Biblical Fathers

Today is Father's day. I have three kids, Gabriel, Liliana, and my oldest daughter Kayleigh's birthday is tomorrow. She was born the day before father's day.

So I got to spend the day in the hospital with her and literally every single person coming in the room to do whatever they were doing, like the nurses and techs and the doctors.

They all came in saying either "Happy Father's Day!!" or "eh … um, happy fathers day... " some of them were really excited for me, or faked it very well. And the others didn't care. They didn't care that I was actually there. I was just in the way of their job.

Act a little more excited or something right?!?0 like, it's Father's day and you work in a place where people are having babies?! Aren't you happy that the father is even here?!

Every 6 years Kayleigh's birthday is on Father day. And I can look back and think to myself that in God's providence and wisdom, she was born a couple weeks early and gave me this sermon illustration.

In seriousness though, my children are a reminder of the father that I want to be on more occasions than just on Father's day. Every time I take time to think of my children I am reminded that I am, in fact, a father to them.

What does it mean to be a father? I know that when you think of Father's day, you think of people much like myself who are biological parents or adoptive parents like some others. But in reality, all Christian men act in a fatherly sense towards others. We are called as men to take care of those around us and serve those just as Christ serves the Church.

Lots of men take up this responsibility too! I’ve seen many men here at Sonrise step up and assume the role of father in many ways. Even to those who don’t have fathers.

The problem is that society thinks that it's ok to NOT have a father.

or .., as society progresses to further sinfulness…

for the father to not be a man.

Our culture today is wrecked by sin, and so it comes as no surprise to me that the picture of a biblical father would get destroyed, along with everything else that God stands for.

(PAUSE)

So the question is, "Why are fathers important?" Why do we need to discuss this today? Why should this come up any day?

Well...

Let's look at some statistics on fathers and why they're important.

There is a father absence crisis in America.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 19.7 million children, more than 1 in 4, live without a father in the home. Consequently, there is a father factor in nearly all social ills facing America today.

Many of the fathers today are pretty much "baby daddies" and have no involvement in their children's lives, if they even care to know that they actually have children.

What happens when you don't have a dad in the house?

Listen to this

4x greater risk of poverty.

Your teenage daughters are 7x more likely to engage in premarital sex and get pregnant.

There a correlation between families without fathers and mental illness.

there's is as higher risk of the family getting into drug and alcohol abuse if the father isn't present.

Children are 2x as likely to become obese.

The list goes on and on. There is a reason that God designed the family to have a father in it. Even the church calls God, "Our Father in heaven." There is no mistake in this, the Spirit guides the authors of Scripture to make this connection.

Fathers are critical to the development of not only their children, but their whole family and also society as a whole.

So what does the Bible say about Fathers? Is there a specific section about raising your kids, providing for your family, how to discipline, you get the idea right, how to be a dad?

There is no Father book with chapters 1-5.

But the bible does tell us about Fathers and their responsibilities. It's peppered throughout the Bible in various places and to get the whole picture I'm going to explain some main points of "how to dad" that the Bible gives us. They may seem pretty obvious, but we need to be reminded often.

(PAUSE) Our main scripture today is in CSB.

The book of Deuteronomy is covenant treaty between God and his people. Now while the principles in this passage apply generally to God’s people, we can grab some bits and pieces from it to teach us about fathers.

Moses says starting in 6:1...

1“This is the command—the statutes and ordinances—the LORD your God has commanded me to teach you, so that you may follow them in the land you are about to enter and possess. 2 Do this so that you may fear the LORD your God all the days of your life by keeping all his statutes and commands I am giving you, your son, and your grandson, and so that you may have a long life. 3 Listen, Israel, and be careful to follow them, so that you may prosper and multiply greatly, because the LORD, the God of your fathers, has promised you a land flowing with milk and honey.

4 “Listen, Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one.,h 5 Love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength. 6 These words that I am giving you today are to be in your heart. 7 Repeat them to your children. Talk about them when you sit in your house and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. 8 Bind them as a sign on your hand and let them be a symbol on your forehead.,l 9 Write them on the doorposts of your house and on your city gates.

CSB

POINT 1.

Biblical Fathers are dedicated to God, (FIRST)

The first thing we see here is God expects of of his people is to be dedicated to him.

