Train Up a Child in the Way He Should Go

Good morning, Lion cubs present here with your teachers this morning. It is a great blessing to be with you to share some moments around the Word of God with you; and also with each one of you, youth and adults who are in this children’s service (they have allowed you to be here with them too).

So, let’s see what God has in store for the children on this occasion.

The Scripture says in Saint Luke chapter 2, verse… let’s see…

After Jesus was presented in the temple, once He was eight days old, according to the custom… because every firstborn son had to be presented to God when he was eight days old.¹

Let’s read verse 21 and on, of the 2nd chapter of Saint Luke, it says (speaking about Jesus, it says):

“And when eight days were accomplished for the circumcising of the child, his name was called Jesus, which was so named of the angel before he was conceived in the womb.

And when the days of her purification according to the law of Moses were accomplished, they brought him to Jerusalem, to present him to the Lord;

(As it is written in the law of the Lord, Every male that openeth the womb shall be called holy to the Lord,)” (meaning, that every firstborn would be set aside for God).

“And to offer a sacrifice according to that which is said in the law of the Lord, A pair of turtledoves, or two young pigeons.

And, behold, there was a man in Jerusalem, whose name was Simeon; and the same man was just and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel,” (in other words, he was waiting for the Coming of the Messiah), “and the Holy Ghost was upon him.

And it was revealed unto him by the Holy Ghost, that he should not see death, before he had seen the Lord’s Christ.

And he came by the Spirit into the temple: and when the parents brought in the child Jesus, to do for him after the custom of the law,

Then took he,” (meaning, Simeon), “him up in his arms, and blessed God, and said,

Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, according to thy word:

For mine eyes have seen thy salvation,

Which thou hast prepared before the face of all people;

A light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel.

And Joseph and his mother marvelled at those things which were spoken of him,” (that is, at those things which were spoken of Jesus).

“And Simeon blessed them, and said unto Mary his mother, Behold, this child is set for the fall and rising again of many in Israel; and for a sign which shall be spoken against;

(Yea, a sword shall pierce through thy own soul also,) that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed.

And there was one Anna, a prophetess, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Aser: she was of a great age, and had lived with an husband seven years from her virginity;

And she was a widow of about fourscore and four years…”

Notice how age is not a problem; even for those of great age, notice, the Coming of the Lord is a blessing.

It had already been eighty-four years since she became a widow, and she had lived with her husband for seven years: so that is ninety-one years; and when she married her husband, well, she must have been, let’s say, fifteen to eighteen years old; if you add all of that together, she is more than one hundred years old. In other words, there is hope for the elderly, too. And this elderly woman was a prophetess.

“…And she was a widow of about fourscore and four years, which departed not from the temple, but served God with fastings and prayers night and day.

And she coming in that instant gave thanks likewise unto the Lord, and spake of him to all them that looked for redemption in Jerusalem.

And when they had performed all things according to the law of the Lord, they returned into Galilee, to their own city Nazareth.”

In other words, when they had fulfilled everything that was required by the Law for the presentation of the firstborn, the firstborn son, on the eighth day; after fulfilling everything that was required by God in the Law of Moses, Joseph and Mary returned, not to Bethlehem of Judea, but to Nazareth.

Now, notice how here… let’s see… Notice what it says after that:

“And the child grew, and waxed strong in spirit, filled with wisdom: and the grace of God was upon him.”

Now, notice how the child Jesus grew, became strong, and was filled with wisdom: His mother Mary taught Him the Scriptures; and also in the temple, when He went, He heard the teaching of the Word of God there.

For this occasion, our subject is: “TRAIN UP A CHILD IN THE WAY HE SHOULD GO.”

It is the responsibility of every father and mother to train up their children in the Way of God. It is not a matter of having children and leaving them on their own without teaching them the Way of Eternal Life, which is the Way of God; it is a responsibility that every person has before God.

If you have children, you are responsible for giving your children the instruction of God’s Program.

And now, notice how in Proverbs chapter 22, verse 6, it tells us:

“Train up a child in the way he should go,” (in other versions it says: in the path he should go), “and when he is old, he will not depart from it,” (he will not depart from that way).

For everything a person wants to obtain in life, he needs a teaching, a training, and then he obtains what he desires.

If a person wants to be a mechanic, well, he has to receive a teaching related to [automotive] mechanics, which he can obtain in an auto repair shop, starting as an assistant (because he cannot start as a mechanic, but washing parts first), and then he starts obtaining that teaching from the mechanic or mechanics who are there. And as he learns, well, he can start doing other things in the auto repair field.

