“God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise…” I Corinthians 1:27

As the world unravels, world leaders turn to ‘sophisticated’ solutions. Anything that is simple, wholesome, and private is the very last option to be considered. Yet our God chose the ‘foolishness’ of the home from which to spring life. Real life.

Not only has the foundation of the home been ignored, it has been assaulted. Both men and women have been pressured to choose making money over making disciples. We now are a country full of huge mortgages and bankrupt relationships. Children have been shipped off to ‘professionals’ who simply cannot train up children, but simply manage them. The family has been apart too long and generations have grown up and grown old without knowing how to grow together.

When God confronted Adam and Eve in the Garden, he held the man responsible for the sin that had been committed. He holds the man responsible today for what has happened in the home. He has given men the opportunity to wake up by sending the Spirit of Elijah to turn our hearts back to our family. Only after the man’s heart turns home, does the home begin to have any hope at all. As the man’s heart turns, the cold lifeless home begins to turn warmer with the Spirit’s power.

 What makes your house a home? Maybe you’ve heard the saying that “Your home is where your heart is.” Our Creator wired us with a heart for home. To be loved by mom and dad. A husband or wife. A family. To experience His love in human form from the time we are born. A love that would give us a natural opportunity to understand the love of our Heavenly Father.

Yet Jesus knew that our homes would be tainted by sin. The safety and security that he desires to surround us with from birth, is dependent on us letting him into our homes. In Mark 9:42 we read, “If anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to be thrown into the sea with a large millstone tied around his neck.” Let’s face it, all of us deserve to be sitting at the bottom of the sea, especially us dads. Instead of discipling our children we have dumped them into schools and Sunday schools and youth groups. The Spirit of Elijah is graciously piercing men’s hearts and turning their homes toward their family.

Children don’t simply need academic training with a few minutes of parental oversight each evening. Our children need our hearts. They need to be discipled. They need what we call “Seven Life Muscles” that are fully developed and ready to climb.

Home should be a base camp, not a pit stop. Children should be producers, not consumers. Yet this requires a Hebrew lifestyle, not a Greek one. A home that is focused on relationship, not simply results. Our children today are taught to make the honor roll, and haven’t a clue what honor is.

The vision that we would like to cast for the home is not sophisticated, but simple. A home becomes a base camp for relational and spiritual climbing when the heart of its leader, the man, turns toward God and the eternal rewards of investing in real relationships. As this love flows from his marriage and into the discipleship of the children, the home is equipped to be a powerful base camp. A base camp that billions of dollars could not build.

Psalm 127 says, “Unless the Lord builds the house, its laborers build in vain.” Let us stop building in vain for our vanity sake and let God build our homes according to his purposes. This will require us throwing off man’s way of building a home and taking seriously what God’s Word says about turning our homes into base camps from which our family can overflow into our church, and then our world.