[SLIDE]

The LORD our God, the LORD is one. Love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength. These words that I am giving you today are to be in your heart.

The text clearly says what it means to follow God in response to the first statement. Our LORD, Yahweh, the almighty God over all creation, is the one true LORD. His name is above any other name. No other religion, man, or any institution is above him. Yahweh is the LORD.

And since we have been called as his chosen people, it seems only natural that the fathers of his children should love him with everything they have.

Jesus, being God himself in the flesh, told us this in his discussion with the pharisees and the scribes.

29 Jesus answered, “The most important is Listen, O Israel! The Lord our God, the Lord is one. 30 Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength, 31 The second is, Love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other command greater than these.”

32 Then the scribe said to him, “You are right, teacher. You have correctly said that he is one, and there is no one else except him. 33 And to love him with all your heart, with all your understanding, and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself, is far more important than all the burnt offerings and sacrifices.”

34 When Jesus saw that he answered wisely, he said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.”

.

Fathers are supposed love God with all of their hearts, with their whole soul, and with all of their strength.

But what does that look like? How do you love somebody with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength?

(PAUSE)

To love the Lord like this we must do it as he give us ability; we must love the LORD in faith.

We get at the heart of the command to love the Lord when we have all of our faith in him and him alone. He is the true LORD, the only God above all, whose name is above all other names. Those who have complete faith in him are his people and love him.

Pledging allegiance and loyalty is what the covenant stipulated. Over people, over country, over other “gods” that we may have, EVERYTHING.

The Bible clearly teaches that it is faith alone, our love for the Lord and undying loyalty to him is what saves.

A father is first commanded to love the LORD in faith.

Abraham implicitly followed the LORD and had complete faith in him, even when he was asked to sacrifice Isaac.

Job had complete faith in the LORD even as he lost everything, his family, his livelihood, everything.

And so as fathers, we need to have complete faith in the LORD that he will get us through everything, because he should be everything to us.

That is how you love the LORD with all your heart, all your mind, all your soul, and all your strength.

(PAUSE)

Illustration

Very often, fathers will get busy.

They are sometimes overwhelmed with work, They are overwhelmed with responsibilities at home and with friends.

I often fall into this trap of getting anxiety over silly things because of things like this. We get overwhelmed. If your a father and you get overwhelmed, let me tell you this: IT’S NORMAL. And it’s normal because as men, actually, because we’re human and sinners, it’s because we forget why were here in the first place.

We get overwhelmed often because of pride, because we try to be lazy, often it’s because we are selfish and get too self involved and when the problems of life come around we frankly don’t care. And often because we don’t work in life the way we were designed.

Getting overwhelmed is normal, but there is a solution: By putting your faith in the LORD first, and not in yourself. The reason we get overwhelmed is because we are focused on a temporal matter and not focused on God and what he wants us to do.

Application

So how do we do what the LORD wants us to do? How do we stay faithful to God?

A couple of ways help, but ultimately nothing is going to completely fix the problem until the LORD comes to take us to the Heavenly Father and leave sin forever.

One way is to work hard, and do it for the LORD. says…

And whatever you do, in word or in deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. CSB

Work hard and get tired, come home and help mom take care of the kids, put them to bed, take care of mom, go to bed tired. That’s what men are supposed to do, That’s what fathers are supposed to do.

Now I understand that may not be possible for a select few people, but just like says, whatever you do, do it wholeheartedly for God above everything else.

(Short PAUSE)

Also, wake up early and prioritize God. Whether that is studying your bible, doing a devotional, praying, or something else. Get up early and spend time dedicated to the Lord first.

Remember to work and live your life for the glory of God. Live in complete faith and reliance on our Heavenly Father. By trusting in the LORD and loving him above all else comes with a promise.

… so that you may follow them in the land you are about to enter and possess…

The verse says that if we love the Lord like this, it shows that you are part of the kingdom of God.

When people ask why you work so hard and why you love your family so much, you can tell them that you have faith in the LORD, that our Heavenly Father has promised us blessings in paradise. Be the father of faith that shows you are part of the kingdom of God, because you have much more to look forward to.

(PAUSE)

POINT 2.

