Fully Engaged
Notes
Transcript
Welcome to Fathers Day 2023
Fathers Day
A day of socks and ties and if your lucky a BBQ that you have to put on.
40 million less cards are sent on fathers day compared to mothers day.
Maybe it's because mothers are just better at laying on the guilt: 40% feel obligated or pressured to buy for their mom on Mother's Day, while just 30% feel the same about Father's Day.
Or he reason is Moms are more engaged with their children.
It is a fathers best day or for most fathers a rough day.
You have this feeling you either did a good job or a terrible job.
You hope your kids will call you today, but it isn’t guaranteed. Maybe they will send you something maybe they won’t
The day a Man becomes a father is a day you don’t forget.
I remember the day having Trina's nails dug into my arm looking at me with intensity in her eyes.
I did not have the courage to say - come on honey how bad could it be.
Then the sense of responsibility, that was never going to end. Not at 18 , 21 or 30.
Only Fathers can be fathers, Women sorry you can’t be fathers. Fathers are not Gender neutral. Fathers are adult males. No matter what society says. Fathers have a unique role.
Being a Father is not the same as fathering a child.
The role of the father is critical in the life of a child - If your missing a father it can be tough - AMEN
Many become fathers early in life when your out trying to make a name for yourself or working one or two jobs or trying to keep up with the Jones's.
Changes in your thinking are not easy but necessary - AMEN
It is also Spiritual.
Even your Spirit cries out ABBA Father -
Floyd McClung from YWAM wrote a book the father heart of God There is a unique bond that is there. It also affects our relationship with Father God.
Much of the challenges we have today are because of a lack of engagement. There are many reasons for it. Fear, Ignorance, Laziness, lack of confidence, Selfishness. etc.
God’s heart is to restore relationships and He is involved in the process.
I am going to read a scripture from the prophet Malachi that might help.
5 “Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes.
6 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.”
Here is a modern day challenge
You might say “of course he is.” Many today don’t believe this and are deists.
Many belief today that In the history of religion and philosophy, deus otiosus (Latin: "inactive god") is a term which refers to the belief in a creator God who has largely or entirely withdrawn from the government of the universe after creating it and is no longer involved in its daily operation.
Even Luther struggled with God being Hidden and Remote at times. ( or at last it might seem that way at times)
Deism emphasized the use of reason over revelation for deciding religious questions.
Dictionary of Hermeneutics: A Concise Guide to Terms, Names, Methods, and Expressions Deism (Also Deist, Deistic)
The belief that although God created the world, He did so by making it self-sustaining. I.e., God does not providentially support His creation, nor does He intervene so as to set aside the laws that govern it. It is derived from an eighteenth century philosophy of religion that emphasized natural religion guided by reason (cf. RATIONALISM), not by an appeal to divine REVELATION
We have to have a change of thinking - This is the enemy's thinking
Inactivity creates no solutions - It rights no wrongs - It is demonic and selfish
Where do we start? We change our beliefs ( deism has to die)
1. God is fully engaged
He was fully engaged from the beginning. From the creation of the Universe to today he is engaged in the lives of all..
He is fully engaged in the affairs of people. The enemy of your soul wants to convince you that God isn’t engaged with your life.
Its all you - Its what you can make it in life. Its the battle of the fittest. Its your contacts, its managing your opportunities, its who you know and what you know, its your fight- basically it is all about you.
You think - God has taken a back seat. He is watching from the stands to see how it works out for you.
God doesn’t take back seats.
If you put him in the back seat you will find no God at all. God owns the road.
God is a God of relationship - He wants to work with you. It is up to you to work with Him
God is in the reconciling business. He loves to fix broken relationships.
18 All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation;
19 that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation.
20 Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.
21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
God has placed you in Him which is a good place - AMEN
It is a place you could not put yourself.
Without God you are without hope
12 remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.
Without God your fathering skills are limited limp. With God as your example of a good good father , WOW it can be amazing.
