Now tonight I want to preach about the subject of loyalty.
Now loyalty is not a word that's used in the Bible, but the Bible does use the word faithfulness
over a hundred times, and if you look up the word loyalty in a dictionary, the dictionary
I used had three definitions for loyalty, and they all included the word faithfulness
in the definition.
You know, I looked up loyal in the dictionary, it said number one, the state or quality of
being loyal, faithfulness to commitments or obligations is loyalty.
Faithful to commitments or obligations.
Number two, it said faithful adherence to a sovereign government leader cause, et cetera.
And number three, an example or instance of faithfulness, adherence, or the like.
But the reason I use the word loyal is that faithfulness has a lot of definitions.
It means a few different things, whereas loyalty is a little bit more of a specific word that
kind of narrows down exactly what we're talking about.
And so I want to preach about the fact that we must be loyal to certain people in our
lives and in a certain order of priority.
Now first of all, it should go without saying, go to Matthew chapter 10, that the number
one loyalty we should have in our lives is our loyalty to Jesus Christ.
If you look up that word faithful in the Bible, and you look at the scriptures that are admonishing
us to be faithful, most of them are telling us to be faithful to the Lord, and to be faithful
to Jesus Christ.
Because obviously that should be our number one loyalty.
Matthew chapter 10 verse 37 reads, he that loveth father or mother more than me is not
worthy of me.
And he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me, and he that taketh
not his cross and followeth after me is not worthy of me.
In this scripture we see that some of our dearest relationships, our parents and our
children, should not be closer to us than our relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ.
We can't love them more than we love Jesus Christ.
Our number one loyalty is to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Go to 1 Samuel chapter 2.
This is one that we looked at last Sunday in a different sermon, in a different context.
First Samuel chapter number 2.
While you're turning there, I'll read for you from Mark 10, 29 where the Bible reads,
And Jesus answered and said, Verily I say unto you, there is no man that hath left
house or brethren or sisters or father or mother or wife or children or lands for my
sake and the gospels, but he shall receive a hundredfold now in this time houses and
brethren and sisters and mothers and children and lands with persecutions and in the world
to come eternal life.
So again, God is telling us that there's a time when you have to choose God over family.
You have to choose God over your friends.
You have to choose God over houses or lands.
You have to choose God over spouse, over parents, over children.
Jesus Christ must hold the number one place in our lives.
In all things, he must have the preeminence and we should never be more loyal to anyone
or anything than we are loyal to the Lord Jesus Christ.
First Samuel 2 29, this is where Eli is being rebuked and it says in verse 29, Wherefore
kick ye at my sacrifice and at mine offering, which I have commanded in my habitation, and
honourest thy sons above me, to make yourselves fat with the cheapest of all the offerings
of Israel my people.
So this is a case of someone putting their children above the Lord and being more loyal
to children than the Lord.
Another example of this that would be a positive example is 1 Kings 15.
Flip over there, 1 Kings chapter 15.
Now should we be loyal to our parents?
Absolutely.
The Bible teaches, for example, in the Ten Commandments, Honor thy father and thy mother,
that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee.
And then Ephesians 6 in the New Testament says, Honor thy father and mother, which is
the first commandment with promise, that it may be well with thee, and that thou mayest
live long on the earth.
Proverbs 23 22 tells us, Hearken unto thy father that begat thee, and despise not thy
mother when she is old.
So should we be loyal to our parents in the sense that we love them, honor them, and when
they get old, take care of them?
Absolutely.
He says, look, don't despise your mother when she's old.
Honor your father and mother.
First Timothy 5 teaches that, I'll read it for you, you don't have to turn there, but
verse 3, Honor widows that are widows indeed, but if any widow have children or nephews,
let them learn first to show piety at home and to requite their parents, for that is
good and acceptable before God.
So what's the Bible saying?
Your mother is a widow and she's old and needs to be taken care of.
It is your job as the child or the nephew to take care of your destitute mother, because
we should not forsake our parents and have no loyalty to them.
No, we should have loyalty to our parents.
The Bible teaches that.
It says in First Timothy 5, 16, if any man or woman that believeth have widows, let them
relieve them and let not the church be charged that it may relieve them that are widows indeed.
So God teaches that we should honor our parents.
