The Role and Responsibility of Fathers in the Old Testament

********** Start Timer **********

-We’re going to be continuing our study:

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Marriage, Family, and Sexuality

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Thus far, we’ve spent the overwhelming majority of our time...

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…focusing on biblical definitions and commands for Marriage...

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(With a little bit of instruction on sexuality....

...mixed in with it)

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-But, now… following the general outline of our book (show)...

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Click Off

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…We’re going to begin taking up the issue of family!

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And, I guess it will come as no surprise to any of you...

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…that, the Bible has A LOT to say about that subject as well!

-And, since we don’t have any one particular text to expound...

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...let’s just begin with a word of prayer...

…and we’ll jump right in...

…to introductions and definitions!

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Pray

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-Kostenberger begins this section of the book...

…by asking, and answering, this question:

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What is a family?

Building on our definition of marriage in the previous chapter as a sacred bond between a man and a woman, instituted by and publicly entered into before God...

...we may define “family” as, primarily, one man and one woman united in matrimony (barring death of a spouse) plus (normally) natural or adopted children and, secondarily, any other persons related by blood. — Kostenberger

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Now, that last cause “any other persons related by blood” . . .

…is important for us to keep in mind...

… as we try to understand...

...the family structure of the Old Testament.

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Later, Kostenberger reminds us:

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Because of their descent from a common ancestor, the Israelites perceived themselves as a large extended kinship group.

The Old Testament features four major terms related to family: (1) ‘am (“people”); (2) šēbeṭ maṭṭeh (“tribe”); (3) mišpāhḥâ, (“clan”); and (4) bêt ’āb (“house of a father”)...

The most relevant expression for our present purposes is the fourth one, bêt ’āb, the Hebrew term for “family” (lit., “father’s house”. . .) — Kostenberger

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And then, he points out...

…this obvious, but important difference:

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Unlike the modern Western notion of a nuclear family consisting of husband, wife, and children, ancient Israelite households were comprised of large extended families...

...also including a couple’s married children’s families, any as-of-yet unmarried sons and daughters, and male and female hired servants and slaves along with their families. — Kostenberger

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So, it’s going to be important...

…that we keep these differences in mind...

…as we try to glean the pertinent principles for our lives...

…and make appropriate applications from them.

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-Now, in this consideration of Family in the O.T...

We’re going to begin with (Show title Screen):

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The Role and Responsibilities of Fathers.

And there is a lot that is, either...

…said, implied, or exemplified...

…about that in the Old Testament.

We’re only going to scratch the surface of it.

Lord Willing, in days to come...

…we’ll look at the specific duties of fathers...

…to their sons and daughters (respectively)...

This is going to be more of a survey of the over-arching responsibilities.

-Now, I think most people would (by default)...

…describe the Old Testament family...

…as being very patriarchal.

(Meaning = “father ruled”)

And indeed, that is true...

We’ve seen that a lot already:

1 Corinthians 11:7–9 (ESV)

7 For a man . . . is the image and glory of God, but woman is the glory of man.

8 For man was not made from woman, but woman from man.

9 Neither was man created for woman, but woman for man.

1 Timothy 2:12–13 (ESV)

12 I do not permit a woman . . . exercise authority over a man...

13 For Adam was formed first, then Eve;

Ephesians 5:23–24 (ESV)

23 For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body...

24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.

So yeah, insofar as it goes...

The OT family structure was explicitly patriarchal.

-However, Western Feminism has so demonized that word...

…that it tends to communicate things to the modern hearer...

…that do NOT align with BIBLICAL patriarchy.

I would argue, that BIBLICAL patriarchy...

…was never meant to be...

…a dictatorial or despotic institution.

(Don’t misunderstand me...

…an OT father’s authority was pretty absolute)

…but, what I’m getting at, is...

…that there’s just as much material dedicated...

…to the father’s responsibilities...

…as there is to his power.

And, I think that...

…when we do a survey of these responsibilities...

…it might just end up...

