More Than Medicine
More Than Medicine
DWDP: The Red Eye of God
Ever wondered how a simple camcorder trick could transform a mischievous third-grader into the model student? Listen as I, Dr. Robert Jackson, recount a hilarious yet impactful tale from our homeschooling journey with my son Jehu. His notorious classroom antics were curbed by his sister Hannah's clever use of what we playfully dubbed the "red eye of God." This episode promises insights into the surprising power of accountability and creativity in parenting, illustrated through our family's unique experience.
Join us for a heartfelt exploration of biblical principles interwoven with everyday parenting challenges. Through the lens of family anecdotes, I share valuable lessons on guiding our children with love, discipline, and a touch of humor. Discover how the "fear of Daddy" humorously reflects the broader values we strive to instill in our children and how these lessons are not just for parents but for anyone invested in nurturing the next generation. Whether you're homeschooling or simply on the lookout for parenting inspiration, this episode offers a treasure trove of wisdom and laughter.
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Welcome to More Than Medicine, where Jesus is more than enough for the ills that plague our culture and our country. Hosted by author and physician, Dr Robert Jackson.
Speaker 2:Papa, can you tell me a story? Do you really want me to tell you a story? Well, you go, get your brother and your sisters and I will tell you a story. Well, you go, get your brother and your sisters and I will tell you a story. Welcome to Devotions with Dr Papa. Gather around, grab your Bibles and let us look into the written Word, which reveals to us the living Word, which is our Lord Jesus Christ. I'm continuing in a series of lessons that are describing incidents that happened with my children that taught me biblical principles of life.
Speaker 2:As many of you already know, my wife homeschooled all of my children. As we were going along in our homeschooling career, we had seven children. My seventh child was a little boy named Jay Hugh, and when he was in about the third grade he was incorrigible. He was not the ideal student. He would stand in his chair. Ideal student he would stand in his chair. He would flip his pencil, he would break pencils, he would torment his younger sister, who was a first grader, and my wife had a very difficult time keeping him on task as a homeschool student. Well, this went on for the longest time and she often expressed her frustration to me with how was she going to manage him as a third grade boy? Well, one day his older sister, hannah, had a bright idea. This was back in the days when we had camcorders handheld camcorders and she set that camcorder up in the room where we did our homeschooling and she told her younger brother, ju, that she was going to record his behavior in class and show it to Daddy when he got home from work in the evening. So she set it up on a tripod, she hit the button and, as you know, when the camera is recording there's a little red light that comes on the front of it when it's recording.
Speaker 2:As soon as she hit the button and the little red light came on, j Hugh became extremely nervous. He began to look around. He looked at his mother. He looked at his mother, he looked at his sisters. He sat down in his desk, he flipped his pencil a few times and then he put his head down and he began to do his assignments without making any noise or any disturbance. His mother and his sisters just smiled and they let that camcorder record his behavior, or so they thought. At the end of the morning they went to the recorder and they realized they'd forgotten to put a tape in it, but they didn't tell young Jehu that they had forgotten. Well, the next day he began his antics once again. So his older sister, hannah, went back to the camcorder. She hit the button, a little red light came on and as soon as he saw that, he immediately sat down and began to be the perfect third grade student. Well, when my wife told me about this when I came home from work the second day, I have to admit I laughed until I cried. It was a humorous thing to me.
Speaker 2:After a week of recording, well, j Hugh thought he was being recorded, but they never really put a tape in the machine. At the end of the week he was the perfect student for five days. The next week they forgot to set the camcorder up. But guess what? Mr J Hugh continued to be the perfect third grade student. His behavior had been modified and did not require the red light. His sisters had dubbed the red light as the red eye of God. The red eye of God because it was modifying and regulating his behavior. Well, after another week he started to slide backwards and go back into his old way of behavior and his mother looked at him and said JU, do I need to put the camcorder back up and turn on the red eye of God. And he looked at her and he shook his head negatively, put his head down and began to do his homework, slash schoolwork as a perfect little third grade student.