We also find that for different trades and in different trades, you obtain a teaching; and thus, you obtain knowledge on that subject, on that field.

In the professional field, the person also needs to go study: he has to study after he is done with his schooling, go to a college or university, to obtain the teaching relevant to what that person wants to be as a professional. Unless you obtain that teaching, you can’t obtain the degree; and if you don’t obtain the degree, you aren’t recognized in your country as a professional who has graduated with a college or university degree.

Now, notice how a teaching is required in every field of the human being’s life.

Notice, even housewives received a teaching from their mothers to be able to cook, otherwise, notice, they would always be burning the beans and the rice, but they started receiving that teaching since they were little, and that is how they started obtaining the knowledge of how to do things.

This is so because, the Scripture tells us in the Book of Psalms, chapters… or Psalm 119, notice what it says there… 119. Psalm 119, verse 130, says:

“The entrance of thy words giveth light; it giveth understanding unto the simple.”

Now, notice how the entrance of the Word gives light.

The teaching, the entrance or exposure of everything a person wants to learn, is the same way.

A teaching has to come; and when that teaching comes, it enlightens the understanding, the eyes of the understanding, to be able to understand what is being taught, otherwise, it cannot be learned, that teaching must come to the person somehow.

And that is why, as for the things of God, the Word of God is a lamp: “Your Word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light on and to my path,” God says in Psalm *119, verse *105.

And also, notice how in different passages it speaks to us about teaching, like in Deuteronomy chapter 32. And this is regarding the things of God, which contain the most important teaching that the human being can receive.

It says in Deuteronomy chapter 32 (let’s see which verse), verse 2, it says… Let’s start from verse 1, it says:

“Give ear, O ye heavens, and I will speak; and hear, O earth, the words of my mouth.

My doctrine shall drop as the rain, my speech shall distil as the dew, as the small rain upon the tender herb, and as the showers upon the grass:

Because I will publish the name of the Lord: ascribe ye greatness unto our God.”

Now, notice how the doctrine or teaching of God comes like rain, what for? To enlighten the eyes of the understanding of human beings, and thus, for the person to obtain the knowledge of the Way of God.

And parents must pass on that teaching to their children.

Remember that God told the Hebrew people: “You shall teach your children and your children’s children all that I give you”?² In other words, what God gave the Hebrew people through the Prophet Moses was to be taught to the Hebrew people: to the parents, to the children, to the grandchildren, and to the entire seed of the Hebrew people.

And now, notice how they were responsible for teaching their children (what?) the Way of God; God’s Way, God’s Program for the Dispensation of Law. And that is how it has been from age to age, and from dispensation to dispensation.

The Message comes to the messenger of each age or of each dispensation; and then that Message—being for all the people of God, and for every human being—must be taken, It must reach the soul of every human being: children, youth, adults, and elderly people.

And parents are responsible before God for bringing that Message directly to the soul of their children.

And for our time, we have seen that God has given mothers and fathers helpers: He has given them Bible teachers, [Lion] cub teachers, to help them put that Word of God in the of soul their children; therefore, mothers and fathers should be grateful at this time, where your children have the opportunity to hear the Message pertaining to our age and to our dispensation, at the level that children understand, in other words, in the vocabulary that children understand.

Notice, God also does with adults the same thing that you do with children.

Notice, when children are taught about the Second Coming of Christ, they are shown a picture or a drawing of the sun shining, smiling, very joyful; the joyful sun represents the Second Coming of Christ.

And now, notice, God also teaches us adults using the same symbols, He tells us: “Unto those who fear My Name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in His wings.”³

All that has an explanation because those are the Biblical or prophetic symbols of the Second Coming of Christ.

We are taught that the Son of man comes with a white wig, with eyes as a flame of fire, with feet like fine brass,⁴ but that has a meaning.

And now, notice how children are taught using those figures, those types and figures, using those drawings or pictures, and they are shown that it represents the Coming of Christ as the Sun of Righteousness, and they are taught at that level in which children speak and children understand.

And now, notice how at our time there are children who know what the theologians and Doctor of Divinity still don’t know. Just like in the time of Jesus: there were children back then who knew what the theologians and doctors of divinity and the high priest still didn’t know (and he died, and didn’t come to know it); and yet, simple children knew that Jesus was the King of Israel, and they knew that Jesus was the Messiah, the promised Christ fulfilling His Coming among the Hebrew people.

