Early Training in Godliness Lasts a Lifetime and Beyond, Part 1

Early training lasts a lifetime. I was raised in a Puritan family, and I am godly because I was raised in a godly Puritan family. From infancy, I was trained in the Scripture, as Timothy was trained.

In Genesis 3:1–7 we read about the first family:

Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?”

The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, but God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.’ ”

“You will not surely die,” the serpent said to the woman. “For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.

I want to speak on two points: first, the first family of Adam, and, second, early training in godliness lasts a lifetime and beyond.

1. The First Family of Adam

The first point is the first family of Adam. We want to look at twenty-three characteristics of that family.

1. Adam disobeyed God by not ruling the serpent, the devil. In Genesis 1:26, 28 we read that God gave Adam authority to rule: “Then God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.’ . . . God blessed them and said to them, ‘Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground.’”

Adam failed to rule. He was given authority, but he did not use his authority. The husband is given authority, and the wife is given authority. But I found out they did not use it. “Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old, he will not depart from it” (Prov. 22:6). I was trained in godliness, which lasts a lifetime and beyond.

2. Adam disobeyed God by obeying the devil by eating the forbidden fruit. Adam did not pay attention to what God had said in Genesis 2:17: “You must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die.” But the devil said, “You will not surely die.”

The last Adam, Jesus Christ, was tempted, yet he never sinned. When the devil came to him, he said, “It is written,” meaning, “The will of the Father is written in the Scripture and I obey the Scripture” (see Matt. 4). He never sinned.

3. Adam believed the devil, who is “the father of all lies” (John 8:44).
4. Adam did not oppose the devil. Though he was the head of his family and commissioned by God, he did not oppose the devil.
5. Adam did not oppose Eve, who believed the devil, not God. God had said, “The day you eat thereof you will surely die.” The devil said, “You will not surely die.” Adam and Eve believed the devil.
6. Adam did not function as the head of his wife by protecting her from the devil. A husband has the responsibility to protect his entire family from the devil. If you are a husband, you are to exercise the authority which God has given you. First Corinthians 11:3 states that you are the head of the family and your head is Christ.
7. Adam sinned by disobedience. Eve was deceived (1 Tim. 2:14), but Adam disobeyed.
8. Adam believed the devil, not the God of truth. Jesus said, “I am the way and the truth and the life” (John 14:6).
9. Adam ate the fruit given to him by his wife.
10. Adam obeyed his wife and the devil, not God.
11. Feminism was born in the garden of Eden.^[1] Feminism says the wife is the head of the family. Eve is referred to eight times in Genesis 3:1–7, while Adam is only mentioned once. And, notice, in this passage, Adam never spoke. He ate, but he did not speak. We do not see him speaking with authority.
12. Adam and Eve wanted to be like God, or superior to God. It was pride.
13. Adam and Eve became like the devil.
14. Total depravity was born in the garden of Eden. It has an ancient history.
15. Romans 6:16 says that whom you obey is your master. The devil became the master of Adam and Eve, and Adam and Eve became his slaves.
16. God has an order, and the devil has an order. God’s order is that God gives authority to Adam to exercise authority over Eve. The devil has an order also, in which the devil gives authority to Eve, that she may exercise authority over Adam.
17. Adam’s legacy is found in Romans 5:12: “Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all men, because all sinned . . .” Adam’s legacy is sin and death to all his descendants.
18. Passive husbands originated in the garden of Eden. The wife tells her husband, “Take the shoes off your feet! I have told you many times!” And obediently the shoes are taken off and put outside. But in my home, my father was the ruler. What he said we did. When I came to this country, I found that in most homes, the mother is the boss.
19. We see Adam eating, but not speaking or ruling. God wanted Adam to speak and rule. But the only thing we see him doing is eating. Eve picked the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and ate it. Then she picked another fruit and gave it to Adam, and he ate it without protest.
20. Adam was to rule for God. Eve was to assist Adam in the ruling, but that is not what we see in this passage.
21. God’s word proved true. Adam and Eve died spiritually instantly when they ate.
22. Adam and Eve were driven out of Eden, and eventually they also died physically. God is truth. He had told them, “The day you eat thereof, you will surely die.” But the devil said, “God is jealous. He doesn’t want the competition. He knows the day you eat thereof you will be like God.” But they died spiritually and physically. Jesus said, “Thy word is truth.” This is a church which preaches God’s word, which is profitable for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness. That is discipline, which my father exercised in our lives. The devil is a murderer and the father of all lies.
23. Thank God, God had a plan to save some, including Adam and Eve, and to destroy the devil. In Genesis 3:15 the Lord told the serpent (the devil), “And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.” In 1 John 3:8, John writes, “He who does what is sinful is of the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work.”

Jesus came to destroy the devil’s work. The eternal Son became incarnate. He obeyed God always. He took our sin and he died. ‘The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord” (Rom. 6:23).

