Father’s Day, 2006
God our Father and Human Fathers

Tod Kennedy, June 18, 2006

Introductory comments

Quotes and incidents:

1. “We make men without chests and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honor and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We castrate and then bid the geldings to be fruitful.” C.S. Lewis

2. “Can you imagine a world without men? No crime and lots of happy fat women. “Nicole Hollander

3. “Women and cats will do as they please, and men and dogs should relax and get used to the idea.” Robert Heinlein

4. Two of Bill Cosby’s stories from his book, Fatherhood.

                    i.            Now that my father is a grandfather, he just can’t wait to give money to my kids. But when I was his kid and I asked him for fifty cents, he would tell me the story of his life. How he got up at 5 A.M., when he was seven years old, and walked twenty-three miles, to milk ninety cows. And the farmer for whom he worked had no bucket, so he had to squirt the milk into his little hand and then walk eight miles to the nearest can. All for 5 cents a month. The result was that I never got my 50 cents.

But now he tells my children every time he comes into the house: “Well, let’s see how much money old Granddad has got for his wonderful kids.” And the minute they take money out of his hands I call them over to me and I snatch it away from them. Because that is MY money.

And,

                  ii.            For Father’s Day I give each of my five kids $20 so that they can go out and buy me a present——a total of $100. They go to the store and buy two packages of underwear, each of which costs $5 and contains three shorts. They tear them open and each kid wraps up one pair, the sixth going to the Salvation Army. Therefore, on Father’s Day I am walking around with new underwear and my kid’s are walking around with $90 worth of my change in their pockets.

5. Human fathers are necessary in the proper function of the divine institutions. God delegated the authority in the family to fathers. Fathers give stability, order, and direction to family. As with any authority figure, fathers are not always liked for this. Unlike our heavenly father, human fathers are imperfect—they fail, disappoint, react, forget, get tired, and do not perfectly organize their time.  Bible says much about fathers. But human fathers have a model—God, our heavenly father.

6. Most important characteristics in a father includes a godly character, unconditional love, and involve self in children’s lives; being consistent , reliable, and dependable; teach by example, explaining, discussion, and questions and answers; and open door policy.

Fathers

1.     The character of God the Father, in Psalm 103.6-12, demonstrates the character goals for earthly fathers.

a.      Helps others with righteous deeds and righteous decisions (6).

b.     Clearly makes norms and standards known (7).

c.      Compassionate (8, 13).

d.     Gracious (8).

e.      Slow to anger (8).

f.       Loyal love (8).

g.     Does not dwell on faults (9).

h.     Does not make children pay for failures (9).

i.        Knows children will fail (10).

j.       Forgives, forgives, and forgives (11-12).

k.      Knows we have weaknesses (13-14).

2.     God the Father’s relationship with believers demonstrates the relationship and actions that an earthly father should strive for with his children.

a.      The Father’s sons and daughters have a relationship with him that is based upon the father’s love and care (John 15.9; 1 John 3.1; Matthew 6.26-34).

b.     The Father plans for and takes responsibility for our well-being (Ephesians 1.3-8).

c.      The Father wants us to come to him and ask him for good things (Matthew 7.9-11).

d.     The Father gives us total and unquestioned security (Romans 8.28.30).

e.      The Father comforts us in our testing and suffering (2 Corinthians 1.3-4).

f.       The Father properly disciplines us for our own good (Hebrews 12.5-11).

g.     The Father teaches us so that we may live properly, successfully, and happily. We, of course, must be teachable. We grow up by teachable—listening to our Heavenly Father and learning from our Heavenly Father and trusting our Heavenly Father and obeying our Heavenly Father (2 Timothy 3.16-17; John 17.17; Hebrews 11.6; John 15.10).

h.     The world will not always agree with us, and many times the world will reject us when we walk with our Heavenly Father (John 15.18-19; John 17.14).

3.     The parable of the prodigal son demonstrates God the Father’s continual love for desire for fellowship with any rebellious or wayward believer, and this demonstrates the earthly father’s same continual love and desire for his own rebellious or wayward son or daughter (Luke 15.11-32).

4.     Ephesians 6:4, And, Fathers,

a.      “do not provoke your children to anger;” (Provoke=paroggizw + mh to make angry, to provoke, to act in a way that irritates, provokes, arouses to anger. Present active imperative, 2^nd plural.)

                                                              i.      By foolish statements, not doing what you said you would do, critical of them in public, expecting perfection, inconsistent correction and discipline, no dependable, not helping, no showing unconditional love and support.

b.     “but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.” Bring them up=ektrefw. Present active imperative, 2^nd plural. To nourish the life, here especially to the ideas, guidance, boundaries, encouragement, correction, praise that is based upon the Bible.

                                                              i.      Be a model for them of godliness, explaining, answering questions, consistent Bible teaching, questions and answers, biblical worldview and guidelines.