Speaker 2:Now, what's the biblical lesson that I'm learning here? Well, I began to understand what the fear of daddy does for third grade boys. Well, really, daddy does for third grade boys. Well, really, what it does for all of my children and probably what it does for your children as well. When I was growing up, the most fearsome thing that my mother could say to me and my brothers was you just wait till your daddy gets home. Whenever my mother said that, my brothers and I would immediately go to our bedroom, sit on the bed and we would just rub our thighs and, with great apprehension, we would sit on our bed with fear in our heart until our dad came home, and then he would come and he would deal with us appropriately for whatever offense had prompted our mother to say those awful words. You just wait till your father gets home. Well, you see, the fear of daddy regulates behavior. What does the fear of God accomplish in your life and mine? Well, I would submit to you that. It regulates your behavior and it regulates my behavior.
Speaker 2:Listen to Proverbs, chapter 14 and verse 2. There's a verse that I was reading recently. It says he who walks in his uprightness fears the Lord. You see, when you and I walk in integrity, when we walk in uprightness, it demonstrates that we fear God. But he who is devious in his ways despises him. A devious man, a man who does not walk in integrity, it demonstrates that he despises God, he doesn't fear God. And you and I know that. Now watch this In Psalms 139,. This talks about how the red eye of God, how the eye of God is always on you and me. Psalms 139.
Speaker 2:O Lord, you have searched me and known me. You know when I sit down and when I rise up. You understand my thoughts from afar. You scrutinize my path and my lying down and are intimately acquainted with all my ways, even before there is a word on my tongue. Behold, o Lord, you know it all. You have enclosed me behind and before and laid your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me. It is too high. I cannot attain to it. Where can I go from your Spirit or where can I flee from your presence. If I ascend to heaven, you are there. If I make my bed in Sheol, behold, you are there. If I take the wings of the dawn, if I dwell in the remotest part of the sea, even there your hand will lead me and your right hand will lay hold of me. If I say, surely, the darkness will overwhelm me and the light around me will be night. Even the darkness is not dark to you, and the night is as bright as the day. Darkness and light are a light to you. You see, there's nowhere that you and I can go to escape the presence of God. The red eye of God, the eye of the Lord, roams to and fro throughout the earth, seeking those who fear him. And you see, knowing that God is always watching, knowing that God knows everything about us, every thought, every deed, it regulates our behavior.
Speaker 2:Now think about Job. You remember Job and you remember God's commendation of Job. You remember when God spoke to Satan in the first book, chapter of Job, and the Lord said to Satan have you considered my servant, job, for there's no one like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man fearing God and turning away from evil. You see the fear of God in Job's heart prompted him to turn away from evil, prompted him to turn away from evil. Whenever there is an appropriate fear of God, it always leads you and me to turn away from evil, just like your children's respect and fear of their parents causes them to turn away from evil and it regulates their behavior.
Speaker 2:Now let me ask you a question. How do you know when the fear of God is regulating your behavior? Think about it. How do you know when the fear of God is regulating your behavior? I'll tell you. You'll know when you have an appropriate fear of God when you choose righteousness in a secret place or a strange place when no one is watching. The proper fear of God leads a pious Christian to obey, even if there's no prospect of punishment and no prospect of reward. That Christian obeys simply out of reverence and the utter conviction that God deserves our very best. He will choose to give his best and he will choose to please and not offend, and he understands that God alone is his audience. It's the eye of God that is upon him. Now let me ask you another question. Do you fear the highway patrolman? Sure, you do, when you're speeding along on the interstate and you see that highway patrolman parked on the side of the road, you immediately take your foot off the gas because you don't want a speeding ticket. You fear the highway patrolman. Now, is that an emotional or a logical response on your part? Well, it doesn't matter. Either way, it is appropriate and it's reasonable because it regulates your behavior. You see, the fear of the highway patrolman regulates In the same way that the fear of your father when you were a child regulated your behavior as adults and as Christians.