Jesus tells us when he is explaining the covenant agreement that the first part of the greatest commandment is to Love god. The second part is to love our neighbors.

Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. & Love your neighbor as yourself.

He also says this ...

9 “As the Father has loved me, I have also loved you. Remain in my love. 10 If you keep my commands you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love.

11 “I have told you these things so that my joy may be in you and your joy may be complete.

12 “This is my command: Love one another as I have loved you. 13 No one has greater love than this: to lay down his life for his friends.

Jesus says that the greatest love is to lay down your life for your others because of the love our Heavenly Father has for us. We supposed to love our neighbors and friends this way.

(Short PAUSE)

So for fathers, that is their family. Our wives and children are our first neighbors and friends. They deserve and require our attention first.

So just like I was saying about being faithful, we need to prioritize loving our children. Without them, we wouldn’t be fathers in the first place.

And this goes hand-in-hand with what I just said because Biblical Fathers put the needs of their family over their individual needs.

Now I might be going on a bit of a rant right here, because it’s something I’m passionate about, but I’m going to tell you how I think it should be, from a biblical perspective. That doesn’t mean there isn’t exceptions.

Men, we need to sacrifice our personal wants and needs and step up to raise our families. If you work the whole day and then come home to your wife and children going crazy, it's time for you to take over and help.

If your wife is a stay at home mom and is dealing with a natural disaster that has blown through the house, Get in there and help. Don’t say stuff like "I didn't go to work all day to deal with this!" or “Why do I have to clean up your mess?” to your wife and kids.

Fathers don’t get to say that.

It’s our responsibility to care for our family, to sacrifice ourselves for our friends and neighbors. Remember that Jesus actually cleaned the feet of and fed his disciples.

Your children are your disciples.

The work you do for your family disciples them. Children learn by example. If you treat them like crap, like you don’t love them and aren’t willing to sacrifice for them, that's what they'll do too.

If you treat your wife or family like they are your servants or like they are worthless, that is how your children will act. I have seen people who have no respect for their wife, speak poorly about her around their kids, and then their kids treat all women like this as they get older.

Our wives and children are NOT a burden to us. As fathers, they are a blessing to us. Let’s start treating them that way. Work for the LORD as you sacrifice your selfish desires and pride.

As the example of what it means to be a Christian in our families lives, we need to model Jesus to them by living a sacrificial life of service to them.

The Apostle Paul says in his second letter to the church at Corinth

2 You yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts, known and read by everyone. 3 You show that you are Christ’s letter, delivered by us, not written with ink but with the Spirit of the living God—not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts.

In Paul letters, he is writing them about how to be the Church basically and in this he tells us that we are ourselves letters to our families and others about what it means to be a faithful follower of Jesus Christ.

What kind of letter are you writing to others and your family?

(PAUSE)

Illustration

Look at how different fathers have sacrificed themselves for the betterment of their families. You can see it every day in fathers all around us.

In the bible there is a particular father that I can think of that fits this description.

Joseph, the husband of Mary and earthly father of Jesus, sacrificed his pride and raised Jesus as his own. He followed the Heavenly Father and had faith in him alone. He sacrificed his pride when he followed what the Lord told him and took Mary as his wife.

Imagine what people thought of him. His wife was pregnant before they got married. So in the others’ eyes, either they had conceived a child before getting married, or Mary had an adulterous relationship and gotten pregnant. Either way, Joseph followed the LORD and took her under his care. He sacrificed himself for his family.

(PAUSE)

Application

So how are fathers supposed to sacrifice ourselves for their families?

Fathers are supposed to model Christ to their family. As Christ loved the Church, so we should love our families.

Look how Jesus served his people. He cleaned, he fed, he taught. He showed the LORD’s people how to live and love.

This leads into my ending perfectly, which is that...

POINT 3.

Biblical Fathers teach and discipline their children

As a parent, a father should be the first teacher a child has.

says …

6 These words that I am giving you today are to be in your heart. 7 Repeat them to your children. Talk about them when you sit in your house and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. 8 Bind them as a sign on your hand and let them be a symbol on your forehead. 9 Write them on the doorposts of your house and on your city gates.