5.     Colossians 3:21, “Fathers,

a.      “do not exasperate your children,” Exasperate=ereqizw present active imperative, 2^nd plural. To arouse, provoke, to irritate, embitter.)

                                                              i.      Same as above in Ephesians.

b.     “that they may not lose heart.” Aqumew Present active subjunctive, 3^rd plural. To be discouraged, to lose heart.

                                                              i.      Children become very discouraged without a stable home life and the father is the leader in the home.

                                                             ii.      Inconsistency by the father, unreliable, lack of time, interest, love, leadership.

6.     Questions for Fathers. Our children follow how we live. Jerry L. Steen wrote,

At the first church that I pastored, I had the job of mixing feed to supplement my income. For a period of about two weeks, each day that I came home from work, my two boys, ages 2 and 3 would look at me, smile, and would say, "Boy, dad, you sure are dusty!" I would reply, "Yes, I sure am dusty." Then I would get cleaned up.

I didn't think too much of this until I was washing my car and saw my oldest son doing something very strange. He was picking up the gravel and stones that were in our drive and rubbing them into his pants. I asked him, "Want are you doing?" He replied, "I want to be dusty like you dad!"  

a.      What kind of character do you have?

b.     Does your character show itself?

c.      Are you the leader?

d.     Do you care about your relationship and fellowship with your sons and daughter? If you care, do you do anything about it?

e.      What is your soul health when your son or daughter rebels or becomes wayward? Are you mad, uncontrolled, glad, loving, working at restoring your son or daughter?

f.       Do you lead by example?

g.     Do you teach them carefully, consistently, and regularly? The Bible, school lessons, manners, organization?

h.     Do you expect too much from them?

i.        Do you pray with and for your sons and daughters?

j.       Do you encourage and support your sons and daughters or are you critical and complaining?

k.      Do you carefully and thoughtfully correct and discipline?

l.        Do you compliment, thank, and reward your sons and daughters?

m.   Do you do talk with your sons and daughters?

n.     Do you do things with them and participate in their activities?

o.     How important is it to you to be a biblically successful father?

7.     Questions for sons and daughters.

a.      Do you respect your father?

b.     Do you realize that he wants the best for you?

c.      Do your learn from your father?

d.     Do you happily obey your father?

e.      Do your appreciate your father and does he ever know it?

f.       Can you accept the fact that sometimes he will fail?

8.     Review Principle 1. The character of God the Father, in Psalm 103.6-14, demonstrates the character goals for human fathers.

9.     Review Principle 2. God the Father’s relationship with believers demonstrates the relationship and actions that a human father should strive for with his children.

10. Review Principle 3. The parable of the prodigal son and the loving father demonstrates God the Father’s continual love for and desire for fellowship with any rebellious or wayward believer, and this demonstrates the human father’s same desire for his own rebellious or wayward son or daughter (Luke 15.11-32.

11. Principle 4. Ephesians 6:4 and Colossians 3:21 teach fathers not to provoke to anger, to irritate, to embitter your children because they can become discouraged at your lack of leadership and love, but you fathers are to nourish the life, here especially to the ideas, guidance, boundaries, encouragement, correction, praise that is based upon the Bible.

12. Principle 5. The book of Proverbs gives many lessons to fathers. Teaching, correcting, imparting wisdom, imparting morality are the main lessons in Proverbs. That is a study for another time.

13. Conclusion

a.      Develop a plan leading to success in your family.

b.     Get involved with your children.

c.      Give your children genuine affection.

d.     Be role model for them.

e.      Prepare your children spiritually by teaching and example.

f.       Bless your children daily through prayer, work, and telling them you love them.

14. Douglas MacArthur’s, “Build Me a Son, O Lord.”

Build Me a Son, O Lord

Build me a son, O Lord, who will be strong enough to know when he is weak, and brave enough to face himself when he is afraid; one who will be proud and unbending in honest defeat, and humble and gentle in victory.

Build me a son whose wishbone will not be where his backbone should be; a son who will know Thee and that to know himself is the foundation stone of knowledge. Lead him, I pray, not in the path of ease and comfort, but under the stress and spur of difficulties and challenge. Here let him learn to stand up in the storm; here let him learn compassion for those who fail.

Build me a son whose heart will be clean, whose goal will be high; a son who will master himself before he seeks to master other men; one who will learn to laugh, yet never forget how to weep; one who will reach into the future, yet never forget the past.

And after all these things are his, add, I pray, enough of a sense of humor, so that he may always be serious, yet never take himself too seriously. Give him humility, so that he may always remember the simplicity of greatness, the open mind of true wisdom, the meekness of true strength.

Then I, his father, will dare to whisper, “I have not lived in vain.”

-General Douglas MacArthur, Source unknown