Fathers

[00:00:00] This audio sermon is provided by AnabaptistSermons.com and may be freely copied and distributed. You may not sell or edit this sermon. Our prayer is that you would be blessed by this ministry. Greetings in the name of Christ. Usually when we hear a message about fathers, the focus is on the fathers. But this morning the focus will not be so much on the fathers as on the fathers' children. [00:00:31] When you think of Father's Day, why did they ever establish a day that's called Father's Day? Was that a day to tell the fathers how they ought to conduct themselves and how they ought to do and live and so on? I think many of us as fathers, especially younger fathers, have had a real interest in having just a real set of direction to know how can you be a successful father. Now we all have this thing in common this morning that all of us have a father. [00:01:09] Now we've had all kinds of fathers. In our congregation there are people that no longer have a living earthly father. There are some of us that never knew their father. Some are growing up in homes without a father. Some have had fathers that there has been a real blessing, a real security. Other times it wasn't quite the same way. [00:01:43] But I'd like to read the words of God the Father when he took his people out of Egypt and gave them a set of directions to go by that we call today the Ten Commandments. One of these ten, when he summarized and put into a little package, just about, well, into ten words, somebody said, He told us how we could live in a way that would be acceptable to Him. [00:02:15] It really affects, first of all, our relationship to God. Then it affects our relationship to people. When you've got those two things taken care of, life is pretty much taken care of. And so He said in the fifth commandment, Honor thy father and thy mother, That thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee. He didn't say honor your father or your mother if things are going pretty good. [00:02:48] If you've had a famous father, if your father was Moses, then you better honor Moses. He just said honor your father. So we're going to stop with that this morning. To me it seems that this day has been set aside in recognition of how that we should view our family relationship. How we should view our relationship as a child to a parent, to a father in particular. Neither do I notice in the Ten Commandments that he said, honor your fathers if you are 12 years old or younger. [00:03:24] He just said, honor your fathers. In other words, it's a lifetime experience. In fact, in the youth class at Bible schools, we were going through the Ten Commandments. I noticed that the people that put the book together, as they looked into the scriptures and interpreted the meaning of this commandment, it had mostly to do with older people respecting their parents more than the adolescents or younger. [00:03:56] But it was the old folks that needed to honor their fathers. He didn't say, it doesn't say either that we should honor our parents if they're still living. It just says, honor your fathers. So it's a fairly inclusive thing. The Old Testament says, or the meaning of the original language for honor says to make glorious or to promote. So when we honor our parents, we make them glorious. How do you make an unglorious person glorious? [00:04:29] You could ask the question. The New Testament word that's used says value, revere, obey, think and speak well of, take care of, nourish, support. So all those are ways that we can honor our parents. As we said today, we want to focus not so much on the father's responsibility as on our relationship, our focus on our fathers. [00:05:06] I'd like to read a number of scriptures that emphasize the importance. We could have read as well in Ephesians, the sixth chapter, where it says, Children, obey your parents in the Lord. Then he says basically the same thing as the Ten Commandments. Exodus 21. Notice a few things that tell us the importance that God puts on this respect, or this, what's the right word, this view of our fathers. Verse 15. [00:05:40] He that smiteth his father or his mother shall surely be put to death. Verse 17. He that curses his father or his mother shall surely be put to death. Go over to Deuteronomy, the 21st chapter, in verse 18 and following. If a man have a stubborn and rebellious son which will not obey the voice of his father or the voice of his mother, and that when they have chastened him will not hearken unto them, then shall his father and his mother lay hold on him and bring him out unto the elders of his city and unto the gate of his place. [00:06:17] And they shall say unto the elders of his city, This our son is stubborn and rebellious. He will not obey our voice. He is a glutton and a drunkard. All the men of his city shall stone him with stones that he died. So shalt thou put evil away from among you. And all Israel shall hear and fear. Now, we could go on to Proverbs, the Psalms, read similar things. Maybe I'll just leave that. That's enough to make the point, I believe. He is saying simply that if there is a disrespectful son to his parents, what should you do to him? [00:06:55] I don't think any of us ever did anything even close to that, nor do we have any desire to as parents. but in God's eyes he is saying this relationship is of such importance that we have to get rid of the problem. Stone him with stones if he is rebellious, if he is stubborn, if he doesn't listen. Aren't you thankful this morning that we are in the new dispensation? [00:07:28] I am thankful that we were in the new dispensation already when I was a child, a younger child. We might see lots of stone piles around if we were still living in the old dispensation. But thank God today that there is a throne where there is mercy. But usually we say that we're not under the law, we're under grace. But when God says, Jesus said that we're not under the law, but under grace, the condition intensified. [00:08:00] he said it has been said you shall not kill but I