Disciplines of Godly Womanhood - Part 1 {Video}

Sanctity of Life Sunday

Today is Sanctity of Life Sunday which remembers the legalization of abortion in the United States beginning in 1973.

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" Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

So God created man in his own image,
in the image of God he created him;
male and female he created them."
(Genesis 1:26-27 ESV)

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"For you formed my inward parts;
you knitted me together in my mother's womb.
I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
Wonderful are your works;
my soul knows it very well.
My frame was not hidden from you,
when I was being made in secret,
intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
Your eyes saw my unformed substance;
in your book were written, every one of them,
the days that were formed for me,
when as yet there was none of them."
(Psalm 139:13-16 ESV)

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"Behold, children are a heritage from the LORD,
the fruit of the womb a reward.
Like arrows in the hand of a warrior
are the children of one's youth.
Blessed is the man
who fills his quiver with them!
He shall not be put to shame
when he speaks with his enemies in the gate."
(Psalm 127:3-5 ESV)

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“Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and awesome day of the LORD comes.  And he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the land with a decree of utter destruction.”
(Malachi 4:5-6 ESV)

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"but Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven."
(Matthew 19:14 ESV)

The Pizza Box Family

David is gone on vacation with his family, so we decided to post this sermon preached by him last year for you to read.

Preached at Northwest Christian Church
David P. Kautt
Sunday Morning, May 24, 2009.

Psalm 128:1-6 
Blessed is every one who fears the LORD, Who walks in His ways.
When you eat the labor of your hands, You shall be happy,
And it shall be well with you.  Your wife shall be like a fruitful vine
in the very heart of your house, Your children like olive plants
All around your table.  Behold, thus shall the man be blessed
Who fears the LORD.  The LORD bless you out of Zion,
And may you see the good of Jerusalem All the days of your life.
Yes, may you see your children’s children. 
Peace be upon Israel!

If you were to boil down to one thing so as to describe for me the essence of Satan’s strategy in this day and age, if you were to try to zero in on one way – just one – in which Satan is going about his sinister work at the present time, what would that one thing, that one way be?

My loved ones, as I look at our world, as I intersect with people on a day-to-day basis, and as I consider our lives, it seems to me that Satan’s strategy in this day and age, has one primary focus, one main target:  The family – marriage and the family.

I could easily list for you 6, 8, 10 maybe 12 families and marriages that I know are being assaulted at this present time by the one who wants to see those families disintegrate.  And believe me, it’s not pleasant, nor is it pretty.  You know what I’m talking about, I’m sure.

Family trouble – marital difficulties due to the weakness of our sin-stained selves, due to the allurements of this world, due to an enemy who wants to see our marriages and families dead in the water.  It’s ugly, and very, very painful.  Many of you know exactly what I’m talking about here, don’t you?

And yet, then I remember that the family – marriage and the family is where Satan has been setting his sights literally from the beginning.  You go back to the very first chapters of this Book, and what do you read?  What does the Word of God help us to see? 

That Satan has been seeking to unravel marriages and families, and thereby to undermine the plan of God, literally from the beginning of mankind!  There in Genesis 3, in the garden of Eden through his fiendish temptation, he sought not only to set man and woman against God, but against each other!  He purposed to turn Adam and Eve against each other, and away from the ONLY ONE who could help them the God who made them!

Last week I was assisting a young man with some projects he was trying to accomplish, while at the same time, attempting to help him to understand some important truths from God’s Word about life.  This young man and I were here at the building preparing to do a few things around here, when I noticed something laying in the middle of the intersection across the street.  It was a pizza box, with two half-eaten slices of pizza left in it, laying where someone had tossed it out their car window.  It was a pizza box, some trash to pick up and put in the church dumpster, sure.  But it was more than that.  It was an object lesson – a teachable moment for this young man and me, as we walked across the street to clean it up and dispose of it.

What was the object lesson?  What did my young friend and I learn from that bit of sanitation work?  The pizza box, with most of the slices gone because they were eaten, but with some left over, and slung out the window of a passing car:  Some people live their lives that way, don’t they?  Some people, who have swallowed the devil’s lie that THEY are the important ones, that THEY are GOD and the center of the universe.  Some people treat other people – their spouses, their children, their parents, their live-ins – some people treat other people that way.  “I’ve had my fun.  I’ve gotten out of you what I wanted.  [Wad up and sling out the window.]  Now it’s time for me to move on, to find someone else to use and abuse.”

