adam. So the sad story doesn't last long.

"The Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept, and then he took one of his ribs, and he closed up the flesh at that place, and the Lord God fashioned into a woman the rib which he had taken from the man, and he brought her to the man." And if you do some language study with the rest of the verses, Adam basically says, "Wow, because God had brought him a perfect helper. He was not incomplete anymore." Now notice something here at day six, specifically verse 26. Man is first mentioned, isn't that right?

Or I could say it like this, "Man did not exist until we get to verse 26." So when in starting at verse 26, really we're going all the way back. We're going all the way back to the beginning of mankind, and this is more relevant for marriage than you may know. Now one more thing before we start getting into the verses. Notice verses 26 to 31 are really an abbreviation. I said earlier I was going to share with you the difference in chapter 1 and chapter 2. See, verses 26 to 31, they're really an abbreviation, and then starting here in chapter 2, verse 7, we're starting to see some more details.

You need to understand that we do not have two different accounts of the creation. We have one account told in two different ways. Chapter 1, we have the abbreviated version. You could say it's the Cliff Notes. Remember Cliff Notes? And then in chapter 2, we have the more detailed version. So this morning I want us to focus on verse 29 to 28, or excuse me, verse 26 to 28. Then we're going to focus on verse 7 of chapter 2, and then verses 18 to 22. And this is what I'm calling the building blocks for the family. The building blocks for the family.

And out of all of these verses, I want us to zero in on three important realities that will help us see the building blocks for the family. And I'm sure if you're paying attention, you will see some things that I'm not going to cover because I will not be exhaustive in these verses. So let's get started in our verses. Number one, I want us to see that God created man. This is a very simple and much-needed truth. I want us to see that God created man. Now here I'm having to work off of an assumption. Now if you know much about assumptions, you know that assumptions can be dangerous. Isn't that right?

Sometimes making assumptions about what people believe concerning the origin of man or mankind can be dangerous. I am assuming that you do not believe that life came out of a pool way back millions of years ago and that all living things evolved from that first life form. I am assuming that you do not believe that over millions of years man evolved from this primitive life form to what we have today as modern man. You know I'm a odd individual. I know that. My wife says that I have a strange taste in movies, television. I love documentaries. Growing up I watched every documentary I could get my hands on, especially public television.

And I can't tell you how many times I've watched some show on public television that talked about evolution and the evolution of life and man and so on. And we would see all of these hypotheses and these theories and these charts. You see we know the theory of evolution. Now notice that I'm actually making four basic assumptions here. I'm actually making four basic assumptions here. First that you believe in God. Second that you believe that God created all things. Third that you believe that God created man. And fourth that you believe the account of these events are found in the scriptures and they are trustworthy.

We will revisit these four assumptions a little later towards the end of the message. Now that we have those assumptions out of the way it is important for us to major on one major truth here. The fact that God created man. This one major truth that is fundamental and we must get before we can move on the fact that God created man. And we see this truth in multiple places in Genesis. Look at verse 26. Then God said let us make man in our image according to our likeness. And then verse 27. And God created in his own image in his in the image of God God created him male and female he created him.

And then we see it again in verse 7 of chapter 2. And the Lord God formed man of the dust from the ground. And then this verse we didn't look at I mentioned Genesis 5. Notice what we have here. This is the book of the generations of Adam genealogy family history. And notice in the day when God created man he made him in the likeness of God see even in chapter 5 we see the creation of man. And we also see this vital and fundamental truth taught in other places in scripture all throughout the scriptures I will name just two. And Isaiah 45 12 God says this is God speaking I made the earth and created man on it.

It was my hands that stretched out the heavens and I commanded all of their hosts. We also see this truth from Job. Job 33 verse 4 Job said the Spirit of God has made me and the breath of the Almighty gives me life. Doesn't that echo everything we've seen in Genesis 1 and 2. So in chapter 1 and in other places we see the fact that God has created everything and we see that God created this new species starting in verse 26 and this is man. And man is much different than all of the other animals and we will see. But we must start here. This is vital. This is fundamental. We must start right here the fact that God created man.