And when the Bible used the word honor, it has to do with providing for their needs and
it's talking about financially.
That's what the word honor often means in the Bible.
Just if you study the English word honor and the origins of it, okay, for example, the
old English word, if you go back to old English, like a thousand years ago, the word was Hronraad.
And it meant not only honor in the sense of giving someone respect, but it also meant
that you were actually paying tribute to a king in a financial way, because old English
is spoken by the seafaring people around England and so forth, and so a lot of them were conquered
by the Vikings and so forth, and they had to pay Hronraad, they had to pay honor to
these kings.
Now it makes sense that those two definitions would kind of merge together in the word honor,
because if you're honoring a king, what do you honor him with?
You honor him with gold and gifts and so forth.
So when the Bible says to honor your father and mother, it's often tied in with taking
care of them financially when they're old.
Like for example, the Bible said that Jesus was disputing with the Pharisees in Matthew
15, and he told them, hey, the scripture says, honor thy father and mother, but your tradition
is saying, you know, any man that says Corban, that is to say it is a gift concerning whatsoever
thou mightest be profited by me, and it says you don't suffer him to do aught for his father
and mother, you're making the word of God of no effect when it says honor thy father
and mother.
And the word of God of honor thy father and mother isn't just saying, oh, honor them like,
you know, respect them or treat them well, it does mean that also, but it also contains
the meaning of paying for their needs when they become old and need that if they don't
have any money.
You know, that used to be the retirement plan, by the way.
Before socialist security was instituted in the 1930s, you know, parents were taken care
of by their children when they're old.
Children and grandchildren would chip in and take care of their parents, and that's what
the Bible commands, and I could do a whole sermon where I go over that, but there's a
lot of scripture about honoring your parents, loving your parents, taking care of them when
they're, not despising them when they're old, not forsaking them.
Loyalty to your parents is important, but loyalty to Jesus Christ has to trump loyalty
to parents.
That's your number one loyalty.
Look if you would at this story of a guy who understood that.
First Kings 1511, this is King Asa, and the Bible says, and Asa did that which was right
in the eyes of the Lord, as did David his father.
So we don't have to wonder whether what he did was right here or not.
God comes right out and tells us Asa did what was right, and he's going to explain to us
the right thing that he did.
Verse 12, he took away the Sodomites out of the land.
That's always a good place to start.
Took away the Sodomites out of the land and removed all the idols that his fathers had
made, and also Maacah his mother, even her, look at those two words, even her, he removed
from being queen because she had made an idol in a grove, and Asa destroyed her idol and
burnt it by the brook Cai-dron.
But the high places were not removed.
Nevertheless, Asa's heart was perfect with the Lord all his days.
So the Bible is saying that it was right of King Asa to take his mother out of the position
of being queen because she had made this idol and was teaching false religion, and he even
destroyed her idol and burnt it and destroyed it.
So the Bible is showing us a great example here of a guy who understood, look, we love
our parents, we should honor our father and mother, we should respect them, but there
comes a point where if we have to choose between honoring the Lord and honoring our parents,
our loyalty is to Christ first and foremost.
That has to be our main loyalty.
Now not only does the Bible teach that we should be loyal to Christ, it teaches that
we should be loyal to our parents, it also talks about the fact that we should be loyal
to our friends.
Turn if you would to Proverbs 27, Proverbs 27, and while you're turning there I'll read
you an example from 2 Timothy chapter 1 of a guy who was loyal to his friends.
This is a guy by the name of Onesiphorus, and Onesiphorus was a friend of the apostle
Paul and he was loyal to him.
It says in verse 15, wait for me there in Proverbs, I'll be there in a moment.
This thou knowest that all they which are in Asia be turned away from me.
So these are people that were disloyal to Paul, they were not faithful to him.
In his hour of need they weren't there for him.
So it says all they that are in Asia be turned away from me, of whom are Phygelus and Hermogenes.
The Lord give mercy unto the house of Onesiphorus, for he oft refreshed me and was not ashamed
of my chain.
So what's he saying?
He lost a lot of friends by going to prison.
You know he'd gone to prison and a lot of his friends were ashamed of his chain.