Thank God, he had a plan of salvation! You have been elect from eternity, before creation, regenerated in time, justified, and are being sanctified to be glorified. You will see him as he is.

2. Early Training in Godliness Lasts a Lifetime and Beyond

Proverbs 22:6 says, “Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it.” That is what happened to me. I am a proof of this. I was brought up on Scripture from infancy, especially wisdom literature, including Proverbs. I had to memorize a psalm each Sunday and recite to the teacher in the Sunday School, and I did.

Parents are responsible for their children’s spirituality. What they see at home, they will practice in their homes. Professor Jay Adams of Westminster taught that it takes six weeks for anything to become a habit. You will do it naturally. For example, if you are overweight, you can be what God wants you to be, if you undergo discipline for six weeks. If you want to get up and pray in the night, and you do it for six weeks, it will become an effortless habit.

The father is the head of the home. The father is to speak to his family in the morning and in the evening. My father spoke and prayed, and we prayed every day, in the morning and the evening. We were to get up at five in the morning, and from five to six, we had morning devotions. And at night, for one hour or more, we had evening devotions, during which time our father taught from the Scriptures.

Early training in godliness lasts a lifetime and beyond. My parents taught us, “Honor your father and your mother, [for the purpose] that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you” (Exod. 20:12). That is not just long life; it is also eternal life. Long life is a symbol of eternal life.

In Deuteronomy 5:16 we read, “Honor your father and your mother, as the Lord your God has commanded you.” Who commanded? The Lord your God—the eternal, sovereign, almighty, infinite God. Do you want to tangle with him? You will lose, and he will win. (PGM) He wins all the time. The verse continues, “so that you may live long and that it may go well with you in the land the Lord your God is giving you.” Here we see two blessings resulting from obedience: eternal life and prosperity. What is prosperity? If you have food and clothing, be content therewith” (1 Tim. 6:8). God has been providing us food and clothing all our days.

Parents, lead your children from an early age to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. This is your most important task, not teaching them about sports or other worldly past times. Children want to be worldly, not godly. I have seen it in my own experience. Children have wanted to be worldly, and they became worldly, not godly.

The first thing we must all do is believe on the Lord Jesus and be saved, and our households (Acts 16:31). That is the most important thing in the world.

Parents are God’s delegated authorities. Children are to respect them, respond to their word, and receive a blessing. That is my story. My parents have died, and are with the Lord, but I am receiving a blessing from the training they gave me—one blessing after another blessing continually.

God blesses our obedience. In Acts 8, we read that Philip was told to go up to the Ethiopian eunuch’s chariot, and Philip ran to obey. Respect, respond, and receive a blessing. Obey immediately, exactly, and joyfully. Do your children do that? I did that, and I stand before you as a blessed person. The Lord is our shepherd and we lack nothing because we are his sheep.

Consider Ephesians 6:1–3. Paul begins, “Children, obey your parents in the Lord.” That means this is the will of the Lord. And if children do not obey their parents, they will be eternally damned, unless God has mercy and saves them. Obey your parents immediately, exactly, and joyfully, “for this is right.” It is righteous. It is God’s will. “‘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 long life [eternal life] on the earth.’” I do not want long life unless it is eternal life, meaning life with God in the new heaven and the new earth wherein dwells righteousness. Happiness to the nth degree is reserved for us.

The first blessing in this verse is eternal life, and the second is prosperity. You will have food and clothing, provided you work six days a week. God hates an idle person. In 2 Thessalonians 3:7 and 11 we read: “For you yourselves know how you ought to follow our example. We were not idle when we were with you. . . . We hear that some among you are idle. They are not busy; they are busybodies.” Idle people hate to work. So if you are young students, I urge you to study hard, pray, get a job, obey your boss, please him or her, and you will be promoted. Employers are always looking for people they can promote.

What about household salvation? Ancient households consisted of parents, grandparents, children, grandchildren, servants, and others.  Joshua said, “But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord” (Josh. 24:15). Earlier, he said, in essence, “You can do whatever you want. You want to worship the old gods? Go ahead.” That is what Solomon did. He was the richest man, but he became a wicked man. But Joshua declared, “We will serve the Lord.”

In Acts 2, Peter declared, “The promise [of salvation through Christ] is for you and your children.” If you love your children, you will raise them in godliness. “The promise is for you and your children, and for all who are far off—for all whom the Lord our God will call” (Acts 2:39). And in Isaiah 44:3 the Lord says, “I will pour water on the thirsty land, and streams on the dry ground; I will pour out my Spirit on your offspring, and my blessing on your descendants.”

May God help us to train our children in godliness, that it may last a lifetime and beyond. Amen.

^[1] For a more in-depth study, see P. G. Mathew, “Adam, Where Are You?” at https://gracevalley.org/sermon/adam-where-are-you/.