“...As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord” (Josh. 24:15).
“As for me…” – Joshua began with himself. We cannot too strongly press the truth that for a godly education the first and the most essential requisite is personal consecration. It is good to reflect on our responsibility, to study our duties and the best way of fulfilling them, to speak with our children, and to pray much for them – but all these may be called accessories. The first thing on the part of the parent is a life devoted to God and His service. It is this that creates the spiritual atmosphere the children are to breathe. It is this that gives our performance of duty and our dealings with our children their spiritual influence. It is this that gives our praying and our working its value with God.
“As for me” – there must be no hesitation or half-heartedness in the consciousness or the confession of devotion to God’s service. As often as the prayer for God’s blessing on the children comes up, it must be in the spirit of David: “Thou, Lord God, knowest Thy servant. Therefore now let it please Thee to bless the house of Thy servant” (see First Chronicles 17:18, 27). With God and men, in the home and out of it, as well as in the hearts of parents themselves, it must be a settled thing: “As for me, I will serve the Lord.”
A Prayer
O Lord my God, I thank Thee for what I have seen this day, Thy servant Joshua, the leader of Thy people Israel into Canaan, in his faithfulness to Thee as father in his own home. I humbly ask Thee to give me grace to say as distinctly and as publicly as he did, “As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”
Lord, may mine be a personal religion. O my Father, let Thy love to me, and my love to Thee, be its inspiration and its joy. May my children see that it is with my whole heart I serve Thee, that it has become a delight and my very nature.
And may mine be a family religion, exercising its influence on my home, gaining and training all to walk with me. Lord, remove every inconsistency and all weakness that might hinder any one from being wholly Thine. May mine be a truly consecrated home.
May mine, too, be a practical religion, serving Thee day and night. Let the knowing and the doing of God’s will, the working for His kingdom, the seeking His glory, be the one desire of our hearts.
May thus our home be a blessing to others in encouraging them to take a stand for Thee. Lord God, let Thy Spirit work mightily in the homes of Thy people that everywhere this confession may be heard ringing out: “As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” Amen.