They didn't want to be, it kind of reminds me of another situation, but anyway, friends
and loved ones and family don't want to be associated with him because they're ashamed
of his chain, but Onesiphorus was faithful to him, he was a loyal friend.
And it says he oft refreshed me and was not ashamed of my chain, but when he was in Rome
he sought me out very diligently and found me.
The Lord grant unto him that he may find mercy of the Lord in that day and in how many things
he ministered unto me at Ephesus thou knowest very well.
Look down at your Bible there, Proverbs 27 verse 10, thine own friend and thy father's
friend forsake not, neither go into thy brother's house in the day of thy calamity, for better
is a neighbor that is near than a brother that is far off.
Flip back to chapter 18.
The Bible is saying be loyal to your friends and you're going to be able to rely on them
in times of need, sometimes even more than your own family if you have good friends to
rely on.
So be loyal to them because if you're going to expect loyalty or want to have friends
that are there for you in your time of need, you need to be there for them in their time
of need.
That's why the Bible says in chapter 18 verse 24, a man that hath friends must show himself
friendly and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother.
And so sometimes our friends can even be closer to us than our own family.
It's important to be loyal to them and to be there for them in their time of need.
There are a lot of other scriptures on friendship, but go if you would to Ephesians chapter 5
where we started tonight, Ephesians chapter 5, while you're turning there I'll read for
you from 3 John verse 14, but I trust I shall shortly see thee and we shall speak face to
face, peace be to thee, our friends salute thee, greet the friends by name.
You know, the apostles took great, they held great importance in the friendships that they
had because you'll notice at the end of their epistles, like he says, hey, greet the friends
by name, Paul even went to the great length of listing what seems like every friend he's
ever had at the end of Romans.
You know, Romans chapter 16, he just lists friend after friend after say hi to this person,
just shout out after shout out, friend after friend, and Romans 16, he just goes on and
on, but you know, it shows that he valued his friends.
And often at the beginning of his epistles, he'll say something like, you know what, I've
been praying for you by name, God is my witness that I've been making mention of you and my
prayers night and day.
I mean, that's a pretty bold statement to say I'm praying for you by name every day
because it's in scripture, so it must be true that he was really doing it.
You know, Paul was somebody who loved and took care of his friends and was loyal to
his friends, and therefore he had a good friend that was loyal to him, Onesiphorus.
You know, Luke was a good friend to other people that were loyal friends.
It's important to be loyal to Christ, we should be loyal to our parents, we should be loyal
to our friends, but let me say this, our number one loyalty outside of the Lord Jesus Christ
should be to our spouse.
And this is a conflict that people often come into in their lives, and people often come
to me and ask me.
And I've been asked this many times, where people bring me a situation, a strife in their
family, problems.
And when you're a pastor, you know, people come to you and talk to you about this kind
of stuff because they want to get some kind of advice from the Bible, and so a lot of
people have asked me about situations, and I always tell people the same thing.
And I'm going to show you why I believe that from the Bible, is that your number one loyalty
is to your spouse, outside of Jesus.
Because more important than your relationship with your parents, is your relationship with
your spouse.
Brothers and sisters are not as important as your spouse.
Friends are not as important as your spouse.
That I believe is your number one loyalty outside of the Lord Jesus Christ himself.
Now look what the Bible says, and tell me if I'm wrong.
Look at Ephesians 5 verse 28.
So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies.
He that loveth his wife loveth himself, for no man ever yet hated his own flesh, but nourisheth
and cherisheth it, even as the Lord the church.
For we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones.
For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife,
and they too shall be one flesh.
This is a great mystery, but I speak concerning Christ and the church.
Nevertheless, let every one of you in particular so love his wife, even as himself, and the
wife see that she reverence her husband.
So what do we see in this passage?
We should love our wife as our own body, and we should consider our wife bone of our bone
and flesh of our flesh.
You say, well yeah, but this is family.
No, your wife is your family.
Your husband is your family.
I mean that is bone of your bone and flesh of your flesh.
Who's your closest relative?
Your wife.
Not because you're from Kentucky, okay?
I'm saying, you know, I'm saying, you know, now that you're married, it's your closest
relative, okay?
I'm not saying that you're inbreeding.
I'm saying that, you know, when you marry your spouse, you're supposed to leave father
and mother and cleave unto your wife and be one flesh with her.