…deflating our neo-patriarchal balloons, a little bit!

And brothers (in particular)...

…I’m not capitulating to the culture by saying this...

I’m trying to be faithful to the Word of God.

YES! The Father is the head of the family

YES! The OT family centered around the father (it just did)

But the LORD calls the fathers among his people...

…to much more than just a lofty position...

He calls them to a lofty practice!

He calls them to model Him!

And look at the way HIS paternal function is described:

Psalm 68:4–7 (ESV)

4 ...his name is the Lord; exult before him!

5 Father of the fatherless and protector of widows is God in his holy habitation.

6 God settles the solitary in a home; he leads out the prisoners to prosperity...

Does that sound like an uncaring despot?

Neither should we be!

-Now, probably the biggest responsibility...

…in the life of an OT father, was:

The Responsibility to Lead the Family in Faithfulness to God

And they were to fulfill that responsibility (firstly)...

…in leading by way of example:

Genesis 17:1–2 (ESV)

1 When Abram was ninety-nine years old the Lord appeared to Abram and said to him, “I am God Almighty; walk before me, and be blameless,

2 that I may make my covenant between me and you, and may multiply you greatly.”

Genesis 17:7 (ESV)

7 And I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring after...

Genesis 18:19 (ESV)

19 ...I have chosen him, that he may command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice, so that the Lord may bring to Abraham what he has promised him.”

Moving forward, this was the obligation of all OT fathers...

And the well-being of their families depended on it:

Remember these daunting words?

Numbers 14:18 (ESV)

18 ‘The Lord is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, forgiving iniquity and transgression, but he will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, to the third and the fourth generation.’

(Think about Achan and his family)

We see an example of this at the Covenant Renewal:

Joshua 24:15 (ESV)

15 ....choose this day whom you will serve . . . But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”

*What’s the application for us?

# We have a duty to live out the faith before our children...

…as an example for them to follow.

-Similarly, the OT father was responsible for:

Ensuring that his family properly and faithfully participated in the worship of the LORD.

We can see the fathers centrality...

…in things like the observance of Passover:

Exodus 12:3 (ESV)

3 Tell all the congregation of Israel that on the tenth day of this month every man shall take a lamb according to their fathers’ houses, a lamb for a household.

This was:

father-led

father-administered.

It was his responsibility to ensure...

…that his family properly worshipped God.

We see an expansion of this duty...

…in the later Feasts that were given:

Deuteronomy 16:16 (ESV)

16 “Three times a year all your males shall appear before the Lord your God at the place that he will choose: at the Feast of Unleavened Bread, at the Feast of Weeks, and at the Feast of Booths...

But, watch:

Deuteronomy 16:11 (ESV)

11 And you shall rejoice before the Lord your God, you and your son and your daughter, your male servant and your female servant, the Levite who is within your towns, the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow who are among you, at the place that the Lord your God will choose, to make his name dwell there.

Everyone has to participate

The heads of household have to ensure that they do.

The onus and responsibility is on them.

*What’s the application for us?

# It’s our responsibility (fathers)...

…to make sure our families faithfully..

Go To

Participate in

…the life of the church!

It’s usually the wife that does it

It’s not her responsibility.

-Similarly, God charged the OT fathers, with:

Making sure their children were adequately instructed in the ways of the Lord

Deuteronomy 6:1–2 (ESV)

1 “Now this is the commandment—the statutes and the rules—that the Lord your God commanded me to teach you, that you may do them...

2 that you may fear the Lord your God, you and your son and your son’s son...

Deuteronomy 6:5–9 (ESV)

5 You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.

6 And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart.

7 You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.

Deuteronomy 6:20–25 (ESV)

20 “When your son asks you in time to come, ‘What is the meaning of the testimonies and the statutes and the rules that the Lord our God has commanded you?’

21 then you shall say to your son, ‘We were Pharaoh’s slaves in Egypt. And the Lord...

