What Does God Say About Fathers?

Sunday, June 20, 2004

Rev. Timothy Phillips

Typed from audio transcript

Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Please pray with me. Heavenly Father, we talk about fathers today and we can only learn from you what a real father is, what a godly father is, what a loving father is. And so we pray that, by your Holy Spirit today working through your Word, you will teach us in our hearts so we may live the way you have called us to live, as godly fathers, in Jesus' name. Amen.

What does the bible say about fathers? That's our challenge to think about this morning. As I thought about that, I have to say one of the greatest joys I have beyond being a Christian and having Jesus as my Savior is to have a wonderful godly wife and to have two beautiful children given to me by God. And I want to talk about becoming a father because, for me, it was a very powerful and unique experience. I was 37 years old, and I was a pastor on the North Shore of Lake Superior. They talk about that biological clock. I don't know if it's a biological clock as much as I felt like life was passing me by and I was quickly approaching the point where maybe that wasn't going to be God's plan for me to be a father. I was single and hadn't been married and had been through all the experiences you go through when you're single and not real happy with God. In fact, I was actually angry. I was listening to Christian radio, and I was hearing about Abraham and God promised Abraham he would have descendants numerous as the stars in heaven and the sands on the seashore. That's how many descendants he would have. And I very emotionally cried out to God, and I said, “Where is my promise? I love children. I want to be a husband. I want to be a dad. Where is my promise?” Six months later, I met Kim, my wife. Six months later after that, we were married. God heard my heart's cry and answered my prayer.

And as I think about that whole process, there are three things that really stand out to me. The first is the first time I met Kim's children, they were hers from a previous marriage, they called me Daddy. That sealed the deal for me. The next thing was, a year later, after we had been married, when I formally adopted the girls. We were in the courtroom and I had handled most of the legal work myself. I had consulted with a few attorneys, but I prepared everything myself. So we went to court for the hearing, and the judge pretty much interrogated me. “You know what you're getting into? Do you know what your responsibilities are for these children?” On and on and on. And I said, “Yes, I understand. And I want to be their father.” And then after all the questions were done, the judge asked another question. He said, “Is there anybody here that would like to say anything?” My 4-year-old raised her hand. He said, “Yes?” She said, “My name's Grace Phillips. I'm 4 years old and I can write my name.” That's one of the joys, isn't it, of being a dad. Seeing those tender moments.

But there are difficult moments, too, heartrending moments. And one that almost was a heartrending moment for me is just still a very moving thought to think of. Sometime after that, Grace and a little friend were playing in another room in the house and I was kind of listening to what they were doing. Grace said, “I have two daddies.” And my heart was just about to break just hearing that she might not think of me as her daddy. And she said, “I have a real daddy and I have a step-daddy.” And then she said, “My step-daddy lives in California.” Which makes me the real daddy. That was a very powerful moment for me.

Being a dad is a wonderful thing. It's a great privilege that God has given us. Having a dad is also a wonderful thing and not something to take for granted in today's culture. Becoming a father also includes the experiences we have as children or as little boys. They start to become a father as they witness the role model in their own home. They see the kind of dad they have, and that begins to mold and shape them for their future spouse. That's a pretty sobering thought, isn't men, because the example we are setting is going to be imitated in the marriages of our children.

The bible speaks very powerfully to this issue of fatherhood. In our Epistle lesson, I'm going to be focusing mainly on that, it speaks, first of all, to the children. “Children obey your parents in the Lord for this is right.” Honor your father and mother, which is the Fourth Commandment, with a promise that it may go well with you and you may enjoy long life on the earth. That's the first point I want to make, that God calls children to honor their parents, their fathers in particular today we're talking about. This is the Fourth Commandment. It's no mistake that there's a promise connected to it, because we know when we honor our fathers, that blesses them and it makes things better in our relationship with them. But sometimes it's a challenge. That commandment, according to Luther, also applies to all those in authority over us, whether it is spiritual authorities or political authorities or educational authorities, such as your teacher, your professor, things like that. God calls us to honor all of them. The word honor in Greek is “timao,” which is part of my name, Timothy. It means honoring God, so the word honor in Greek is literally translated to count as valuable. So when God is calling us to honor those in authority over us and our fathers, to honor our fathers and our mothers, He's calling us to count them as valuable. Now a lot of times in our culture, value is based on what you can do for me or what you have done for me or what you haven't done for me or what you can produce. That's a lot of time where value comes from. But in a Christian setting, value is determined not by what we come up with but by what God says. And God says that our value is so great that He considers every single one of us so precious we're worth dying for. That is our value. That is everyone's value. And when God calls us to honor our fathers and our mothers and those in authority over us, He's calling us to look at them the way He does, not on the basis of their performance or work or anything like that but that they're so precious in God's sight that they're worth dying for. Imagine what would happen in our culture if we did that, honored our parents and those in authority in such as high way?

The second call in that word from Ephesians is to obey, and this really captures the concept in the Old Testament in the Hebrew language of hearing. It's not just listening or hearing it, but it's hearing and doing it. That's what this word is in Greek, to hear and obey. Now as you think of your role as a parent and your children and their response to your commands, it doesn't quite work the way you'd like it, does it? Because they're real people and you're a real person. And when we give those commands, sometimes they're not the most wonderful news to hear. And when the children respond, their obedience isn't really driven by what we'd like to see in them, perfect obedience to our role as parents. The problem is we're all sinners. Parents are sinners. Children are sinners. And our nature, as sinners, is to rebel against God and to rebel against our parents and those in authority over us. But think about it. God gives us the command to honor our father and mother. He gives us that command because that's the best way for things to work. And when we obey it, there's a promise, right? That it may go well with you and you may live long on the earth. And when we disobey it, there's a curse and there's conflict and there's strife and struggle. God's commands are best. So when we listen to our parents and we obey them, that's best. That's a good thing. That's wonderful thing. And it brings peace and harmony in our relationship.