Satan’s strategy, his scheme to destroy what God intended to be beautiful, and sacred, and a hub for His blessing in our lives, believe me, it’s a frightening thought, as we live in these latter days, it’s a sad, and discouraging thing to see all the ‘pizza box’ marriages and families and relationships laying here and there along life’s road.  But what can we do to defeat that strategy of the enemy in our own lives and in this world?

The ‘pizza box’ family – the ‘pizza box’ marriage or relationship – you know something, my friends?  I’ve yet to meet anyone who wants to have that kind of family or to be treated in that way.  However, I’ve also found it difficult to find very many who really know how to make their marriages and families any different.  Anybody here have any idea why that is?

I’d like to suggest that it all begins right here, in God’s Word.  If you treat the Book of God, and the God of this Book, like some half-eaten slice of pizza and the box it came in, no wonder you don’t know how to make your marriage and family any better!

The Blessed Family – not the Pizza Box Family – but the Blessed Marriage, and Family:  How does your family and my family get to be that kind of family?

The psalmist writes,

“Blessed is the man who fears the LORD
Who walks in His ways.

When you eat the labor of your hands,
You shall be happy,
And it shall be well with you. 
Your wife shall be like a fruitful vine
in the very heart of your house,
Your children like olive plants
All around your table.
Behold, thus shall the man be blessed
Who fears the LORD.

The LORD bless you out of Zion,
And may you see the good of Jerusalem
All the days of your life.
Yes, may you see your children’s children. 

Peace be upon Israel!

This psalm is a beautifully picturesque view of the Blessed Family.  It’s what I want my family and my marriage to be.  And I trust that is your desire as well.  But how does it come to pass?  What do we need to do to reach that goal?

If I may, I’d like to use the time we have left this morning to examine several secrets to family success that God has made plain right here in His Book.  Would you follow along with me, please? 

How does a family – how does a man and his wife cultivate the blessing of God in their lives, in their marriage and family?  Before we answer that from this passage, notice the blessings that God says He has in store for those who do:

    Verse 14  --  rain in its season
    Verse 14  --  a bountiful harvest
    Verse 15  --  well-fed livestock
    Verse 21  --  long lives and strong family heritages.

These blessings and many others, God has in store for His people.  But how do we open ourselves up to them?

Pick up the reading of the text beginning in verse 18 through 21:

Therefore you shall lay up theses words of mine in your heart and in your soul, and bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes.  You shall teach them to your children, speaking of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up.  And you shall write them on the door posts of your house and on your gates, that your days and the days of your children may be multiplied in the land of which the LORD swore to your fathers to give them, like the days of the heavens above the earth.

How do families go about cultivating God’s promises of blessing?  They do so by starting right here with His Word!  The Blessed Family – How do our families get that way?  They get that way by learning God’s Word together.  By treasuring up this exceedingly rich source of wisdom in their hearts.

Mom and Dad, it begins with you!  “Lay up these words of mine in your heart and in your soul,” the Lord declares.  And then He says, “You shall – [that’s the language of commandment.] – You shall teach them to your children.  You shall speak of them”  step-by-step, as you go about the day.

Do you want to be a Blessed Family, not a Pizza Box Family?  Start here, with God’s Word.  Start here.  There are a lot of things, even many worthwhile things, to learn in this world, to find out about as a family.  But listen.  Nothing… NOTHING is as important as learning, and knowing and DOING this.  Nothing!

Please find 1 Corinthians 16:19 with me.  Someone has made this astute observation about families: “The Christian family, not the Pizza Box family, but the Christ-centered family is in actuality the Church in miniature.”  Have you ever looked at your family and your marriage that way?

The so-and-so family – “Hey, we’re the Church in miniature.”  The such-and-such family – “Hey, we’re the Church in miniature.”  You get the point.  But now then, how does that connect with the subject of cultivating the blessing of God for our families?

