Father, Dad, Good & Bad
This month we'll look at how we, as men, portray God to the watching world. Listen to the way Jesus tells us to pray:
'Our father who is in heaven, hallowed be Your name.'Jesus tells us to think of God as a father, THE Father - what does that mean to you?* When you think of your own father, what kinds of emotions are kindled? Love? Joy? Admiration? Hope? Anger? Fear? Hatred? Indifference? It's possible that your experience with your earthly father has left you with a bitter spike wedged between you and any concept of God as your heavenly father. You may not even be ready to admit to yourself that your distrust, or rejection, of God is based primarily on the way you see your earthly father. What you may not know is God is aware of that, He is suffering with you, and will continue to speak through His word, and through others, to you about who He really is. I would ask you, especially, to stick in till the end of this post and struggle with what you find.
Often times our earthly fathers have fallen horribly short of representing the God who made them to reflect His image, and His character. Though imperfectly, men were made to be examples of the God who is our protector, our shield, our loving provider, and our peaceful place of rest. I believe this is one of the reasons Jesus chose to describe God here as Father. He says something about what God's name signifies that is worthy of looking at here. The word 'hallowed' means "holy, consecrated (set apart), sacred, revered," and we should recognize that God alone is worthy of this kind of reverence.
But men, especially, are to consider their worth as God's created leaders of the family, and what their performance (or lack thereof) portrays about God (even if inadvertently). Are we pursuing holiness, or just holes-in-one? Are we set-apart keepers of God's desire for fathers, considering our duties to be sacred, or are we gathering in packs of bitter and selfish men who whine and moan about their wives and children when they're not there? Does you family revere and respect you or mainly just tolerate you, or try to stay out of your way? Listen to what scripture's holiness codes have to say to fathers:
"Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her, so that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word... So husbands ought also to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself; for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ also does the church... Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord."
Ephesians 5:25-26, 28-29, 6:4
"Husbands, love your wives and do not be embittered against them... Fathers, do not exasperate your children, so that they will not lose heart."
Colossians 3:19, 21
Our pursuit of holiness as fathers, or men in general, is just that - a pursuit. A journey. A work we begin and never finish in this life. Leading our families should be sacrificial, not domineering or oppressive, if we are to be like Christ. Our leadership should uphold the need for our sanctification, time in the word, and unity within the body of Christ through baptism and fellowship. We are to feed and care for our relationships with our wives and kids and so fulfill the call of Christ on our situation. There is a place for discipline of your kids but the goal should always be their instruction in life and in the Lord. If our families have lost heart, if our relationships there seem mere shells of what they once were, it's time to recenter on the Source of life and follow the Christ by whose name we are called.
It's time to grow up and seek God for the direction and strength to be who you were created to be. Earn your Father's Day this year. Change your ways to align with Christ, and let the Holy Spirit change your heart for your spouse, children, and everyone else in your life. I know this has been a heavy read, so take a moment to watch the below video by Church On The Move, even leave me a comment and join the discussion below, and then get back to work!
And don't worry women, we'll be talking about you next month.
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* For those of you who want to think deeper, I say "think" because Jesus paints numerous pictures of God for us to understand God's qualities. For our time on earth we see God imperfectly, as dimly through a mirror, and only when we see God face to face will we see God as God truly is. I think many will be surprised that God is not a man, as we think of and know men to be now and throughout history, even a perfect man. The perfect God-man of the Trinity is Jesus the Christ, but God is Other, as the Spirit is also Other. Neither God the Father nor God the Holy Spirit are ghosts though, so we use words we can understand to try to wrap our minds around the mystery that is God. How else could we explain that God is One in three distinct persons? If this is hard for you to grasp, don't worry about it! Theologians who have studied it throughout history have disagreed and tried to explain the glorious nature of God, and no one has it figured out - so don't hang your faith or salvation on whether or not you figure it out! We would all do well to study as we want to and develop opinions as we want to, but not make those opinions something on which another's salvation, or faith, hangs.
