ZECHARIAH 10:7

“Ephraim will be like a warrior, and their heart will be joyful as if from wine; indeed, their children will see it and be joyful, their heart will rejoice in the LORD.”

Recently, my wife has been going through old photographs. She found one of my son, when he was 2 ½ or 3, standing on a little wooden box in our house with his little green pocket New Testament. He would mimic me preaching by saying, “Oo, Ah, Oo, Ah, Oo, Ah!” I hope I didn’t sound like that. Lol. He was watching my every move those weeks he accompanied me to the campus chapel at John de la Howe School in South Carolina.

I love how the Lord reminds the people here that their children are watching them. As they rejoice, their children will as well. But notice the last phrase, “their heart will rejoice in the Lord.” They won’t be joyful because of their parents’ joy. Their joy will be in the Lord. Their parents’ faith will be the source of their own faith in the Lord. They are being taught by example.

APPLICATION

There is a phrase that is often used in my ministry with men. “More is caught than taught.” We teach men how to walk with God, succeed in life and multiply spiritually through our Every Man A Warrior material. But the men are watching us put into practice the very skills we are teaching. They want to hear our personal stories about applying these skills.

In our teachings, we talk about being a Level 7 man of the Word. That Level 7 means we memorize, meditate, study, apply, grow convictions about, see success in and finally teach another man concerning a passage of Scripture. We tell life stories of applying the Word. These men catch it as we throw out these examples. I just love when I see a man “catch it.”

As a parent and grandparent, I want my children and grandchildren to catch what I am throwing spiritually. I want them to know me as a man who seeks after God’s own heart, just like King David (without the affair and murder, lol). When I am gone, I pray I will leave a legacy of caught truths about God’s Word with others. What are you throwing out to others?

Father, help me be an example to my family but also others around me. Let them catch spiritual truths from my life.