The Christian family – the Church in miniature.  Take a look at 1 Corinthians 16:19.  And then we’ll learn how it connects.

1 Corinthians 16:19 – “The churches of Asia greet you.  Aquila and Priscilla greet you heartily in the Lord, with the church that is in their house.”

This man, Aquila, and his wife, Priscilla, are dear friends of Paul.  The apostle Paul describes their home, their family, as being the headquarters for their church.

What does all of that mean?

Here’s what it means.  You wanna be the Blessed Family?  Do you want to cultivate God’s goodness in your marriage, and in your family?

Worship God together!  Worship God together.  Beloved, that’s what Joseph and Mary, and their young son, Jesus did.  Talk about a blessed family.  Remember, Luke chapter two?  That occasion when 12-year-old Jesus got separated form His mother, and Joseph?  Where were they?  And why was this family there?  They were in Jerusalem.  And they were there to worship, to go to the house of the Lord to worship together as a family.  You wanna be the Blessed Family?  Worship God together.

Number Three – 1 Timothy 3:4, 5 and 12 is the passage that sets forth for us the qualifications for church leaders.  What does a passage about church leadership have to do with what it takes to have a Blessed Family?  Take a look and you’ll see.

Men who are candidates for, possible prospects to fill the key roles in the Church of  the bishop (also known as the overseer or the elder / shepherd) and the deacon / servant – how are you and I to know whether or not they are suited for the job?

The Bible says we should take a look at their homes.  Examine closely their marriages, and their families.  Godly men – men fit for these important positions of spiritual influence – what are they, to begin with?  Let’s look at 1 Timothy 3:4, 5 & 12.  To begin with, they are men who rule well – men who rule well – their own households.  The idea there is that of loving leadership, not a Hitler dictator, not a Saddam Hussein tyrant, but a “compassionate overseer” who guides, guards and governs his wife and children in a Christ-like manner.

Mom and Dad, you are to be the family watchmen.  You say you want your family to be in on God’s blessings?  Then you – Mom and Dad – you must be the family watchman.  By the way, I say Mom and Dad for a reason.  Proverbs 31:27 – We’ve looked briefly at what God’s Word has to say about the husband and father’s role in all of this.  He must “rule his house well” according to 1 Timothy 3:4, 5 & 12.  But what about his wife – his partner in caring for the children?  Look at what Proverbs 31:27 has to say about the godly woman, the Christlike wife and mother, and what her responsibility is in seeking to cultivate God’s blessings on the home.

Proverbs 31:27 – “She watches over the ways of her household, and does not eat the bread of idleness.”

What is the godly woman’s role?  It’s the same as that of her husband.  Like her husband, she is to “watch over, watch out for, the ways of her household.”

What can you and I do to cultivate the blessing of God on our marriages and on our families?  Believe me, there is nothing more sad, more painful - yes, even more ugly – than a “pizza box” family.  With God’s help, I’m going to work to make certain my family isn’t one of them.  How about you?

One of God's Best Gifts

Preached at Northwest Christian Church

David P. Kautt

Sunday Morning, May 9, 2010

A billboard out on Central Expressway, what would it look like? What it says? What it doesn’t say? I’d like to put on one of those big billboard this message: “Godly mothers are one of God’s best gifts.”

Now think about it with me, will you my friends? What the message didn’t say was: MOTHERS are one of God’s best gifts – though I believe mothers are very important in God’s grand scheme of things. But that’s just it, isn’t it?! Any woman – any young woman of sufficient physical health and maturity can bring a child into this world, right? And, sad to say, we have many of those kinds of mothers these days, don’t we?

But, listen. What we don’t have a lot of these days are GODLY mothers. And in my estimation, this is one of the key ingredients that’s missing from our society and so many homes and families in our day and time. GODLY mothers.

Now, let’s think this through for a minute, shall we? “GODLY mothers.” What does that word ‘godly’ mean? It means “God-like.” In other words, when boys and girls look at their mothers, more than seeing her, as undoubtedly she is – as their maid, their chef, their chauffeur and their doctor – they ought to see what GOD is like. Now, don’t misunderstand me, for a mother some of the most important daily venues in which she is to reflect God’s nature and character are those very venues! As she cleans their home – and, by the way, as she guides here children to learn how to make their home neat and clean – by her attention to detail, by her cheerful spirit, by her attitude of “I’m doing this to glorify God and bless my family,” she serves as an extremely powerful model to her little ones (and big ones, too!). In all of that, she’s a model of what it means to be a Christian! What it mean to be godly.