In this first man Adam became the father of all humanity all mankind. Don't we see that in Genesis 5 verse 1 and 2. That's the genealogy of Adam the genealogy of mankind. Now an application this is very basic information I know but it needs to be seen and applied to our day and time and this needs to be applied to marriage and family as well because that's what we're aiming at. One word in application. You can write this down. Really this major truth here all centers around one word ownership. Ownership. God created man. God created mankind. And man and mankind is bound to God as the Creator. His Creator.

Man does not have the right to disconnect from God in any way. Man is bound to God and his word because it is God who created him. So man should relate to God as his owner. More specifically man is bound to what God says about marriage family and children according to what God says in his word. We will get to more of these specifics this morning and then also next Sunday really as we continue in the series. But right now we must see that man is bound to what God says about the family. Why? Man is bound to what God says about marriage and husbands and wives and children. Why? Because God created man. He created all mankind and he is what?

The owner. Now a little more specific how does this relate to the building blocks of the family? That's the title of the message. The building blocks of the family. God is the Creator and owner and sustainer of all of his creation. God created man. He sustains man mankind. God created marriage. We'll get into that a little more as we continue in the series. God created man. He created marriage. He gave marriage to man and he sustains it all. God created the family. He gave the family to man. God created children. He gave the family to the man, to the woman, to the marriage and God sustains it all. See?

He is the Creator and owner of it all and man will give an account for all of these things. You see? So at its basic level you must have a marriage and a family that is built on God's ownership. God created it. If you do not you have sin, you have chaos, you have chaos and sin. You see? I was reminded of a personal example when our first born Annie was born. We were in the hospital. She was jaundice. Many of you know what that means and so I was holding her while Christie rested and I was holding her sitting with the window to my back in the hospital room with the sun shining on her little body.

And I'll never forget my pastor at the time, brother bended again. He's passed away. I had forbidden him from driving all the way to Jackson to see us but he gave me a call just to check on us and I remember what he said. He said, "Remember that she is not yours. She's really just loaned to you." What was brother bended saying? What was the point? Ownership. Ownership. And listen, in all of our marriage counseling when we're preparing young couples to get married, listen, we need to tell them that it is not your marriage, it is God's. He created you, he owns you and all that you would have in your life and in your marriage, it belongs to him.

Now I'm getting ahead of myself. We're gonna cover some of this next week and throughout the series but what am I trying to show you? At its basic level, you must have a marriage and a family that is built on God's ownership. Ownership. And as Christians, we have no right to deviate from what God's Word says about marriage and family and children. It should really be the opposite. We as Christians should rush to God's Word, rush to God in the Word to see what he says about these things. Why? Because he owns us. We belong to him. Now number two, our second major truth, I want us to see that God created man unique.

I want us to see that God created man unique. Now I want us to move past that one basic and fundamental truth and look and see just how unique this creation man was. And I want us to do this in two ways by looking at how God created and what God created. This was all much different than the rest of the creation. This Word unique. Honestly, it would do us all some good to go back and read through all of the creation. I zoomed through it earlier. Maybe we'll do this in another series. As a matter of fact, when I was studying, I just couldn't help it. I was calling and talking with Brother Keith about what we were looking at.

And I said, "Brother, I just this makes me want to study and preach through the first few chapters of Genesis, at least the creation." Maybe we'll get there. But I want us to see how God created man and what he created in man. So first, dealing with this unique creation, God's work of creating man was unlike all his other works of creation. We see this in what God said. Right away, we see this in what God said. Now if we look at the few details, at a few details from each day of creation, to see what God said, we could look back at day one, day two, all the way to day five. We see that God created everything in the same way.

And each day the text reads, "Then God said, 'Let there be.'" At each day, and it was so. I'll give you an example. Look back at day three, starting in verse nine. What does it say? "Then God said," and then on down at the end of verse nine, "And it was so." Now I'm cheating because I have a lot of this stuff marked up in my scripture. But if you'll go back into your copy, you'll see that. It says, "Then God said, 'Let there be.'" And day one, down to day five. This is the pattern of every day. But things are much different when we get to day six, when God creates man. We can see the difference if we compare day six to the previous days.

In verse 26, when God begins to create man, we see this familiar, "Then God said." But what follows is much different. Whereas in days one to five, God speaks in this impersonal third person, "Let there be." Here in verse 26, God shifts to the very personal first person, "Let us make." And although the original readers would not have understood the meaning of this pluralistic language here, scholars tell us that this is a clear illusion of the Trinity. Because we have God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit right here in these verses. They are active in the creation.