That is a great mystery.
That is a great relationship in our lives.
Now, let me show you a scripture that's one that most people have never even read.
Let alone has it ever been preached hardly at all.
But go to Numbers chapter 30.
It's an interesting chapter.
Numbers chapter 30.
I don't remember ever having heard a sermon on this.
Maybe I preached on, I'm pretty sure I preached on this once before in a sermon somewhere,
but I'm not even sure.
It's kind of one of those obscure chapters in an obscure book that people don't really
think about, but there's an important lesson in this chapter.
Because I think Ephesians 5 makes it pretty clear where your loyalty is when it says you
leave your father and mother and you cleave to your wife, okay?
There's a leaving and cleaving.
That's a good way to remember it.
Leave and cleave.
There's a leaving and cleaving that needs to take place in our lives where we leave
our father and mother and cleave unto our wife and that becomes our new family, our
new loyalty right there.
But look at Numbers 30 and let's look at it from the woman's perspective.
The Bible says in verse 1, And Moses spake unto the heads of the tribes concerning the
children of Israel, saying, This is the thing which the Lord hath commanded.
We're going to read the whole chapter.
Listen to this chapter.
If a man vow a vow unto the Lord, or swear an oath to bind his soul with a bond, he shall
not break his word.
He shall do according to all that proceedeth out of his mouth.
That's just a great verse right there in and of itself.
That's if a man vows a vow to the Lord, he must stick with it, he must keep the vow,
he must do the thing that's gone out of his lips.
That's Numbers 30 verse 2.
But for the rest of the chapter he's going to talk about women.
So first he says, okay, here it is for a man, real simple.
You make a vow, you keep it, period.
Okay, now we're going to spend the whole rest of the chapter talking about women making
a vow.
It says in verse 3, if a woman also vow a vow unto the Lord, and bind herself by a bond,
being in her father's house in her youth.
So this is a young lady that's still at home, still living with her parents, and she makes
a vow.
It says in verse 4, and her father hear her vow, and her bond wherewith she hath bound
her soul, and her father shall hold his peace at her, meaning he doesn't say anything, he
hears her make the vow and he doesn't say anything, then all her vows shall stand.
And every bond wherewith she hath bound her soul shall stand.
But if her father disallow her in the day that he heareth, not any of her vows, nor
of her bonds wherewith she hath bound her soul shall stand.
And the Lord shall forgive her because her father disallowed her.
Now let's just explain this real quick.
What this is saying is that if a girl who's living with her parents at home swears to
do something, makes a vow that she's gonna do this or not do this, and her father hears
her make that vow and doesn't say anything about it, then that vow stands.
But if she makes that vow and her dad says, no you're not gonna do that, no that vow is
not legitimate, no I do not approve of you vowing that, then that vow just went out the
window and means nothing.
Why?
Because it's not her job to control her own destiny, her father is an authority figure
in her life.
And she can't just say, well I'm gonna go do this, or I'm not gonna go do this, no,
you're not.
He can shut that down.
Now when it says in the day that he hears of it, that means that if a young lady makes
a vow unto the Lord, and it's not in the presence of her father, and then he hears about it
two weeks later, he can disannul it the first time he hears about it.
When he hears about it, even if it's six months later, oh he hears about it?
That's null and void because I said so.
But if he hears about it six months later, and he holds his peace at that time and the
whole day goes by and the next day, well then that vow stands, because he didn't say anything.
But if he didn't hear about it, you know, it's when he hears about it.
Does everybody understand?
So let's keep reading.
It says in verse six, and if she had it all at husband when she vowed, or uttered not
out of her lips wherewith she bound her soul, and her husband heard it, and held his peace
at her in the day that he heard it, then her vows shall stand, and her bonds wherewith
she bound her soul shall stand, but if her husband disallowed her on the day that he
heard it, again notice it's when he hears about it, then he shall make her vow which
she vowed, and that which she uttered with her lips, wherewith she bound her soul of
none effect, and the Lord shall forgive her.
But every vow of a widow, and of her that is divorced, wherewith they have bound their
soul, shall stand against her.
And if she vowed in her husband's house, or bound her soul by a bond with an oath, and
her husband heard it, and held his peace at her, and disallowed her not, then all her
vows shall stand, and every bond wherewith she bound her soul shall stand.