say unto you, you shall not hate which is the greatest and you could include that in the different commandments and if that's applicable in the others it's probably applicable here so if he's saying if you take a son that is rebellious doesn't respect his parents stone him what would he say under the news probably has to do with attitudes and not just drunkenness like he was talking about here [00:08:34] or deliberate disobedience. But he's saying our relationship ought to exceed the Old Testament relationship. Our respect. We go back to 2 Timothy, the third chapter. My mind was drawn to that passage as I was thinking about this subject. and probably also because of these situations that have been occurring in the last number of months here in our country. [00:09:06] Things are happening that simply are completely irrational. Don't make sense any way you look at it if you stop and analyze. Let me just read this first. This know also that in the last days perilous times shall come. Are there some perilous times about us today? In the last days perilous times shall come. Men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, [00:09:42] truce breakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God, Having a form of godliness but denying the power thereof From such turn away He says that's the way it's going to be in the last times There are going to be perilous times And he says amongst the things that he mentions as a sign of this peril These calamities is the fact that people are going to be disobedient to parents [00:10:15] Now in the home is the first place Where we learn some of these principles, these character qualities of life, right, from our parents. And I would venture to say this morning that the person that has had the most unqualified parent among us has a lot to be thankful for yet today, for the things that we do have. I am wondering, no, I am believing that a lot of the things that are happening, the absurd things, the far out things that are happening in our day [00:10:56] are a consequence of this loss of respect that has occurred. A few of us, comparatively speaking, can remember the 60s. I still remember going to Detroit, going to the big cities of our country. What was happening in those cities back in those days? What was happening over here by Stone Lake when tens of thousands of young people gathered together for a rock festival? [00:11:33] There was an open demonstration of disrespect for authority. Policemen were called pigs Fathers were called the old man or the old fogey or much worse There was a collapse of respect today 50 some years later or around 50 years later Those people that were made free are now the people in authority in our land [00:12:03] and the moral state of our country has not improved. What is going on? Well, some things are no longer like they were. I used to be afraid, very hesitant to go to Detroit in those days because city blocks were burning off time and again as people gathered together and demonstrated their freedom. In Chicago it was the same and in some smaller towns it was the same. [00:12:36] There was chaos and disorder because it was the beginning of the hippie movement as we knew it then. It was the beginning of the free demonstration of the rock society. What it was, was a rebellion against structure and authority. Disrespect for parents. Even today yet, you will find people roaming this earth in pursuit of meaning. They are roaming. If you travel in other countries, you will run into them time and again. [00:13:09] They are looking for meaning in life. They have discarded the home structure. And largely, it is not the fault of the young people. It is largely the responsibility of older people. But, that is a choice that young people have made, or that people have made, to not respect authority. I would say we would still be much better off today if we would not have lost the respect for God's order than we are to rebel against God's order when God's order is violated or disregarded. [00:13:51] we have lost much more than we have gained because first of all God instituted this order whatever this commandment is disregarded the result is calamity God said to the children of Israel honor your parents so that it may be well with you and you may live long in the land I wonder if that doesn't have to do with that other scripture Where is it in the Psalms where it says the wicked shall be turned into hell and all nations that forget God. [00:14:28] When we forget God there is always a calamity in the making. So that's why you see people that can grow up in a church. People that can go to take communion with their church people while they are living in open adultery. No, secret adultery but not secret to God. until a woman can go to her lover's house, shoot his wife, and think they'll get away with it. Just like happened in Ohio last week. [00:15:02] Or that's why people can live in adulterous relationships and think somehow it's going to turn out all right. That's why a man can give a message to his neighbor and say we'll see you in heaven when he's on his way to commit suicide. Now these are all very current things and we're not going to preach about current events this morning. These are things that are happening and these are not isolated cases. [00:15:32] These are things that are more and more taking place across the world until our sensitivity can become dulled and no longer do we see the severity of the thing. It can be traced directly to this issue. There is a loss of respect for God's order. So I'm glad this morning that there's a lot brighter picture than the one I just painted. That we have much to be thankful for and that we do well [00:16:07] Even when our fathers are imperfect as the present day generation fathers are As this one at least There is lots of imperfection But I'm glad this morning, though I cannot say that my father was a perfect father That he always did things I can remember things that I wish I couldn't remember But I can remember many more things for which I am indeed very