You see, the godly mother, she shows her children what GOD is like. Yes, as she pushes that broom and tugs on that vacuum cleaner; as she kisses their ‘owies,’ as she tenderly applies ointment and band aids to skinned knees; as she tirelessly rocks her little ones through the pains of ear infections and stomach flu – what does she do? She shows her children what it means when God says, “I am merciful and compassionate to my children!” God uses you, as a mother, in those uniquely, God-given responsibilities of motherhood (and, not in something else, not in some other way.) Mom, in your tasks of cooking and cleaning and nursing and mending, God uses YOU to impact your children, those precious ‘arrows’ HE has placed in your quiver. God uses you to touch their lives for His sake and for eternity!

What am I trying to say? Two things, really. Godly mothers, Christ-like mothers. Number one – we need more of them, not less of them! You know, as important as other influencers may be to our children’s growth and development, no one – NO ONE can replace a mother’s supremely important role, as one of the two most vital people in children’s lives! So what am I saying? Mom, you are important! And your exemplifying Christ in your work as maid, chef, chauffeur and physician to your children is important! Don’t let the world tell you otherwise!

Godly mothers. We need more of them, not less of them!

And the second thing I’m trying to say is this: “Mom – ‘a godly mother’, ‘a Christ-like mama’ – does that description fit you? Is that what you are?!”

Let me point you in the direction of some ways to evaluate yourself, and along with that, some help for those of you who want to become a godly mother.

First things first: This Book, the Bible, the Word f God, this unlimited resource of divine wisdom and guidance about every area of life, including motherhood – this Book is our starting and ending point! Advice columns, library ‘top-shelvers,’ check-out stand periodicals, even ‘family’ wisdom handed down from one generation to the next – none of these can compare to or should ever take the place of THIS Book! This is our Source, your Source, Mama! And God’s sufficiency supplied to you, so that you can carry out that role!

Now, having said all of that, Mothers, how can you know if you’re a godly mother? What characteristics of Christ-likeness should be especially evident in your lift in that unique role you play?

Allow me to suggest the following areas for you to investigate further, as you seek to become all God wants you to be. First of all, I invite you to think about your voice. Mothers, when God wants your children to hear words of love, when He’s looking for someone to say to your children, “I’m glad God made you!” does He use your voice? When your little ones’ Heavenly Father is searching for someone whose voice – both in terms of WHAT that person say, and HOW he or she says it – when God is looking for someone to say to your son or daughter, “I love you!” doe He use your voice? Ladies, He wants to. His desire is to use your voice in that way!

Think about it with me, will you? Please find Proverbs 31:26. This is Solomon’s magnificent description of the excellent wife, the wife and mother whose godly character surpasses all others.

Proverbs 31:26: “She opens her mouth with wisdom, and on her tongue is the law of kindness.”

What does Solomon say in answer to these questions?

Listen, sisters. He says, “When God is looking for someone to speak words of love and tenderness and truth to your children, He wants to use you! He wants to use your voice!” And how will that come to pass? It will come to pass when you have the law of kindness on your tongue, and God’s eternal wisdom flowing from your mouth.

Now find Proverbs 10:21. What does Solomon say about the lips of the righteous, about your lips, my dear sisters, if godliness is what your life is all about? Proverbs 10:21: “The lips of the righteous feed many.” Think of it! Your lips can actually serve as God’s instruments to nourish your children, if your goal is to be a GODLY mother! Jot down these other verses to look up along these lines: Ephesians 4:15 and Ephesians 4:29. “but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head – Christ.” and “Let not corrupt word proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification, that it may impart grace to the hearers.”

So mothers, you are important, supremely important to your children, and to their becoming all God intends for them to be. But listen, more than chefs and maid and chauffeurs, what your children need and what God wants you to be for these He has made in such a fearful and wonderful way is for you to be godly! And you begin that right here with your mouth, with your lips, with your voice – in the things you say and how you say them, in allowing God to use you to speak words of love and truth and Biblical wisdom to your children.