But if her husband hath utterly made them void on the day that he heard them, then whatsoever
proceedeth out of her lips concerning her vows, or concerning the bond of her soul,
shall not stand.
Her husband hath made them void, and the Lord shall forgive her.
Every vow, and every binding oath to afflict the soul, her husband may establish it, or
her husband may make it void.
But if her husband altogether hold his peace at her from day to day, then he established
with all her vows.
What does he say?
Silence is agreement.
For all of her bonds which are upon her, he confirmeth them, because he held his peace
at her in the day that he heard them.
But if he shall anyways make them void after that he hath heard them, then he shall bear
her iniquity.
So that verse is important too, verse 15, let's stop and understand it.
But if he shall anyways make them void after that he hath heard them, then he shall bear
her iniquity.
What does that mean?
If he later on hears about a vow, and he holds his peace when he hears it, or if he immediately
hears about a vow and just doesn't say anything, and then a few weeks later he's like, you
know what, I changed my mind, that vow's not going to stand.
Then at that point, the vow does not stand.
But he's the one now who's broken the vow, and he gets punished by God.
The curse is on him for breaking a vow.
Now, I don't know about you, but doesn't this chapter seem repetitive?
Now there's always a reason when God is repetitive.
He's not just being repetitive because, you know, he just wants to make the Bible a certain
length and he's just trying to fill space and needed more chapters.
If God repeats something, it means that it's important.
And if God repeats something in a bunch of slightly different ways and saying it a little
differently over and over again, a little different here, a little, it's because he
doesn't want to be misunderstood.
So he's going over it from a bunch of different angles, just making it really clear to make
sure that we understand.
And if it gets a whole chapter, it must be important.
That tells me that it's pretty important to God whether we keep our vows.
If you make a vow, you better keep, there's a whole chapter just demanding that you keep
the vows.
And he says, if you're a father and you have a daughter living at home, or if you're a
husband that has a wife, you have the power to either establish or disanal your wife's
vows in the day that you hear them.
And that's when you're supposed to disanal them if you have a problem with them.
And if you do, it's all forgiven.
You're not in sin, she's not in sin.
The vow is as if it had never happened.
But if he does it later, if he waits a few weeks or months, I change my mind, that's
about, now he's the one who gets punished.
But the wife or daughter is still supposed to obey the father or husband.
And I, well no, I vowed that.
You didn't disanal it in time.
It's like, well no, he's disanoling it, but he bears the sin.
He bears the burden for that.
That's what verse 15 is teaching.
And then it closes things up in verse 16 by saying, these are the statutes which the Lord
commanded Moses between a man and his wife, between the father and his daughter, being
yet in her youth in her father's house.
Now what we see in this passage is three possible phases of life.
We see, first of all, the daughter who is living at home in her father's house in her
youth.
That's one phase.
Who's the authority in that situation?
The father.
Then we see her as a married wife.
Who's the authority in that situation?
Her husband.
Then we see a third possible scenario that's brought out of a woman whose husband has died
or divorced her.
And in that case, the Bible says no one is going to either establish or disanal her vows.
If she makes a vow, it just stands.
Because at that point, you know, she's on her own.
Now the Bible does talk about a girl going back and living in her father's house and
being supported by her parents if her husband dies or divorce her.
But at that point, it's not the same structure of, you know, disanoling or establishing vows.
That's what the Bible says in Numbers chapter 30.
You say, well, why does that matter?
Well, it matters because we should keep our vows.
Of course, one of the biggest vows we make in our life is when we vow to our spouse when
we get married.
I mean, that's a vow that we're taking.
But not only that, and that's why, by the way, that's why we should be married publicly.
To make sure that everybody hears that vow and then you say if anybody has any reason
why these two should not be joined together, you know, speak now or forever hold your peace.
Now I'm not teaching some strange doctrine that, you know, after people get married,
you know, dad can come in later disanoled because here's the thing.
When you get married, it's the husband who's the new authority.
And if he disanoles it, that's called divorcing your wife.
That's wrong.
The Bible says God hateth, listen to me, the Lord God of Israel hateth putting away.
He hates divorce.