Now if you want proof of that, if you look at Genesis 1 and 2 of chapter 1, we see God the Father and the Spirit active right there in those verses. And then if we go over into 1st John, or excuse me, the Gospel of John, chapter 1, verses 1 to 3, we have the Son there in creation. So we have what God said, and it was unique. He never speaks like this in all of his other creative works. And we also see this in what God did, in what God did. Again, we're dealing with God's creating man unlike all of the other works of creation. Now to see what God did, we've got to turn over to chapter 2, and we've got to look at what God did.

Now let's do a little comparison before we look at the verse. If we look back at each day of creation from day one to day five, we see that God created everything by what he said. We've seen this. "At each day, then God said, 'Let there be,' and it was so." But things are much different when God gives us more details in chapter 2, verse 7. We see that God did two things. I want us to read the verse before we look at it. "Then the Lord God formed man from the dust from the ground." That word formed his key.

"And he breathed," that word breathed his key, "into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living being." So notice, first he formed. He formed. He formed man from the dust from the ground. Now the picture here is of a master craftsman working the materials at hand with great skill, shaping a great work of art into a thing of beauty. And there's more. We also see, we also see, second, that God breathed. He breathed the breath of life into man. Now the picture here with this word breathed is of a warm, personal, face-to-face work whereby God breathed into man the spiritual and fundamental life of the man.

This life was not formed by God, but breathed by God into the man. And this is the part of a man that actually bears the image of God. So we have what God did and it was unique. He did not form the rest of creation like he did man. He only breathed the breath of life into man making him a living being, a unique living being from all of the other creation. So we've seen God's work of creating man. It was unlike all of the other works of creation. And second, man was created unlike all of the other creatures. As a result of this unique creative work, we see that man was unlike any other part of the creation.

Four times in verses 26 to 27, we see that God made man in his own image and in his own likeness. It's very repetitive. Now what does this mean? Scholars have debated if these words image and likeness mean the same things. There is a little bit of a debate there, but if they're basic meaning, these two words really mean the same thing. But a question, what does it mean for man to be created in the image or the likeness of God? Two things. First, unlike all other animals, man is a spiritual being. He is a free agent, whereas all the other animals are bound by what we would call instinct. Man is not. Man is intelligent. He can reason.

Man is conscious of himself in the world. He can feel emotion. He understands morality, integrity, and holiness. Unlike all of the other animals, man is an eternal being. As a matter of fact, Ecclesiastes 3, 11 speaks of the fact that eternity is in the hearts of a man. And then in chapter 3 verse 21, it talks about the beasts of the field when they die, they just go down. They're not eternal. Simply man can live forever and will live forever, but animals will not. And unlike all the other animals, man can have dominion over the creation. See, man is God-like. He is God-like.

He is a God-like pattern of God created by God for God's purposes and glory. And then second, unlike all the animals, man is the crown of creation. God enabled all of the animals to procreate and he certainly did this for man. But only man was called to take dominion over the creation. Although man is in the creation and a part of the creation, he has the ability to rule over the creation. And the greatest evidence that man is the crown of God's creation is redemption. God's plan of redemption was only for men. It was only for mankind.

So we see that man was created unlike all of the other creation, unlike all of the other creatures, even unlike the angels. Now in application, there is a lot more that we could say here, but what we have seen needs to be applied to our day and our time in this series. We need to see that this applies to marriage and family. And I want us to start off an application with one word. Unique. Unique. One word, unique. Man is unique. Man is different. Man and mankind is one of a kind. You see, man is not like an animal. He is not like an animal. Only man was created as the crown of creation, bearing the very image and likeness of God.

Although God did create the angelic beings, only man was given the privilege of being created in the image and likeness of God for the purposes of God on earth. And only man was and is at the very center of God's glorious plan of redemption for the ultimate glory of Jesus the Son. I've already said that I have a weird taste in television and movies, so I'll just dig that pit a little deeper. This reminds me of one of my favorite old movies, a 1964 film titled "The Train" starring Burt Lancaster. You need to go watch that. I promise it's a good one. It's based off a true story, to be honest with you.