The father of the prodical son understood love when his son came crawling back home after blowing his inheritance. He was there with welcome arms. He new his son was humbled, he didn’t hold it over his head, he gave him another chance. AMEN
2. You must be fully engaged
In our relationships we act more like Deists than Christians.
I am going to speak to the men of the church for a minute.
Fathers , need to get back in the game instead of watching it on TV
1 Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ.
If God is engaged then we have to figure out a way to get engaged.
The father brings into a relationship Love, trust, loyalty and commitment
That is alot of stuff. We are not called to simply be fans.
In fact most of our kids don’t need fans they have 100’s of them on facebook they need mentors
When we have no one to imitate and no positive male figure to engage with we will have severe problems. ( we have plenty of ungodly male figures)
Men’s Influence is amazing
Men’s Influence is amazing
Influence of Dads on families’ spiritual journey
• If a child comes to Christ first – 3.5% of families will follow
• If Mom comes to Christ first – 17% of families will follow
• If Dad comes to Christ first – 93% of families will follow
Question - If these stats are true, who should the church be trying to reach the most?
Influence of Dads’ church attendance on children’s faith
• When both Mom and Dad attend church – 72% of children remain faithful to God
• When neither parent attends – 6% remain faithful📷
• When only Mom attends – 15% remain faithful
• When only Dad attends – 55% remain faithful
Without engagement and mentoring researchers have found that children will have
Diminished self-concept and compromised physical and emotional security:
struggling with their emotions and bouts of self-loathing.
Behavioral problems: and are more likely to report problems with friendships, many will disguise their underlying fears, resentments, anxieties, and unhappiness
Truancy and poor academic performance: 71 percent of high school dropouts are fatherless; fatherless children have more trouble academically, scoring poorly on tests of reading, mathematics, and thinking skills; children from father-absent homes are more likely to play truant from school, more likely to be excluded from school, more likely to leave school at age 16,
Delinquency and youth crime, including violent crime: 85 percent of youth in prison have an absent father; fatherless children are more likely to offend and go to jail as adults
Promiscuity and teen pregnancy
Drug and alcohol abuse: Fatherless children are more likely to smoke, drink alcohol, and abuse drugs in childhood and adulthood.Homelessness: 90 percent of runaway children have an absent father.
Fatherless children report significantly more psychosomatic health symptoms and illness such as acute and chronic pain, asthma, headaches, and stomachaches.Mental health disorders: Father-absent children are consistently overrepresented in a wide range of mental health problems, particularly anxiety, depression, and suicide.Life chances: As adults, fatherless children are more likely to experience unemployment, have low incomes, remain on social assistance, and experience homelessness.Future relationships:
Father-absent children tend to enter partnerships earlier, are more likely to divorce or dissolve their cohabiting unions, and are more likely to have children outside marriage or outside any partnership.
We must turn to Jesus and ask for his help - AMEN
29 “Then I said to you, ‘Do not be shocked, nor fear them.
30 ‘The Lord your God who goes before you will Himself fight on your behalf, just as He did for you in Egypt before your eyes,
31 and in the wilderness where you saw how the Lord your God carried you, just as a man carries his son, in all the way which you have walked until you came to this place.’
13 Just as a father has compassion on his children, So the Lord has compassion on those who fear Him.
God gets us - Or as the commercial says - Jesus gets us. -He understands.- He is there to help
If we do this
3. Your children will be fully engaged
Scripture says that God is at work reconciling the lost bringing the children back to their fathers
6 Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.
Fathers will have to operate in repentance for their failures.
It is never to late to engage.
Don’t give up the fight.
Or As i used to say for Fathers Day
Never throw in the towel.
Conclusion
What does being fully engaged look like?
Time - time spent - caring about the little and the big things - undivided attention
Walking Beside - through the process of life. Children are not born adults- every step is a victory
Faithfulness - Not through broken promises and neglect but through promises kept and care.
Keeping our eye on the faithful one.- AMEN
2 tim 2:13
13 If we are faithless, He remains faithful, for He cannot deny Himself.