That's what Malachi chapter 2 teaches.
So don't get mixed up on that.
But why am I teaching this in this sermon about where our loyalty should lie?
What I'm showing you is that after the woman gets married, her father ceases to become
the authority in her life.
Did everybody see that?
Her father ceases to be the authority in her life.
The husband is now the authority in her life, not the father.
And not only that, but even after the husband's dead, he doesn't have the
same authority that he had before.
That should just make it clear to you that the husband replaces the father as the authority
figure in her life.
I mean, is there any doubt about that?
It's an important teaching.
You say why is that important?
Because of the fact that one of the greatest causes of marital strife in the world today
is meddling in-laws.
If you look at a list of top ten marriage problems, probably even top five marriage
problems, you know what's always going to be on that list?
In-laws.
When you get a list of just, hey, just name the big five, talk to a pastor who deals with
people or talk to just a statistician or just talk to any kind of a family counselor or
maybe a judge that deals in divorces or something or a lawyer that deals with divorces.
Somebody will tell you that is one of the top marriage problems.
Because what are the marriage problems that you're going to hear about?
A big one is money.
That's why it's so important what I preached this morning about covetousness in regard
to marriage.
Because money can be a big issue in a marriage.
Financial problems.
What's another big issue that people have?
Basically in-laws is right up there toward the top.
That's a major marriage.
Another thing that's always maybe a problem in the bedroom.
That's another thing that's high up on the list with people.
What else?
Somebody help me out.
Adultery, obviously, is a big one.
Adultery or whether it's total adultery or just flirting with adultery or whatever, right?
Somebody help me out.
I don't have the list in front of me.
Yeah, drug abuse, alcohol, obviously those are things that can be damaging to a marriage.
But if you look at a list, the in-laws are pretty high on the list for a reason.
Money, in-laws, adultery.
These are the type of things that destroy marriages.
Now why are in-laws such a big issue?
And look, as a pastor, I can just tell you, people come to me with marriage problems all
the time.
And it's not usually people in our church.
Sometimes it is, obviously.
I mean, there are people that have issues.
But because my sermons are online, basically people from all over the country and all over
the world will sometimes contact me with marriage problems or just trying to get advice
and what do I do.
And usually I try to, if I can, because I sympathize with people in their situation,
I try to direct them to a sermon or something that I've preached that could help or try
to direct them to a scripture or something.
But I hear, when you're a pastor, people tell you stuff.
People just come to you and tell you all kinds of stuff.
And so you hear about problem after problem after problem regarding in-laws.
It's a major problem that people have.
And I'm constantly telling people the same advice.
You need to put your spouse before your in-laws and your family.
And you know what?
Fathers of women need to be told that they're not the boss anymore.
And they need to bug off and let the husband rule that home.
That is what the Bible teaches.
And you know what is one of the most wicked things that is a tradition in our Western
culture that you hear about all the time is this kind of a talk that a dad will have with
his daughter where he basically says to her, now listen, honey, you know you can always
come home to us, don't you?
You know what I'm talking about.
You know that if it doesn't work out or if there's problems, you know, you always have
a place here, honey, to come and badmouth your husband and to come talk crap about your
husband.
Just come and see us.
The door's always open.
And you can always move back in with us, honey.
That is wicked and disgusting.
And you know what?
I will never say that to any of my daughters.
You know what I'm going to say to my daughters?
I'm going to say, look, this is your husband.
I'm going to hand you off to him in that wedding and you belong to him now and you are to obey
him and your loyalty is to him, not me.
That is biblical.
That is the truth.
And look, no man can serve two masters.
You can't sit there and have these two competing authorities and parents who don't want to
let go of their kids.
Now look, it's great to love your kids, but there comes a time when you have to cut the
apron strings and when your son needs to leave and cleave and when your daughter needs to
be handed off to the husband.
And you know what?
I just want to tell this to my three little daughters right now that are way too young
to even be thinking about any of this.
I just want to say to my three daughters right now, don't ever come crying to me about your
husband because I'm going to tell you to turn around and go submit yourself to your husband
and go obey him and submit to him and I don't want to hear about it.
That's true.
That's right.
And you know what?
A lot of marriages would be helped.
A lot of marriages would be saved if that were the mentality.