And they cried, with joy: “Hosanna to the King that comes in the Name of the Lord!” And the Doctor of Divinity said to Christ: “Tell those children to be quiet.”⁵

But who was right? Who was right: the great Doctor of Divinity saying that Jesus was a false prophet, that Beelzebub was operating in Him and that was why those miracles were performed;⁶ or those children saying: “Hosanna to the King that comes in the Name of the Lord! Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is the Kingdom of David that is coming!”? Well, notice, those children were right.

Now, notice that the parents of those children were also believers in our beloved Lord Jesus Christ, and they taught their children what was happening at that time.

And now, notice how in each age and in each dispensation there were children who knew the Divine Program, who were taught in the Divine Program, in the Way of God, for each age and each dispensation, for the age or dispensation in which they lived.

In the time of Moses, notice, who were the ones that entered the Promised Land? The ones who were born in the wilderness, those children who were born, of whom the Hebrew people said, “Our children will be food for the serpents and wild animals.”⁷ And God said, “Those are the ones who will go in, those children.”⁸ And in addition to them, the ones who were twenty years old and under when they came out of Egypt, in other words, young people.

The young people who were twenty years old and under who came out of Egypt, plus the children who were born in the wilderness; those were the ones who went into the promised land, and those were the ones who were under the Divine Teaching pertaining to that new dispensation that had begun.

And now, notice how in their childhood they were living under the teaching of the Message of Moses, the Message of the Dispensation of Law; and they grew and they continued to see the manifestation of God in that dispensation through the Prophet Moses.

And so, notice, when children are trained in the Way of God, later on when they become adults they don’t turn from the Way of God.

Notice how God teaches us the training of the child: “Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old,” (in other words, an adult), “he will not depart from it.”

And now notice how Jesus was taught, was trained, in the Way of God; and He grew and became strong, and was blessed by God; He grew in the grace of the Lord.

Notice how this also happened with John the Baptist, in chapter 1, verse 80, of Saint Luke, it says:

“And the child grew, and waxed strong in spirit, and was in the deserts till the day of his shewing unto Israel.”

The same happened with whom? With John the Baptist.

And it is necessary for our children to grow, to be strengthened in the spirit by the Word of God; because you can’t give literal food to the spirit or to the soul, only the Word of God, “for man shall not live by bread alone but by every Word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.”⁹

And just as adults need the Word of God to feed their souls, so do our children; so that they are strengthened there in the soul, and in the spirit, and well fed with the Word of God, and they grow spiritually as they grow physically too.

Their spiritual nourishment, like their physical nourishment, is a responsibility of the parents; in other words, feeding the body of the children is for the parents to do, and feeding their soul, feeding [them] with the Word of God, is also for the parents to do. It is a responsibility because the parents are the ones who have brought these children here to Earth; therefore, they are physically and also spiritually responsible for feeding their body, their spirit and their soul as well.

And now, notice how just as we have help to feed the body: we have stores where food is sold, we have fields where food is grown, and there are people who plant, and there are stores that sell food… And at home, the mother is the one who cooks, there must be something left for the mother to do; and the father, well, he can’t stand around with his arms crossed, he has to work to buy food, and have the food for the body at home, which the father as well as the mother and children need.

And now, look at all of that and apply it in the spiritual field too, because both the father and the mother need the Food for the soul and the spirit, and so do the children. So, feeding the body, the soul, and the spirit of their children is the parents’ responsibility.

And now, notice how God has also established helpers, people who help, so that our children are well fed; and the adults and young people as well.

And there are ministers who work in the Work of Christ so that the Food pertaining to our time (to feed our souls) reaches the youth and the adults and the elderly, and so that it also reaches the children.

And therefore, just as Christ commanded His disciples to feed that multitude on two occasions,¹⁰ He said to them, “They have no need to go buy food outside, you give them to eat. Let them sit down, let them lie down on the ground, sitting on the ground, by fifties.”

And now, fifty is the Year of Jubilee.

And now, notice, for example, there is a group sitting here listening to the Word of God; and although there are more than fifty people, they are sitting in the Age of the Cornerstone and Dispensation of the Kingdom, which pertains to the fiftieth year, the Year of Jubilee.

So, some are sitting here, others in another city, and others in another city and in another country, by fifties; in other words, they are all sitting in the Year of Jubilee, they are in the Year of Pentecost, receiving the spiritual Food of the Word of God pertaining to this Last Day.

