The Main Job
Our text for today is Deuteronomy 6:5-9
Before I read, let me explain what I am going to read. There are two commands. The first is to all folks. The second is to those who hold the most important job on earth. It is not the job of a king or a president. It is not the job of a teacher or a doctor. It is a job of a Godly mom or dad.
The first verse we read is to all of us.
[5] Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.
This is the greatest command. Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. But the greatest job is found in the next four verses. It gives instructions to mothers and fathers.
[6] These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. [7] Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. [8] Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. [9] Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.
So the greatest job is to see that our children know about God. Nothing is more important. Remember these words from Deuteronomy 6.
I will close with reading a poem that reminds us of why. It is called “The Bridge Builder.”
An old man going a lone highway,
Came in the evening, cold and gray,
To a chasm vast, both deep and wide,
Through which was flowing a sullen tide.
The old man crossed in the twilight dim;
The swollen stream was as naught to him;
But he stopped when safe on the farther side,
And built a bridge to span the tide.
“Old man,” said a fellow pilgrim near,
“You are wasting your strength in labor here;
Your journey will end with the closing day,
You never again will pass this way.
You’ve crossed the chasm deep and wide
Why build you this bridge at eventide?”
The laborer lifted his old gray head,
“Good friend, in the path I have come,” he said,
“There followeth after me today
A youth whose feet must pass this way.
This chasm which has been naught to me
To that young man may a pitfall be.
He, too, must cross in the twilight dim.
Good friend, I am building this bridge for him.”
Miss Will Allen Dromgoole
Remember to help build a bridge for your children. Build is so they will have an easier path to God.
Lonnie Davis