The last portion of our text talks about the role of the father and his responsibilities. “Fathers do not exasperate your children.” And I don't think I have to explain that word exasperate. You know exactly what I mean. You know what it feels like if your father or your mother is overbearing or harsh with you or doesn't take the time to understand where you're coming from or listen to your side of the story. You know what I'm talking about, because you've all been there. You've heard that. You've been exasperated. God is telling us not to do that to our children, Fathers. Godly men, He's calling us to do something greater. He's calling us to love them and to tenderly nurture them and guide them as they grow and develop.

I have five points under the role of godly fathers in our families. The first one is we must love our spouse. We must love our spouse. You think, “Well, what's that got to do with kids?” If you don't love their mom, if you don't love your spouse, it teaches them to not love each other and to be unloving towards their future spouses. So our first and highest priority is to make sure our relationship with our spouse is great, not good, not okay, but great, to work at it, to pray about it, to pray for your spouse, and to honor her and respect her.

The second model, the second plan, the second point here about godly fathers is to model God's grace. Haven't you ever sat at the dinner table and been reminded of something you did ten years ago, five years ago, two years, two weeks ago, and had that kind of held over your head like, “When are you going to grow up?” God doesn't do that, does He? He doesn't keep reminding us of all the stuff we did a long time ago. He releases us, doesn't He? When we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and forgives our sins and cleanses us from all unrighteousness. It's gone. As far as the east is from the west, that's how He removes it from us. It's as if He throws it into the depths of the sea and you know there's a point in the sea, the ocean, that's so deep you could throw Mount Everest in and it would disappear a mile below the surface. That's where God puts our sins. It's as if they never existed. He will not remind you of your past sins, and that's what He calls us to do, godly fathers. That's what He calls us to do, to forgive our children, to model God's grace in our relationships, to confess our sins to our spouse and ask for her forgiveness, to say we're sorry to our children when we blow it. Anybody here that's never blown it? See what I mean? It's okay to say you're sorry; in fact, it's wonderful to say you're sorry because you release your children from the bitterness of not hearing those words. They're just waiting for it. So when we're humble enough before God and before our family to confess and say we're sorry, it releases us to have a wonderful relationship filled with God's grace.

The third point is that God calls us to provide for our children with tenderness and care. This is the opposite of that exasperate thing. It's the opposite, to be tender, to sit down and talk to our children, to understand what's going on in their lives. We ask things like, “How'd your day go?” or “How was school?” And you get those one-word answers, “Fine.” That's not it, is it? You really haven't gotten involved with them. You might have asked a question you thought was good, but it really hasn't accomplished a purpose. We need to have those tender moments, time to work through things, pay attention to what's going on in your kids' lives so you can tune in and walk with them through their difficult times.

The fourth point is to teach your children God's Word. Martin Luther wrote the Small Catechism. Do you know what it says in the Small Catechism? “So the head of the household may teach his family.” That you can teach your children God's Word. Now you don't have to be a professor. You don't have to be a pastor. All you have to be is a student of God's Word, to read it and to share what God's saying to you, and to teach the basic things and to try to answer their questions and to bring them to Sunday School and to worship.

The fifth point is we must discipline our children. I've lived in our house for four weeks now, and there's a family nearby. I've seen this on many occasions where the children routinely scream at the parents, and these are 3-year-old children, 4-year-olds, 2-year-olds. That's not right. And when we permit it, what are we doing? What kind of adults are those kids going to turn out to be if they don't encounter consistent, loving discipline? That doesn't mean when they do something wrong and you're angry, you just take out your anger on them. That would be abuse. What it means is when you respond to their bad behavior, you do it in such a way to encourage good behavior and you do it out of love.

Finally, I want to talk about our Heavenly Father because this is the model for all of us. God, our Heavenly Father, the way He deals with us, that's how He wants us to deal with each other. That's what He calls us to do. In Christ, God has adopted us. We have become part of His family. By birth, we are not part of His family, but by baptism, by coming to faith in Jesus as our Savior, we come into the family of God and receive all the blessings that includes. By faith in Jesus as we confess our sins, He washes us clean. He tenderly cares for us. He answers our prayers, both in good times and in bad, and He promises us heaven.

In Romans 8, there's a phrase that sometimes makes people uncomfortable. We think of God the Father, Almighty God, who created all things, who is in power over everything, holy and righteous. But in Romans 8, it says, “Abba, Father.” Do you know what that means, Abba? It means Daddy. So God isn't just all powerful and all mighty. He's all loving and tender and eager to hear His children call out to Him. He always has time to sit down and listen to us and talk through things.

Thinking about His tender care, I want to remind you that it says in the Book of Revelation that in heaven there is no sorrow, no pain, no grief, no mourning, only peace and joy. And it says that God will be with them and He will wipe every tear from their eyes. That is tenderness. Have you ever had anyone wipe the tears from your eyes? Most of us have to do it ourselves. But wouldn't it be wonderful if somebody we loved wiped the tears from our eyes? That's the kind of relationship we have with our Heavenly Father. That's how He feels about you. That's how in tune He is with your life.

Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for being that kind of a God, for being the kind of role model we need in our lives. We can learn love by seeing how you love us. We can learn grace by seeing how you forgive us, and we can learn truth by exploring your Word and teaching it to our children. Bless us as we honor our parents, obeying them, counting them as valuable. And bless us as we serve as parents to others. In Jesus' name, Amen.

Copyright 2004 Gloria Dei Lutheran Church