Keys to Being an Influential Father

Scripture

Genesis 6:5–14 KJV 1900

And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart. And the Lord said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; both man, and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; for it repenteth me that I have made them. But Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. These are the generations of Noah: Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God. And Noah begat three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth. And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth. Make thee an ark of gopher wood; rooms shalt thou make in the ark, and shalt pitch it within and without with pitch.

Today, across America, we are honoring our fathers. We have been doing that since 1922, and since Lyndon Johnson signed a proclamation in the mid-sixties. However, honoring fathers is more than a cultural thing.

Exodus 20:12 ''Honor thy father and mother, that your days may be long upon the land which the Lord your God has given you.'' The implication is that a nation that does not honor father and mother will not exist long upon the land.

God commands us to honor our fathers. What does the word ''Father'' mean? It means the founder, foundation and author of a family.

Dad, you are the foundation of your home. Psalm 78:5-7 ''For he established a testimony in Jacob, and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers, that they should teach them to their children, that the generation to come might know, even the children yet to be born, that they may arise and tell them to their children, that they should put their confidence in God, and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments.''

Paul said in Ephesians 4 ''And you fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord.''

Admonition means ''Put something in the mind.'' What do you put in your children's mind? You put the Word of God. ''Your Word have I hidden in my heart that I might not sin against you.''

If there was ever a generation that needed godly influential fathers it is this generation.

Genesis 6:4 tells us what kind of world Noah was living in. They were days of apostasy, anarchy, and apathy! God saw the wickedness was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. Noah lived in the worst of times.

The Bible says ''That as the days of Noah were so shall the coming of the Son of Man be.''

I know that this is a familiar story to you....but there are a lot of lessons we can learn from the story of Noah & The Ark.

1. God Describes The Earth.

a. Marriages were corrupt.

b. Men were corrupt.

c. Minds were corrupt.

d. Manner was corrupt.

2. God Declares The End.

a. Notice His Sigh.

b. Notice His Sorrow.

c. Notice His Saying.

3. God Designs The Escape.

a. It was specific.

b. It was spacious.

d. It was sufficient.

Noah’s Testimony

Good evening

My name is Noah, the son of Lamech, who was the son of Methusaleh, and he in turn was the son of Enoch… Now there was a man for you. Enoch. Walked with God he did. They say that one day he and God were out walking and God said: "Enoch, we appear to be closer to my home than yours, so why don’t you come on home with me?" Enoch, now there was a man to pattern your life after.

I have been asked tonight to come and tell you of the flood. Not that I get asked much else, I mean Noah and the Flood, that’s my only real claim to fame, I mean no one wants to know about Noah the Home Improvements guy its just flood flood flood…anyway...

Well The flood… I was a young man then. A mere 500 years old. I read your local newspaper while I was waiting for Craig this afternoon. I don’t have to tell you what a wicked place my world was, just look around you. Anyway I don’t want to dwell on what it was like. It was bad.

Hard to raise 3 boys in that kind of atmosphere. Shem, now he was my oldest. Then there was Ham, my 2nd born. And Japheth, he was my youngest boy. They were good boys. It was hard to raise them right in that evil world

But I suppose what saved us was that we loved God and I knew he loved me in the same way that I loved my sons. I was always telling them of God’s faithfulness and power and mercy and love. Even after they were married, we met regularly to worship. We’d offer up sacrifices, sing praises to God and bow our faces to the dirt in prayer we would just know we were in Gods love.

You have a writer that walked in the time of our Lord. Matthew was his earthly name. He said it just right. In that time we had to love God with our heart soul and mind and body. In the time of the flood, as Mathew described it for you now the most important thing in life.

One day, out in the fields I heard the voice of God. I don’t know how I knew it was God’s voice - I’d never heard it before. But He said to me: "Noah I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I’m surely going destroy both them & the earth."

Build me an ark 300 cubits long, by 50 cubits wide, by 30 cubits high. … Oh, I forgot, you folks probably don’t even know what a cubit is, do you? Well, a cubit was the distance from a man’s elbow to the tip of his fingers. But then you don’t need to know what a cubit is to know that was one BIG boat. Three stories high and longer than a field of grain.