24 And the Lord commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear the Lord our God, for our good always, that he might preserve us alive, as we are this day.

25 And it will be righteousness for us, if we are careful to do all this commandment before the Lord our God, as he has commanded us.’

This is the thrust behind general commands, like:

Proverbs 22:6 (ESV)

6 Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.

That includes discipline, as well as instruction:

Proverbs 23:13–14 (ESV)

13 Do not withhold discipline from a child; if you strike him with a rod, he will not die.

14 If you strike him with the rod, you will save his soul from Sheol.

The Combination:

Ephesians 6:4 (ESV)

4 Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

* What’s the application for us?

# That we do that, too!

# It’s ultimately our responsibility to teach our children the ways of God...

Not (ultimately):

Pastors

Sunday School Teachers

Mothers

All of those are proper...

…but it ultimately falls on the fathers.

-Now, blending the secular and the sacred responsibilities...

We also see that Israelite men had a responsibility to:

Manage and maintain ancestral properties.

Provide for the needs of their families with that land.

Pass it on faithfully to their sons.

Now, this was a pretty Covenant-specific obligation...

But, the principles behind it are transcendent...

…and can be seen in many other places:

For example, as general principles, the Bible says things, like:

Proverbs 13:22 (ESV)

22 A good man leaves an inheritance to his children’s children...

1 Timothy 5:8 (ESV)

8 ...if anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.

And, if you think about it...

…this was set in place at creation:

Genesis 2:15 (ESV)

15 The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it.

Was the “helper” meant to help him...

Work the ground?

Fill up and subdue the world with image-bearers?

Genesis 3:17–19 (ESV)

17 And to Adam he said, “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ cursed is the ground because of you; in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life;

18 thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; and you shall eat the plants of the field.

19 By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread...

Genesis 3:16 (ESV)

16 To the woman he said, “I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children...

Genesis 3:20 (ESV)

20 The man called his wife’s name Eve, because she was the mother of all living.

Those roles are pretty clear.

For most of human history...

…they were simply assumed.

-Again, similar to this, a man was responsible for...

The protection of his household against threats:

Again, this was a primeval responsibility of the man:

Genesis 2:15 (ESV)

15 The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it.

“Shamar” = Keep, Guard, protect.

This, also, was simply assumed.

Hebrews 11:7 (ESV)

7 By faith Noah, being warned by God concerning events as yet unseen, in reverent fear constructed an ark for the saving of his household...

We see it perpetuated in Abram’s rescue of Lot:

Genesis 14:14 (ESV)

14 When Abram heard that his kinsman had been taken captive, he led forth his trained men, born in his house, 318 of them, and went in pursuit as far as Dan.

Women didn’t serve in combat in the ancient world.

Genesis 14:16 (ESV)

16 Then he brought back all the possessions, and also brought back his kinsman Lot with his possessions, and the women and the people.

A ubiquitous principle:

Joshua 1:12 (ESV)

12 And to the Reubenites, the Gadites, and the half-tribe of Manasseh Joshua said,

Joshua 1:14 (ESV)

14 Your wives, your little ones, and your livestock shall remain in the land that Moses gave you beyond the Jordan, but all the men of valor among you shall pass over armed before your brothers and shall help them,

Wasn’t just physical:

Job 1:4–5 (ESV)

4 His sons used to go and hold a feast in the house of each one on his day, and they would send and invite their three sisters to eat and drink with them.

5 And when the days of the feast had run their course, Job would send and consecrate them, and he would rise early in the morning and offer burnt offerings according to the number of them all. For Job said, “It may be that my children have sinned, and cursed God in their hearts.” Thus Job did continually.

-On the other hand, A father was expected to be compassionate:

Psalm 103:13 (ESV)

13 As a father shows compassion to his children, so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear him.

These aren’t mutually exclusive:

1 Corinthians 16:13–14 (ESV)

13 Be watchful, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong.

14 Let all that you do be done in love.

Galatians 4:6–7 ESV

6 And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” 7 So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God.