Voddie Baucham

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Quotes (520)

voddie-baucham If man is merely the result of a cosmic accident, there is no inherent dignity or value in human life. In fact, it was this type of evolutionary thinking that led to the atrocities of the Nazi regime in Hitler’s Germany. If there are races of people who represent a higher level of evolution than others, then it is incumbent on the more evolved race to dominate and/or exterminate the less evolved. While most secular humanists would abhor such thinking, my question to them would be, on what grounds?

– Voddie Baucham

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Quotes (507)

voddie-baucham If man is merely a glorified single-celled organism run amok, he has no inherent worth, value, or dignity; ultimately man is then merely a cosmic accident, and the human community bestows any value he has upon him. It is not difficult to see how this would lead to a radical view on abortion. Peter Singer, a renowned bioethicist at Princeton University, argues that abortion should be legal prior to “personhood.” What makes this shocking is that Singer’s definition of personhood would carry the abortion question not into the second or third trimester of a pregnancy but into the second year after birth. That’s right, by Singer’s definition my thirteen-month-old son (due to the fact that he cannot communicate or sustain his own life without help) has not yet reached personhood, and to take his life now would be no more problematic than a pre-birth abortion. While this is shocking, I must ask a question: What is the difference between my thirteen-month-old son and a six-month-old fetus? The answer is, location. If it is acceptable to kill a child in the womb, it is also acceptable to do so outside the womb. Peter Singer is not being morbid, he is being consistent.

– Voddie Baucham

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Quotes (498)

voddie-baucham Modern American dating is no more than glorified divorce practice. Young people are learning how to give themselves away in exclusive, romantic, highly committed (at times sexual) relationships, only to break up and do it all over again. God never intended for His kids to live like this. And instead of stepping in and doing something, many Christian parents simply view these types of relationships as a normal and necessary part of growing up. Unless your child is wiser than Solomon, stronger than Samson, and more godly than David (all of whom sinned sexually), they are susceptible to sexual sin, and these premature relationships serve as open invitations. . . . Being involved in such exclusive relationships before you are ready to be married is like shopping without any money; either you will leave frustrated, or you will take something that doesn’t belong to you.

– Voddie Baucham

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Quotes (489)

voddie-baucham Many object to homeschooling or private Christian schools based on the fact that God has called us to be “salt” and “light” and to evangelize the world. Ironically, this is precisely why we chose homeschooling. The Great Commission states: “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey all that I command you” (Matthew 28:19-20, emphasis added). How is this likely apart from Christian education? How can I effectively “make disciples” of my children if I send them off to the government school forty-five to fifty hours per week? The Nehemiah Institute, The National Study of Youth and Religion, and the Barna Report have shown us clearly that our children do not even understand–let alone obey–all that the Lord has commanded. Moreover, how can our children evangelize our government schools if they don’t know what they believe and why they believe it? Not to mention that all of the evidence currently points to the fact that our children are the evangelized, not the evangelists, in our nation’s schools. They are the ones being carried away by every wind of doctrine. . . . The Nehemiah Institute continues to demonstrate year after year that Christian children in government schools who actually retain anything close to a biblical worldview are the rare exception and not the rule. . . . Let me be clear–I applaud men and women whom God has called to teach in government schools. These people are front-line warriors, and they need to be right where they are. However, there is a big difference between sending fully trained disciples into enemy territory and sending recruits [children] to our enemy’s training camp. If we do the latter, we shouldn’t be surprised when they come home wearing the enemy’s uniform and charging the hill of our home waving the enemy flag.

– Voddie Baucham

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Lessons from Coach.

voddie-baucham The following is a heart-wrenching excerpt from Voddie Baucham’s book Family Driven Faith:

Over the years Coach and I have kept in contact. Every once in a while I pick up the phone and catch up with Coach. Recently I discovered that he had fallen on hard times. He had finally retired and didn’t know what to do with himself. What’s worse, his marriage of over twenty-five years had recently ended. At first I wondered what could possibly have gone wrong. Then it dawned on me. We saw a committed coach who arrived early every morning; his wife saw a man who was never home when she got up in the morning. We saw him as committed; she saw him as overextended. We saw him as a confidant who was always there for us; his children saw a man who was more of a father to strangers than he was to them. Now he spends his nights alone missing the woman who spent a quarter of a century missing him. He sits at home reminiscing about the house he was so committed to that he drove an hour to work every day rather than moving. He yearns for time with his kids, but that time is scarce because they are busy doing what he didn’t—spending time with their families. His days are spent with his elderly father, and occasionally he has a chance to watch his grandkids play ballgames, something I’m sure he wishes he had done more with his children. Every once in a while someone from the past calls and asks, “How’s it going, Coach?” A few minutes later the reminiscing is over, the voice from the past is gone, and Coach is alone with his memories. And all he has to show for it are a few trophies, a couple of pictures, and some patches on an old, faded jacket. I cried when I got off the phone that night. . . . All of the pictures came together, and I finally saw the truth that had been there all along. This man who had meant the world to me had sacrificed his family on the alter of his career, and I was oblivious to it. I considered it normal, even admirable. Suddenly, all these years later, I went from admiring Coach to feeling sorry for him. I saw the trade-off, and it wasn’t worth it. The occasional thanks of strangers will never dull the pain of years missed with your family. Needless to say, when I got off the phone with Coach, I spent some time with my kids. It turns out Coach still had lessons to teach.