Notice, when thousands of people were fed the first time, and the second time too, the elderly ate there, but the adults also ate there, but the youth also ate there, and who also ate there? The children; men, women, and children, young people, adults, everyone ate there; and there was more left over than when Jesus took those loaves and those fishes.

And now, notice how there will be spiritual Food even for those who will be in the glorious Millennial Kingdom of Christ.

[Habakkuk 2:14] “For the Earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.”

And during the Millennial Kingdom, everyone will know this Message of the Gospel of the Kingdom. Those who have not known It at that time, will know It during the glorious Millennial Kingdom, for they will be living at the Last Day, just as we are also living at the Last Day, meaning, in the seventh millennium.

So, notice how the Message is for children, youth, and also adults.

And everyone must be taught in order to obtain the knowledge of all these things pertaining to the Divine Program of this Last Day, and thus, to know the Way of God pertaining to the Last Day, in other words, to the seventh millennium.

“TRAIN UP A CHILD IN THE WAY HE SHOULD GO.” That is a Divine Mandate for all parents.

And thank God that He has given us teachers who love the children and want to work for the benefit of the children so that the Word of God is in the hearts of the children, and they are prepared to be changed and raptured at this Last Day.

When parents are interested in their children receiving the teaching of the Word of God, well, they are interested in their children being changed and taken to the Marriage Supper of the Lamb, when that great event happens.

In other words, just as adults must be interested in receiving the teaching in order to receive the faith, the revelation to be changed and raptured and go to the Marriage Supper of the Lamb, likewise, they must also be interested in their children receiving that same teaching at the level in which they can understand it; because they are part of you. Children are part of their parents, they are the fruit of the love of the husband and wife.

So, parents, remember our subject: “TRAIN UP A CHILD IN THE WAY HE SHOULD GO;” and especially in his spiritual path, in his path in the Way of God, in the path of God; in the Way that… just as adults and youth are called to walk in It, children are also called to walk in the Way of God.

Train up a child in that Way: in the Way of God, so that his life is a life that is walked or a life that is walking in the Way of God, in the Path of God, for this Last Day.

It has been a great privilege to be with you, children, on this occasion, testifying to you about children’s need to receive the teaching of God for our time; just as there was that same need in the children of other ages and of other dispensations, so that they could know the Divine Program and walk happily in the Way of God, glorifying God.

May God bless you, children, Lion cubs. And may God bless you, teachers, and use you greatly with the children.

And may God bless you, parents, and may He use you greatly; and may you always strive so that your children are taught in the Way of God, and in your homes may you also teach them the Way of God. Don’t leave it all to the children’s teachers: they will do one part, but you do another part in your homes too.

May the blessings of Jesus Christ, the Angel of the Covenant, be upon each one of you, children, and also upon you, youth, and adults, and elderly people; and upon you, teachers, too. And soon may all of you, children, be changed and have the new young body representing eighteen to twenty-one years of age; and may you, youth, also receive that body as Christ has promised; and you, adults; and the elderly too. And me too!

Because just as you need it, I also need it; because I am still in this mortal body, and I need the new body. And Christ has promised the new body for me He has also promised it for each one of you; and we are going to receive it at this Last Day, and in this age: the Age of the Cornerstone.

May God bless you and keep you.

And for the children’s classroom—how many classrooms do you have? How many teachers are there? Two teachers. Well, so that the classroom of the two teachers has… there are men and women who are teachers in different places.

All of you are obedient; and you want to be more obedient to your parents every day, so that your parents always say: “My son or my daughter is good, and very obedient, and helps me a lot in the housework too.”

And so, your parents, Lion cubs, your parents feel really happy when you are very obedient and you like to help your parents with the things they do.

And that way, you start learning how to do the housework too, little girls. And little boys also always help their dads: little boys shine their shoes (that is, they polish them, what do you call it here? They polish their shoes), like this, they help them with this, they brush and wipe their shoes, and so on and so forth. They help them in different ways. Once they are older, they help them clean the car, wash the car, and so on. And well, they start learning and they start having a good friendship and relationship with their parents. And thus, they become useful people, first in the home, and then outside the home.

Well, Lion cubs, may God bless you and keep you. And I will see you in the next service, because I think the youth will also let you be in their service, just like they were in yours. And you adults and youth, may God bless you and keep you.

And we will see each other in the next service, which will be (in how much time?) Within fifteen to twenty minutes or so; just a short break, and I will be back with you again.

May God bless you and keep you all, Lion cubs!

“TRAIN UP A CHILD IN THE WAY HE SHOULD GO.”