With faith and sacrificial love, fathers teach their children what is important to them. But it is not enough to simply act like a Christian and never tell anybody about Jesus. We have to train our kids to love the LORD the way we do and why we do.

Without doing this, how can we expect our children to grow up to be what we hope for them, to love the LORD in faith and know what it means to be Christian.

What we teach our children early on stays with them.

says

Start a youth out on his way; even when he grows old he will not depart from it.

The text of Deuteronomy like I said in the beginning, is God’s covenant stipulations for his kingdom and what is required of us. So, just as the text says about teaching them about faith and love, as Jesus explains, fathers are supposed to teach their children about God.

And let me say this now, it is not anybody else’s responsibility to teach your children. First and foremost, fathers need to proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ to their children and stop assuming they are saved.

Shoving your kids into a children’s ministry and a christian school and letting others do the work for you shows your children that your not sure of what you believe in. Why should they follow what you do if you don’t teach them?

Application

So right now, I’m going to tell you how to do it. It’s not behavior modification we’re looking for here. The LORD changes hearts, so we are going to preach to the good news of Jesus to our children so he changes their hearts.

And if you’ve never heard the news of salvation in Jesus then listen in, because the Heavenly Father is calling his children home.

(PAUSE)

In the beginning, God created everything. He made the universe, he is the author of time, and he created humanity. And he made everything just the way he wanted. And it was all good.

God wanted a family so he created us. He then put us in paradise and all he asked us to do was obey him. Fathers do the same thing with their children, we want them to obey us. That’s what God wants.

That there was a problem waiting to happen. If you really think about it, we cannot go even a couple hours without disobeying God in our hearts. So we didn’t last long in paradise.

We were convinced that we should disobey God by somebody else who disobeys God, the Satan.

In that single act by our first father, Adam, all humanity plunged into slavery to sin. Everything that we are is tainted by sin. We are consumed by it and it controls us. that what it means to be human in our world. We are sinners.

God then kicked us out of the garden, because he can’t tolerate sin. And the big issue for us is that the penalty of sin is death, we have committed eternal treason with God by being sinners.

says…

For the wages of sin is death

The penalty for sin is our blood, we must die.

But God had a plan for that already, and that was and is to fix it for us by dying himself. Before the beginning, when only God was, God decided that he would save his family through sacrificing himself on their behalf.

says…

For he chose us in him, before the foundation of the world, to be holy and blameless in love before him. He predestined us to be adopted as sons through Jesus Christ for himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace that he lavished on us in the Beloved One. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace.

The Heavenly Father decided to save his children through the sacrifice of his Son, the LORD Jesus. Jesus was born apart from sin, he was and is not tainted by sin the same way we are, but was tempted in the same way. Jesus was not consumed with sin, he was free to resist it because Jesus is the LORD, he is God.

Jesus, in his death, took our penalty on to himself, the sin of all time from all humanity, past present and future. He was the only sacrifice that would do, because if he didn’t die perfect, he could not rise.

Jesus did not stay dead, be resurrected from the dead. He was dead three day and rose. In his resurrection, he defeated death and gives us his righteousness. He took our sin and killed it, and we live in his righteousness. Through that perfect sacrifice, we can re-enter paradise with God. Through Jesus’ perfection, we are made perfect through his blood and are justified by him.

God works in us when we are presented with this. He is drawing his family to him. God desires that all his children would repent of their sin, to confess that they are sinners and guilty, and then come running to him. The Father comforts and shelters his children.

Conclusion

(PAUSE)

Fathers, today I present you with the truth to tell your children.

This is the duty of every Christian, and especially fathers with their children. It is our duty to teach our children the good news of salvation, the good news of God’s family.

We must teach our children what is means to be a part of the family of God and learn more about him.

And while I know you’re not all fathers who are here, it is every Christian’s responsibility to proclaim the good news to the people in their lives to draw God’s family home. We must come home to God in Jesus.

What are you going to do?

Fathers, take the charge that’s been given you. Remain faithful, love the LORD with all of your heart, mind, soul, and strength. Live a life sacrificially for God and sacrifice yourself for your family. Sacrifice your pride, your comfort, your desires, and be the Father LORD Jesus created you to be.

Repent of your previous sinful life and come to God with faith.

Let’s pray.