It's based off some events that took place during World War II. Many of you know what took place in World War II. Germany just overran all of Europe, did they not? Well, when they overran all of Europe, the Nazis looted all of the great treasures, all of the great artworks, all of the priceless items in art galleries, national museums. They looted it all. One-of-a-kind treasures, paintings, artwork. Well, in the movie we see that the French Resistance delayed that train from getting all of those priceless objects, all of those pieces of artwork. They delayed getting that train out of France and getting to Germany.

And it's really based off of a true story. Now what was the heart of those events? What was the heart of the story? Those paintings, those works of art were priceless. They were one-of-a-kind. They were worth millions. Really, they were worth more than money, more than gold. They could never be replaced. They were unique in every way. And so it is with man. He is unique in all the creation. He is one-of-a-kind, bearing the image and likeness of God. And more specifically, in marriage and in family, man is not to act like an animal. Man is not to act out in their emotions or what the world says or what another man says.

Man is the image bearer of God created in the very likeness of God. And in marriage, we should see what? God-like people. And there's more that we'll say here in the series. But I do want us to ask the question, how does this apply to the very building blocks of the family? Man is to see himself as the image bearer of God. Man is to see himself as the image bearer of God created to be God-like for God's purposes on earth. And of course, this can only happen if man is redeemed in Christ Jesus. So at its basic level, you must have a marriage.

We must have a marriage in a family that is built on two individuals that see themselves as a unique creation of God, image bearers of God, created to be like God, created to be God-like, created anew in Christ Jesus for all of God's purposes on earth and in the family and in their marriage. And listen folks, as Christians, we do not have a right to deviate from this standard. We are unique. Let's move on. I want us to see our third major truth. I want us to see that God created man, male and female. God created man, male and female. Well here I find myself working off an assumption again.

Here I'm assuming that you believe in two genders, male and female. I know this can be a heated for some because some today believe and teach that gender is fluid. Some believe that there can be any number of genders and I know that this can be dangerous for some because oh so many people have been affected by this and if you bring this up the ramifications can be grave. I did something last night in my study. It was a little dangerous. I did a Google search. Oh be careful with your Google search. Be careful with your Google search.

I googled the number of genders and what came up there in my search, it kind of changed my search, it said number of genders in 2021. The first hit, Women's Health Magazine, how many genders are there? Gender identity list. The next hit, what are the different genders? 64 terms for identifying and expressing gender. The next hit, gender identity guide. 15 gender identity terms defined. A couple of more. How many genders are there in 2021? Then here's another one. This one's from ABC News so you know this should be trusted in that right. Here's a list of 58 gender options. It just keeps getting worse. Now remember my four basic assumptions.

See we don't believe that. Listen to these basic assumptions. First I assume that you believe God in God. Second I assume that you believe that God created all things. Third I assume that you believe that God created man, male and female. And fourth I assume that you believe that God's word is trustworthy in revealing these things to us. Now we have those assumptions out of the way. It's important for us to see one major truth here. The fact that God created man, male and female. Look back at chapter 1 verse 27. And God created man in his own image. In the image of God he created him male and female.

Here we see Adam of the first man and then we see that one becomes two. Isn't that right? Adam the first man, the one he became two because man became Adam and Eve, male and female. What do we see starting in verse 18 back in chapter 2. Then the Lord God said it is not good for the man to be alone. I will make him a helper suitable for him. One that corresponds to him. Verse 21. So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, the first man Adam, and he slept and then he took one of the ribs and he closed up that flesh, that place.

And the Lord God fashioned into a woman the rib which he had taken from the man and he brought her, the woman, to man. That would be Adam. So we see that God created mankind. First he created man and it seems that there is some time that elapsed before he created woman. Think about it. Adam even named the animals and he saw nothing in the creation that corresponded to him. That's why I said it was sad earlier. All of the other animals had mates. They had ones that were suitable to them, they're for them, but not Adam. And then second God created woman. He created Eve for Adam.

So we see that God created all mankind and he created all mankind either male or female. Adam and Eve, male or female. I was reading one Bible commentator Albert Barnes. He called it the two stages of the creation of man. I think that's good. In the first stage God created the first man. In the second stage he created male and female. He differentiated. Man is no longer one but two. Now an application, this is basic information I know, but this needs to be applied to our day and our time. This needs to be applied to marriage and the family. You see? An application starts with one word here, two folks, and that word is gender. Gender. Gender.