But then, what about those times when your children – young or not-so-young – are hurting? What is it that they need? A band aid? Maybe. A dose of cough syrup? Maybe. Some of that white ointment on their scratchy places? What do they call that stuff? “Chigger-ex?” Or perhaps a few stitches in their arm? Maybe.

No, dear sisters. You think about it with me… when your little ones or your gown ones are hurting, whether it be physically or otherwise, what they need the most is comfort. And who do you think God’s Holy Spirit – the Comforter that Jesus promised to send in His place – who do you think He wants to use as His human agent for that comfort? To me, the answer is simple, yet oh-so-significant. God wants to use you! When your children need comfort, when the world of people and problems, either child-size or adult-size, has socked it to your children, when their hearts are broken, their tears are falling, and maybe even their blood flowing… when your children need comfort, their Heavenly Father wants to hear you say, “God here, use my arms, use my hands!” “Use my arms and hands, just like Jesus used His arms and hands to touch, to bless and to hold the little children.” (See Mark 10:13-16). When your children need comfort, Ladies, would you, would you allow Him to use your arms and your hands?

Now let’s look at Proverbs 1:8-9. “Listen, my children, to your father’s instruction, and do not forsake your mother’s teaching, for they will be a crown to grace your head and a lovely necklace to adorn your neck.”

And Proverbs 6:20-24: “My children, keep your father’s commands, and do not forsake your mother’s teaching. Bind them upon your heart forever; fasten them like a necklace around your neck. Then, as you go through life, they will watch over you; and when you’re awake, they will speak to you. For your father’s commands are like a lamp, and your mother’s teaching is like a light, and the correction and discipline they give you are the way to life. They will keep you from immoral people – from the seductive words of wayward sinners.”

What is Solomon saying? What is the point he is trying to communicate to his children about their mother? Ladies, mark this one down, and you children, you ought to circle this one, too! Mothers – oh, certainly you have a big job cooking for hungry girls and boys. (And in case you hadn’t noticed, they prefer your cooking over that of anyone else.) And it’s a big job washing and drying all their laundry, even showing them how to take care of their clothing, and taxiing them from one ball game to another band concert – all these things and your servant leadership in these things is important. But listen, dear sisters, listen to Solomon, God’s inspired spokesman. When God is on the lookout for someone to instruct your children, when He is searching for someone to enlighten your sons and daughters on that subject that is at the very beginning and foundation of wisdom and knowledge, and I mean the fear of the Lord *, guess whose hand He hopes to see go up as the very first volunteer? That’s right! He wants to use your mind to teach them! Think of it, sisters! What an incredible opportunity! What a sobering and humbling responsibility! God wants to use your mind to teach them about His mind! That’s what my imaginary bill board message means when it says, “GODLY mothers are one of God’s best gifts.”

Mother’s Day. I don’t know if you’ve noticed it or not, but I’ve noticed that perhaps more than at any other holiday or special day through the year, whether it be Thanksgiving Day, Christmas, Valentine’s Day or any other special day, perhaps more than any other time of the year, more special meals are being enjoyed, more boxes of chocolate and bouquets of roses are being given, and more long distance phone calls are being placed on Mother’s Day than at any other time of the year! I think that’s wonderful! You mothers deserve all that extra attention!

But you know something? At some of those dinner tables and over some of those telephone lines, there’s an awkward silence – and uncomfortable ‘distance,’ even though mothers and their children may be in the same room! Why is that?

Take a look at 2 Corinthians 6:14 and following **. Have you ever heard of the concept of being ‘unequally yoked’ with unbelievers? To me, one of the saddest things about Mother’s Day is when mothers and their sons and daughters get together for lunch, or when they talk to each other on the telephones and instead of celebrating the wonderful, warm intimacy and mutual understanding, because they are all coming at life from a Biblical view, instead of that closeness and unity which God intended for there to be in families, there is separation and disharmony! They are unequally yoked! And why is that?