I was a builder then. I built houses, chairs, small boats. You name it, if it was made of wood, I could build it. But still… I’d never taken on anything quite this big before. Wasn’t sure I could get it done. But like I said… doesn’t pay to argue with God.

Besides, down deep I knew He was right. This was a wicked generation and something had to be done.

We had to rely on that Love we had for God. We had to trust him. My family trusted me enough to come on board, excuse the PUN, and we had to rely on that trust implicitly. People camped outside the building just to watch the spectacle and laugh. We couldn’t go into town to buy supplies cause people would just throw stones at us and laugh. We had to rely on God for everything. We had to trust him for our very survival. It was tough days. I mean they really thought we were mad. So did I sometimes. I made you folk get your mind around this technological age so quickly; here was a man of 500 trying to get his mind around the concept of rain.

Didn’t matter though. The Boat had to be built… Still we had to work the fields. Had to supply for our families. It took nearly 100 years to build that ark. But when it was finished… best work I’d ever done. I have to admit - at 1st I didn’t think it could be done. Didn’t believe anything that big could ever float. But I tell you, when it was finished, I knew no water would ever get into that boat. I had used every ounce of my abilities to do what God wanted us to do. He had blessed our talents and our hands. We had the ability, and once we gave that to God and started using those abilities, things really came together. I mean we invented scaffolding.

God gave us the exact dimensions, the exact layout and every inch was planned. We built that boat exactly how God wanted it. That was part because we had to trust him as we had no clue how to build something like this and part because he was looking after things and he had a right to be obeyed.

He said he would bring us the animals, and he did not fail.

A week before the flood, God gathered birds of every kind, animals of every size every shape and every color. Once the animals and all my family were inside - God shut the door (pause). I can still hear the creaking of the hinges and the sound of the door as it locked into place. It had the sound of… finality.

And then it began to rain… And it rained, and it rained and it rained. After a while you could feel the boat lift off the ground and float free in the water.

Inside the ark was like Garden of Eden. Every imaginable animal was there. And the smell? Well, there was a smell. But you know, it wasn’t all that bad. Kind of got so I liked it. It was the smell... of life. Many of the animals slept most of voyage – hibernation I think it’s called. Those that didn’t became like close friends. They would follow us around. The birds - they were my favorite. I suppose the journey would have been fairly hard except for one thing… God was there. Even when He wasn’t talking to us – and He did talk with us – you knew He was there. You could feel presence and you could sense he was watching us.

You know the story of how we knew that it was almost time to get out of the ark. Olive tree sprig and so on. The day came though that God told us we would be let out the ark. We were on top of a very high mountain, and as we walked down out the ark we just gasped. A clean world as far as we could see.

That night we had a celebration. We laughed and we sang and we danced. Mother made a meal that was finer than any she’d ever prepared. I knew as I heard God’s promises he made to us with the rainbow that we had done good. We thanked him that night right through the night. He smiled on us from that day forward and we never stopped thanking him and praising him with sacrifice.

He knows each of you just like he knew me and the boys. He smiles when we do things his way. He made us to create pleasure in heaven and for himself. I mean what an honor what a wonderful gift. We can make him happy. You see building the ark was an aside. Giving him the pleasure and causing him to smile was what have me and the boys lives so much purpose. Now that’s the real thing about this flood story.

Living righteously has it's rewards

A. He was a righteous man.

B. He was a blameless man.

C. He does not conform to this earth.

D. He consistently followed GOD's Words.

E. He enjoyed a close relationship with God.

Closing

A Father’s Day Toolbox

Adjustable Wrench - Fathers must be flexible and adaptable to any situation that arises.

Level - Fathers must be fair and level-headed.

Staple Gun and Clamp - Fathers must be able to hold things together.

Shop Towels - Father’s are not perfect. They must be ready to clean up the messes they sometimes make.

Extension Cord - Fathers must be able to stretch (able to do lots of different things).

Cologne - "How did that get in there???" Fathers must put mothers first!

Pliers - Fathers must be able to hold on when everyone else is loosing their grip.

Rubber mallet - Fathers must be able to do some persuasion without doing damage.

Faithful, consistent, courageous, and determined

God has issued the call for godly men. He is looking for men who will take up the cross and follow Him. Men who take a stand for what is right. Men who invest their lives in something that will last for generations to come.