If the wives wouldn't, it's like a cliche of the wife goes crying to mommy and crying
to daddy.
No.
She needs to suck it up and learn how to submit and make that marriage work and obey her husband.
That's what the Bible says.
You say, well, but what's this, submit, obey.
What if he's a jerk?
What if he's this?
Why'd you marry a jerk?
You know what?
My daughters aren't going to marry a jerk because I'm going to kick his backside if
he's a jerk before the wedding.
I'm not going to kick his butt after the wedding because you know what?
It's none of my business after the wedding because she's not mine anymore.
She's his now.
That's what the Bible teaches.
So any butt kicking needs to happen before the wedding.
That's the way it works because you can't sit there.
I mean, look, if some guy wants to be around my daughter that I don't want around my daughter,
he's not going to be around my daughter because I'm going to be stronger than him or I'll
get a bigger stick.
But the bottom line is, you know what?
After the wedding, people need to realize it's over.
You're done.
You had your chance to raise your child and to bring them up in the nurture and admonition
of the Lord and to teach them and to guide them.
And now you are passing that baton off to hopefully a godly man, hopefully a worthy
man, and you're trusting him now with your daughter.
And now it's up to him.
And I'm just telling you that if you have adult children who come to you bad mouthing
their husband, oh, come on over, sweetie, stay at our house for a few days, you need
some space.
No, you need a swift kick in the pants is what you need.
And I'm talking to you, dad.
I'm talking to everybody involved.
Everybody involved needs a kick in the pants.
Okay, because of, well, the women shouldn't even be in pants.
So that proves I was talking about the dad.
So bottom line is that meddling in-laws are destroying marriages today.
It's the truth.
It's fact.
Because they provide that plan B also that we talked about this morning that shouldn't
exist.
It shouldn't be a plan B for man or woman going into it.
They should go into it as do or die, literally, okay?
And when in-laws get involved and they can cause strife and friction, but not only that's
kind of an extreme example, you know, when the wife is going home and crying.
And by the way, there was one woman who did that in the Bible that I can think of.
I can only think of one.
Does anybody remember who it was?
It's a pretty bad story.
It's a really bad story in the Bible.
Does anybody remember?
The woman who went home crying to Solomon?
What's that?
Yeah, that's true.
She did go home to dad too.
That wasn't the one I was thinking of, Zipporah, okay.
I was thinking of that woman in Judges 19 that went home to dad.
You know, that didn't turn out so well, but anyway.
I'm saying that as in-laws, and you know, I know our church is really young, so we don't
really have a lot of people in our church that have adult children.
We do have some, but most of the people in our church are too young to have adult children.
But you know, it's better to learn this now than to learn it when you're already all emotional
about it and you've already made dumb decisions.
It's better to learn this when your child is small and when your child is maybe a teenager
or a little kid, that you're not going to meddle in your children's marriage.
And that you're going to let the husband be the boss in that home.
And you're not going to step in, well he shouldn't be doing that, and he needs to do this, and
you need to tell him this, and blah, blah, blah.
You know, just usurping that authority.
What does the Bible teach in Numbers 30?
Who's the boss after she gets married?
Is dad still the boss?
Is he still disanoling sweetie pie's vows?
No, it's done.
That's her husband's job now to make those decisions, and he doesn't have that right
any longer.
But not only that extreme example of the, you know, the girl going home to mama and
crying to daddy, and oh, will you treat me so bad, and oh, you know, not only that, but
also there are just other situations that are less obvious where there's a bad mouthing
of your spouse going on by your family.
And this could go both male or female.
This could be a husband who gets around his family, and they talk bad about his wife to
him.
And let me tell you something, if my family would ever say anything bad about my wife
to me, I would immediately defend her, and immediately take her side every time.
And I will side with my wife against you, and I will side with my wife against family.
I will not side with my wife against Jesus.
You know, that's the one that has our supreme loyalty, but I would side with my wife against
anybody else.
I'm not going to throw my wife under the bus to make family happy.
And it's the same way it goes for her.
You know, she should not tolerate people bad mouthing me unto her.
And well, your husband, blah, blah, blah, and look, there are a lot of people who bad
mouth me and her.
I'm not saying in our family, I'm saying just in general.