Speaker 2:The fear of God should cause us to eschew evil, to turn away from evil. Just as Job was a righteous man and earned the consideration and respect of God because he was blameless, he feared God and he turned away from evil. Now I'll tell you another consideration. The fear of God motivates worship. Did you realize that? Let me read you a verse in the book of Revelations, revelations, chapter 14, in verse 7 revelations 14, in verse 7, tells us this. It says, and he said with a loud voice fear god and give him glory, because the hour of his judgment has come. Worship Him who made the heaven and the earth, and sea and springs of waters. This was the angel that was flying in mid-heaven in Revelations, chapter 14. And what did he tell the folks to do? He told them to fear God, give Him glory and worship Him. You see, the fear of God generates within us a respect for His holiness and it promotes genuine worship.
Speaker 2:When you and I see God as he really is, when we glimpse His majesty and glory, not only do we fear Him, but we worship Him. We ascribe to Him the worth that is due unto his name. The man who fails to worship God as a lifestyle does not fear God, nor has he seen God, but rather he flaunts his independence of God. How do you know? When you fear God? It's when you live to worship him. When your highest priority and your greatest joy is to worship God, then you know that you have begun to fear God.
Speaker 2:When worship becomes the identifying characteristic of your life, you have just begun to scratch the surface of what it means to fear God. And if you don't understand what I'm saying, then I would submit to you very respectfully that there is no fear of God in your heart. Also, I would submit to you that the fear of God teaches us to hate evil Proverbs 8 and verse 13. Proverbs 8 and verse 13 tells us this the fear of the Lord is to hate evil. Very simply, the fear of the Lord is to hate evil, pride and arrogance and the evil way and the perverted mouth I hate. You see, the fear of God puts in our heart a love of righteousness and a hatred of evil when your personal sin or another person's sin grieves your heart in the same way that it grieves the great heart of God. You have begun to cultivate within yourself a proper reverence of God. Now go back to the very beginning.
Speaker 2:We started out talking about a camcorder and a little red light that my children dubbed the red eye of God and how it regulated the behavior of a third grade boy. Sometimes I wonder if it wouldn't be beneficial in your life and mine if there were not a great red eye in the sky that we could look up and see every day and realize that God is watching us, that he sees every move that we make, that he perceives the thought and intent of our heart, that he records every word that we say and that we could not fool ourselves into thinking that he doesn't see, he doesn't hear and he doesn't remember. You see, god does know. He's a holy God, a righteous God, the righteous judge of all the nations, and we only fool ourselves into thinking that God doesn't see, doesn't hear, doesn't remember. It's the proper fear of God that regulates our behavior. My little boy JU he surely shaped up when that little red light came on that camcorder, and it made him an ideal student. What does it take for you and me to become ideal Christians? Well, there's not a red eye in the sky, but we do have the Word, the written Word, and I would submit to you and me that abiding in the Word every day is what regulates our behavior. Submitting ourselves to Holy Spirit, who lives in us, helps to regulate our behavior, because when we look into the mirror of God's Word, we see God as he is and we see ourselves as we are, and it gives us a proper perspective on who God is. And it's only as we gain that proper perspective and remember daily that our God sees and hears and watches that we gain that proper fear of God.
Speaker 2:You're listening to Devotions with Dr Papa. If you like what you hear, I pray that you would like it follow, share or download. Share it with your friends. I'd also like to remind you that I have several books that you can find on Amazon, four books to be precise. I'd like for you to check it out. Look up my name on Amazon and you can find my books Pro-Life book, a book on evangelism, a book on turkey hunting and a biography about my father and I think that you would enjoy those books. You can also find three of them at Courier Publishing, which is the publishing arm of the Baptist Courier here in South Carolina. Until next week. May the Lord bless you real good.
Speaker 1:Thank you for listening to this edition of More Than Medicine. For more information about the Jackson Family Ministry, dr Jackson's books, or to schedule a speaking engagement, go to their Facebook page, instagram or their webpage at jacksonfamilyministrycom. This podcast is produced by Bob Sloan Audio Production at bobsloancom.