There are only two genders. God did not create a third gender or a fourth gender and according to those other news articles who knows how many genders there are. He didn't do that and God did not make gender as fluid. The Scriptures say that God created man male and he created man female period. That's not up for debate. That's not up for discussion. I don't have the time but I was doing a little more reading in some of what I searched and I was reading the Woman's Health magazine article. Some of you are smiling. Sounds dangerous.

But it talked about all of these experts with all of these PhDs that could help you understand gender and gender fluidity and how many genders there are. You know I have one response for that. Garbage. Horse manure. That's manure straight out of hell folks. Some of the quote-unquote smartest people in the world believe all that. People are buying into this. How sad. And what do we see? We must believe that there are two genders. It's not up for debate and it's not up for change. Now how does this apply? How does this relate relate to the building blocks for the family? God created male.

God created man male and female and marriage can only be between male and female. Not only is this basic science, this is basic standard observation from the scriptures folks. And no man, no institution has the right to redefine what God defined and what God created. And listen here. We have denominations debating these things. There are churches debating these things. There are so-called ministers and so-called churches that are trying to debate these things and redefine what it means to be man and male and female. Now I'm gonna be honest with you. I don't care what church it is or what supposed to administer it is.

If they want to debate these things they are straight from hell. So at its basic level you can only have a marriage and a family built on a male and a female. And listen folks even the animals get this right and they live off instinct. And as Christians we should not be swayed by anyone or any institution that says otherwise. Now I go back to the title of the message. Building blocks for the family. The building blocks for the family. Now I want to illustrate a little bit more. I want to help you understand a little bit more what we've looked at. I remember years ago when I worked construction.

When I left full-time ministry years ago and was in bi-vocational ministry I took a job with a contractor and he built million and two million dollar homes. You know he worked for the other half. The way the other half lives. If I can use that phrase. I can remember when we built a home for this one particular individual. Had lots of money and he really had lots of money from the timber industry. He and his family had multiple businesses that all came from the timber industry. And he was in his retirement years and he was building his dream home. You know he wanted the very best. The best of everything I'm telling you.

And look he was there almost every day on the job and he wanted the best at every turn and at every corner. I remember when we had done all the foundation work and all the footings were poured and the slab was poured. So when the slab was poured we were getting ready to frame things up. So when we got to that time there were what's called bunks of lumber that were brought in. Bunks meaning pallets bundled up. And this was stud material. This is a two-story house so the studs the outside walls were two to sixes. So we had bunks of studs and we were cutting studs. We were grading them looking at them to see if they qualified.

We would throw the trash off to the side. We would grade them. Cutting studs, cutting studs, cutting studs. And I never forget the owner came up and he asked what was going on. We explained it. He shut everything down. Called the boss. Boss man showed up. He said I'm not having this. This is spruce lumber. I don't want it. He said load it up and send it back. Remember he was in the timber business. He said pine's paying for this house and pine will build it. He said I want number one pine on this job. I don't know how much it cost.

I remember later on in the project before we laid any bricks they had all of these pallets of bricks recycled Chicago bricks coming on the job. We had to take thousands of bricks and pressure wash them one by one. I watched that man sort through all of those bricks. He laid them all out. He determined what bricks went on the sidewalks. What bricks went on the floors in the house. What bricks were for the chimney. What bricks were for the walls around the driveway and such. Now what was his motivation? What was the point of all that he was doing? He was building his dream home.

He was building his masterpiece and see that's the way it must be with a family folks. That's the way it must be with the family. We must get the building blocks right or we will fail because listen this isn't our masterpiece. This is God's masterpiece. He's the owner. We are uniquely created and marriage is a unique gift for humanity and listen there's only two male and female. This is the very basics the very basic building blocks for what? For the family and you will see that all that we are studying relates to what we're going to study in the next few weeks far more than you know and you need it far more than you know.

Well let's pray let's close out what we've studied and listen I say this all the time when I'm closing out we're gonna commit this to the Lord but let's not just fold up our notes let's not just check the box that we've heard a sermon let's take this to our own prayer closet because what did we sing earlier Lord I want to be a Christian in my home and we're gonna do that with all that we've studied in this series God's design for the family.