And my wife and I, if we're going to be loyal to each other, we should defend each other
and stand up for each other.
And if you have to choose who you're going to burn, and if you have to choose which relationship
is going to be harmed, you should always harm the relationship other than your spouse.
If you have to say goodbye to a friend, because of the fact that it's coming between you and
your spouse, you need to say goodbye to that friend, if so need be.
If you need to stay away from your family for a while, stay away from relatives for
a while, brothers and sisters, parents, because of a conflict that it's causing between you
and your spouse, you need to preserve your marriage.
I'm telling you, marriages today are an uphill battle in our country, because of the fact
that our culture has destroyed the institution of marriage.
And so it's hard for marriages to work anymore.
That's why you see so much divorce, and even amongst marriages you see a lot of unhappiness
and strife and drama, because it's just hard to have a godly marriage these days.
And so it's important that you do everything you can to make that job of having a good
marriage a little easier, not making it harder.
And when you allow extended family to create, and you say, why are you talking about this?
Because tons of people have issues with this all the time, and I hear about it all the
time.
People who are young married, newly married, need this advice of saying, you know what?
The most important relationship is between you and your spouse.
And if you need some space from somebody, it needs to be from your parents, from your
brothers and sisters, from friends.
I would switch churches in a heartbeat before I switched spouses.
Think about it.
I'm not saying go to a bad church, but I would switch to another independent fundamental
Baptist church.
I'd switch to another church that's a Bible preaching church if it would improve my relationship
with my wife, and if there was a problem somehow with that church.
Because I'm telling you, amongst my human relationships, I believe that my number one
relationship is with my wife.
And I'm going to put her first, amongst human, not before the Lord, but before human relationships
like church friends, or even a church in general.
I'm not saying I would ever get out of church, because that would be coming between me and
the Lord.
I'd never get out of church, but I would even switch churches.
I would even separate from family, separate from friends, before I ever separated from
my spouse, or before I ever allowed that to destroy my marriage.
And so just remember this.
Maybe it's not something you're going through right now.
But just remember, as you go through this long life, married decades, spending all these
years together, that when family is bad-mouthing your spouse, you stick up for your spouse.
And when family is coming between you and your spouse, you stick with your spouse, you
cleave to your spouse, you leave them and you cleave to your spouse.
That's what the Bible says.
And when you have a situation where there's strife and friction, the people that need
to be backed off from are extended family or friendships, not your spouse.
That should be the number one most important relationship in your life.
And on the flip side, don't be that person who tries to come between a husband and his
wife.
That's a wicked place to be.
You know, God hates those who sow discord among brethren.
How much more would God, you know, hate it if someone were to step in and create marital
strife and create a conflict where there was none between husband and wife.
So the sermon's about loyalty.
We should be loyal to the Lord.
We should be loyal to our parents.
We should be loyal to our friends.
We should be loyal and faithful to brothers and sisters and family and people.
But where does our loyalty lie when it comes to a conflict?
Well, it should always be the Lord first and then secondly, stick with your spouse.
And then thirdly, after that is everybody else.
And sometimes all you can do is keep the Lord happy and your spouse happy.
And if you can do those two things, you've done a lot.
And you know, you just call it good, you know.
If you can keep some other people happy, great.
But honestly, those are the two big ones in that order.
And it's epidemic, the marriage problems that are caused by people not minding their own
business and getting involved in other people's issues and not respecting the boundaries of
marriage and respecting that bond as being the supreme bond outside of our relationship
with the Lord.
Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer.
Father, we thank you so much for being faithful to us.
We know that you're always faithful and loyal to us.
You'll never leave us nor forsake us.
Lord, help us to show you the same courtesy.
And also, Lord, the wife or the husband that has been given to us, Lord, help us to be
loyal and faithful and true and to keep that vow and to realize, hey, that's the most important
relationship.
Not friends, not extended family.
We love our parents, we love our children, but it's our spouse that should take number
one place, Lord.
But help us to be loyal to our friends, help us to be loyal to everyone, Lord, as much
as possible.
But help us never to get these priorities out of whack.
Start choosing friends over you, Lord, or choosing family over you or choosing to side
with our parents against our spouse or whatever, Lord.
Help that to never take place.
In Jesus' name we pray, amen.