The Value of Family

Enjoy the Life (and the People) God Gave You

• There is a time to work, to build, to pray. But God also says: enjoy life, and enjoy the people He put in your life.
• We get busy building life, paying bills, and working, and we forget to enjoy the people we are building life with.
• On this cruise: laugh together, eat together, talk together, make memories together, enjoy each other.
• One of God's greatest gifts to humanity is family, and we almost miss it.
• Jesus taught us to pray "OUR Father," not "MY Father" (Matthew 6:9). Give us. Forgive us. Lead us. When you pray, you think family.

Grow Together as a Family

• Growth is not an event; it is a lifestyle. The word is continue to grow.
• What is true individually should also be true for us as a family. Keep growing in:
  • Relationships and communication
  • Love for each other (grow into love, not out of it)
  • Faith in God and the wisdom of God
  • Forgiveness: no more grudges; quickly forgiving is doing the Word
  • Understanding of each other

• Jesus grew intellectually (wisdom), physically (stature), spiritually (favor with God), and socially (favor with people). So must we.
• Grow socially this weekend: do not hide in your stateroom. Socialize with people you would never have met before.
• This is a season of pushing boundaries. Remove every piece of "yellow tape" you have stretched around your own life.
• The test: a year from now, you should be able to say, "I am better than I was a year ago."

Grow With Legacy in Mind

• Legacy is what we leave to the next generation.
• Legacy is the idea that what God does in one generation becomes the foundation for the next generation.

• God chose Abraham because He knew Abraham would carry legacy. God was not just thinking about Abraham; He was thinking about what Abraham would transfer.
• God says the same about you: "I know you. I know what you will teach your children, what you will establish in your household, what you will transfer to the next generation."
• Legacy is developed through relationships. Without relationships, legacy can be lost.

• Not everything can be communicated through written words. Some truth requires presence, conversation, and fellowship.
• You cannot transfer everything through lecture. Some things transfer only through doing life together:
  • Family vacations matter. Family dinners matter.
  • Conversations matter. Phone calls matter.
  • Time spent matters. Stories matter.

Leave a Legacy of the Word — and a Real Relationship With God

• Keep the Word of God in front of your family all the time: at home, on the road, at night, in the morning.
• Make God part of your family, and make God part of your family's conversation.
• Do not just preach the Word to your family. Live it in front of them, especially your children.
• Our children and grandchildren should not only know what the church believes. They should know what YOU believe.
  • They should hear your testimonies.
  • They should know the miracles you have seen.
  • They should know what God has brought you through.
  • At each stage of life, they should see you trusting God.
  • You are not favoring any of your children. You are just growing. Each child gets a better version of you.

• What God reveals to one generation is supposed to become an inheritance for the next.
• Apostle Cynthia's testimony: He is the God of the toilet paper. The God of the toothpaste. The God of the fine — charges dropped in court, and a father who said, "All you want to be is Dad, so I'm going to let you be Dad."
• Apostle Tony's mother made Jesus real: she prayed about parking spaces and got the same spot back; front-row parking at a 2,000-person meeting; the elevator door held open. Her legacy: God is relational. He is real.
• Tony's first prayer as a believer: "I want to know the God my mother knows." That passion led him to hear God's voice and bring a broken man downtown to tears with one message: "He still loves you."

• Timothy had the faith of his mother and grandmother. Many of us are living on our grandparents' faith. That is legacy already working.

Legacy Is Both Tangible and Intangible

• Tangible: money, property, businesses, investments, possessions.
• Intangible: faith, character, wisdom, integrity, love, honor, values, knowledge, experience.
• We want our ceiling to become their floor. The next generation should not have to start where we started.
• True legacy builds people. Your greatest investment in life is people.

• Every family needs family values. What are yours? What values are you giving your family, and what values are they living?
• Hebrews 11 (as read): "Their lives were trophies to their faith... We now complete the history of their lives."
  • Somebody before us prayed, and we are living in it.
  • Somebody before us sacrificed, and we are benefiting from it.
  • Somebody before us endured, so we could stand where we stand today.

• Like a relay race: one generation starts, another completes. They passed the baton; nobody crosses the finish line until the last runner crosses.

Some Things Should NOT Be Passed Down

• Everything that runs in a family should not continue to run in the family. Some things we transfer. Other things we stop.
• Recognize the patterns in your family line: broken marriages, financial struggle, addiction, abusive relationships, hurt, fear, lying, mean spirits, negativity, control, bad tempers.
• Maybe you have not personally struggled with it, but you can see the pattern in the line. Or maybe you are struggling now with something you watched repeat in previous generations.
• The good news: Jesus has given us a new beginning. It can stop at your life. Say it: "It stops with me."

• Because of Jesus: fear does not have to continue. Addiction does not have to continue. Bitterness, broken relationships, anger, dysfunction, unforgiveness, abuse — none of it has to continue.
• Family transformation begins with "search ME" — not search my husband, my wife, or my children. Search me, God, and show me what needs to be healed.
• From generational patterns to generational blessings. We leave a legacy of blessing, not cursing, because Christ has set us free.

Key Quotes

Themes

Nuggets

• Pray "Our Father," and you will think family every time you pray.
• Remove the yellow tape: stop treating your own limits like a crime scene you cannot cross.
• Each child gets a better version of you. That is not favoritism. That is growth.
• Parking-space faith: small answered prayers make Jesus real to children.
• The baton only matters if it gets handed off.
• The curse stops here. The blessing starts here.

How This Applies to Us

• Talk about the Word at home. Make God part of the family conversation: last thing at night, first thing in the morning (Deuteronomy 6).
• Tell your testimonies. Our children need to know what WE believe, the miracles we have seen, and what God brought us through. Schedule the stories.
• Invest presence, not just provision. Family dinners, vacations, phone calls, and time spent are the bridge legacy travels on. Protect them on the calendar.
• Name our family values. Write them down. Measure the family by them.
• Run the legacy audit. Answer the two questions honestly: what happens in our absence, and what are we producing?
• Break one pattern, transfer one blessing. Say both out loud: "It stops with me. It continues through me."
• Pray the search-me prayer as a family. Psalm 139:23–24, aimed at me first, not at my spouse or kids.
• Aim ceiling-to-floor. Make decisions that let the next generation start where we finished.