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Quotes (481)

voddie-baucham When I first became a Christian, I thought all Christians were sold-out, fire-breathing, truth-telling, water-walking followers of the Lord Jesus Christ. I also believed that I could trust anything that was written by a Christian author and published by a Christian publisher. I soon discovered that I was wrong.

– Voddie Baucham

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Sermon of the week: “Child Training” by Voddie Baucham.

voddie-baucham Your sermon of the week is Child Training by Voddie Baucham. Gather the parents and children for this one. It is sure to convict and change your views on raising your children. This is one of the best Baucham sermons I’ve listened to so far and I highly encourage everyone to listen to this one.

For more, I recommend his book Family Driven Faith.

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Quotes (469)

voddie-baucham Most Christians in our culture live like everyone else. There is little distinction between our lives and the lives of the pagans down the street. We wear the same clothes, watch the same movies, read the same books, send our children to the same schools, and sign the same divorce decrees as everyone else. Furthermore, there ought to be a sign posted in every Christian bookstore that reads, “The views expressed in these books do not necessarily express the views of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” I’m not saying, don’t read Christian books. I’m just saying, read them with discernment.

– Voddie Baucham

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Quotes (459)

voddie-baucham One day you visit a church, your teen goes off to the youth service, your little one goes off to children’s church, the baby goes to the nursery, and you and your spouse get a great seat in a plush auditorium with first-class music, professional drama, a relevant, encouraging, application-oriented, non-threatening talk, and you get it all in just under an hour. Moreover, you look at the brochures, and it’s right there in black and white: “Our youth ministry exists to do the job that you’ve neglected all these years.” What a deal! We don’t have to keep the little one quiet, we get our needs met, and to top it off, the youth guy is going to disciple my teenager (whom I don’t even like right now). Who cares if the youth guy has only been married a few months and has never even attempted to discipline a child of his own. “Count me in!” I realize that this is an exaggeration, but the fact is, it wouldn’t matter if the youth pastor were a forty-year-old Ph.D. with five children of his own whom he had raised successfully. That still would not justify the abdication of parental responsibility.

– Voddie Baucham

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Book review: “Family Driven Faith” by Voddie Baucham.

family-driven-faithI just completed the book Family Driven Faith by Voddie Baucham. Don’t let the name fool you; it has absolutely nothing to do with the purpose driven garbage being peddled by the seeker-friendly mega-churches. In fact, I doubt that this book would be well received at such social club churches.

In the book, subtitled Doing What It Takes To Raise Sons And Daughters Who Walk With God, Voddie sounds the call for parents to take back their biblical responsibilities as the primary spiritual mentors and shepherds of their children. He also calls for the church to not only stop interfering and usurping parents’ authority, but to quit dividing and segregating the family: Baby goes in nursery, toddler in Sunday school class, teen in youth group, parents in main sanctuary. If we are to have a multi-generational family, it starts with the family, not the youth pastor.

I highly recommend this book to parents, expecting parents, pastors, youth pastors, Sunday school teachers, church nursery staff, and even teens and children.

You can purchase this book here.

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Quotes (453)

voddie-baucham Many Christians believe the best thing they can do for their family is provide them with more stuff. So we continue to accumulate as though accumulation is the answer. All the while our children are screaming at us from beneath the piles of untouched toys and unworn clothes begging for a few minutes of our time. Time we simply don’t have because we are too busy trying to find that one thing we can add to the pile that will make the screaming stop.

– Voddie Baucham

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Quotes (446)

voddie-baucham I’m not trying to say that it is necessarily wrong for children to play organized sports . . . . [but] being a member of an organized traveling baseball squad at age ten doesn’t add a single day to one’s life. In fact, many of these activities get in the way of much loftier pursuits. People turned boys into men and girls into women for most of recorded history without dragging them around town with their tongues hanging out in an effort to keep up with their overachieving, undereducated, theologically illiterate peers as they try to win trophies that will eventually gather dust in a basement somewhere. If I teach my son to keep his eye on the ball but fail to teach him to keep his eyes on Christ, I have failed as a father.

– Voddie Baucham

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Quotes (437)

voddie-baucham Our children are not falling away [from the Christian faith] because the church is doing a poor job—although that is undoubtedly a factor. Our children are falling away because we are asking the church to do what God designed the family to accomplish. Discipleship and multi-generational faithfulness begins and ends at home. At best, the church is to play a supporting role as it “equips the saints for the work of ministry” (Ephesians 4:12 ESV).

– Voddie Baucham

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Sermon of the week: “Contending for the Faith” by Voddie Baucham.

Your sermon of the week is Contending for the Faith by Voddie Baucham. This is a must-hear sermon and has become one of my all time favorites. Dr. Baucham spells out very succinctly why every Christian has a duty to contend for the faith. He does this in a very powerful and inspiring way. This message could be considered the official sermon of DefCon.

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Sermon of the week: “The Centrality of the Home” by Voddie Baucham.

Your sermon of the week is The Centrality of the Home by Voddie Baucham. This is a must-hear for all church pastors, youth pastors, parents, expecting parents, kids, teens, and you! But be warned, Voddie steps on toes. You can download this message from Sermon Index by right clicking here, or from Go Therefore by right clicking here.

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Should Christians take their children out of the public schools?

Albert Mohler visited the question Should Christians take their children out of the public schools? on this radio broadcast. This podcast also features a brief interview with Voddie Baucham on the issue.