Hear me, dear sisters. The reason so many mothers and their sons and daughters are distant is because some have chosen to follow Christ, and some have not! Bu listen, ladies. Here’s the really important part for you. What is one of God’s very best gifts? Remember the bill board message? It says, “GODLY mothers – GODLY mothers are one of God’s best gifts!” So here’s the deal. If your children – especially your grown children are godly and you are not – don’t be surprised that there’s an awkward silence or an uncomfortable distance between you and them! More than likely, when they’re looking for someone to understand them, to share Biblical fellowship with them, if you’re not a godly mother, they won’t look to you. Why? Because, sad to say, as an unbeliever, there’s just no way you can truly understand them or fellowship with them.

Oh, but listen sisters. Listen! What a celebration your Mother’s Day meal with them this afternoon would be if you – right now – would give your heart to Christ! If you – at the end of this service – would step out and respond to God’s gracious invitation to salvation! Equally yoked! Equally yoked – that what you would be!

Godly mothers. They are one of God’s best gifts. Why? Because, when little ones as young as Hannah, Kayla, Bear and Noah John, and bigger ones like you and me, need to hear words of love, when they need to know that somebody understands them, guess what, ladies? If you’re a GODLY woman, a Christ-like mother, He looks to you – to your voice, to your mind, and to your heart to provide what is needed. Isn’t that amazing?

But then, one more thing – really, the most crucial of all. GODLY mothers – why are they so important? You know a moment ago I described what is probably the less likely scenario, the unequally yoked situation where the division, the separation between mother and children is due to the mother’s unbelief, the fact that the mother is not a Christian – that’s the less-likely situation. Now, let’s consider the situation from the other way around. The children are the ones who are lost and bound for hell. How will that unbelieving son or that wayward daughter come to know Christ?

Dear sisters, I don’t want to make it look more simple than it is, especially when we’re talking about unbelieving grown children. I know I’ve not been a parent nearly as long as most ofyou have, but one thing I am learning is this: the seeds of lifestyle and behavior, attitudes and priorities, habits, friendships, influences and thought patterns that we as parents allow to be sown into the hearts and minds, souls and spirits of our children – even at Cody and Jaden’s age – no doubt about it! No getting around it! Those seeds will grow! They will flourish and yes, they will bear fruit – good fruit and yes, bad fruit, too.

So, what’s the point? What do you mothers, and we fathers too, need to keep in mind here? Hear me well, Beloved, this one final question. When our children ask about God, when they want to know who Jesus is and how to be born again – does God use our faith to help them come to know Him? Do they see Jesus Christ living in us? Or does the One who gave His Son to die for them have to point them to another godly woman or man to be the example of Christ-likeness they need? Allow God to use your faith!

Godly mothers. They are one of God’s best gifts! And I trust that we, who are the children of those dear women, will let them know today and regularly, how grateful to God we are for them.

Let me close with this prayer. “O God, you are the Perfect Parent. You know our children so well, so much better than we do. You know their inner needs. You watch them growing and truly understand them. You care deeply for them and love them so sacrificially. For these reasons we ask for Your help in raising them. No, Lord, more than that. More than Your help, we ask that You bring them up! We hand them over to You! Just don’t let us get in Your way. Don’t let us interfere with Your parenting them! But, dear Lord, when you need human help, use us! Use us! When they need to hear words of love, use our voices. When they need comfort, use our arms to cradle them. When they need instruction, use our minds to lead them into insight from Your mind. When they need understanding, someone who really knows what they’re going through, use our hearts. And most of all, when they ask about You, use our faith humbly lived out before them, so that they too will come to know You as their holy Father in heaven. In Jesus’ name. Amen. “

* Proverbs 1:7 – “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction.” And Proverbs 9:10-12: “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding. For by me your days will be multiplied, and years of life will be added to you. If you are wise, you are wise for yourself, and if you scoff, you will bear it alone."

** 2 Corinthians 6:14ff: “Do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. For what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness? And what communion has light with darkness? And what accord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has a believer with an unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God. As God has said: “I will dwell in them and walk among them. I will be their God, and they shall be My people.” Therefore “Come out from among them and be separate,” says the Lord. “Do no touch what is unclean, and I will receive you. I will be a Father to you, and you shall be My sons and daughters,” says the Lord Almighty.”