grateful And some of them I haven't thought about much That's why stopping and thinking I become more grateful as time goes on [00:16:40] Of the things, the blessings that we have handed down to us That we take for granted If we think the situation today is on the rocks Think a little bit how it would be if there were no godly fathers anymore. If we think the church is a failure, let's start thinking about what it would be like if there were no church anymore. There are a lot of blessings that we have today and as a tribute, not just to my father personally, [00:17:19] but as a tribute to fathers, I'd like to mention a few things that I noticed, that I thought about And maybe we should just stop right here and give everybody a chance to talk about values that you understand that you have picked up in life because of your father. Maybe we didn't stop and analyze, but there it is. We have a belief system, a way of behavior. I thought of reading that little statement Gary read at the Mother's Day program about the meanest mother. [00:17:51] Remember that meanest mother that deprived her children of so many things other people were doing? They couldn't do all the things that they wanted, and now they turned out, so they never ended up in jail. They never had all those experiences, but they had a clean conscience and a godly life. And if that's a mean mother, then God grant us more mean mothers and fathers. People that have values and principles that they stand for. [00:18:23] One of the values that I have received from my parents, my father as well, is the value of self-denial. No, really the truth is that life reality is that not everything is always going to be easy. That's just the way life is. Life is not always fair. It just simply isn't. That as I thought about that, I learned from my father to give up some of my personal desires and some of my plans and some of my preferences and even some of my tastes. [00:19:00] I had to eat things I didn't like. I hope every child in here has learned some of that. That was a teaching to us. Now my father didn't say today we're going to study about self-denial. Jesus said if any man will come after me let him deny himself take up his cross and follow me but simply reality dictates that we cannot always do as we please and have a pleasant life it takes well we can either be flexible or miserable somebody summarized it and that's just about the way it is if we learn that there are times when we simply do well to give up but I see a trend developing that [00:19:44] More and more it seems like we are losing this value in this that we try to make room for everything we'd like to do. And today you find that often people don't have time for certain things, but the interesting thing is that they then do have time for the things they'd like to do. Maybe we would do better to pass on again the legacy of self-denial. Sometimes we had plans to go away and they're unannounced. [00:20:16] You know, it wasn't like it is now. Back in those days, when, may I use that term, back in those days? Okay, then I will. Back in those days, we didn't always call ahead and say, we're coming into your community, could we stay at your house? We just went, we just came, there we were. And maybe a family had plans and things were all in place and there they came. And we weren't ready. We had nothing prepared for them, at least. [00:20:51] That just wasn't in the plans. And here we were all looking forward to doing something together. And now that. What would you say? You don't just say, well, we had plans. We just changed plans. And you know what? It was good for us. And that was true about a lot of things. We learned something about self-denial. We learned as well that happiness is not derived from circumstances or things. [00:21:23] But really contentment comes from accepting life as it comes to us. Being flexible, being adjustable. In that you learn that people are more important than things. and preferences in life. We learned as well that God has a purpose for each of us. That we're here on this earth. Actually, we're not our own. Know you not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which you have of God, and you are not your own. That's what Paul said to the Corinthians. [00:21:55] Then he said, therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's. Actually, when we learn to adjust, be flexible, we learn that we live here on this earth not just for self-interest, but for the good of God's people, the good of God's creation. We learn that God has a purpose for us. Life takes on meaning when you find that God has a purpose for you. And the greatest discovery that a person can ever make is to learn what God's purpose is for me. [00:22:30] What discovery can you make greater than that? We learned a work ethic. And I know that's harder and harder as time goes on. On a farm, that kind of took care of itself. Back in those days, especially if you pitched hay with a fork instead of bale stackers and all those things. And you had, finally, we got a three-bottom, three-sixteen-inch plow. We were really into farming. Things were going great. [00:23:02] But you had to work from sunup to sundown in order to exist, in order to live. And sometimes we could see right through the wall of our house to see the sun. Not through the window, but through the wall. And we didn't know we were poor. It was one of those things where a person learned to work. Today you see the idols sitting around. One of the cries, one of the complaints of people in our present day economic situation is that so many people are on welfare today, even plain people, that they have time to sit at home and play games instead of doing something constructive day after day after day. [00:23:53] Now, it's not wrong to play a game, but it's not very edifying or fulfilling to play games day after day after day without accomplishing something of value. We learn the work ethic. Maybe sometimes we learn it too well. I'm not sure. There's that possibility. But that's something we ought to be thankful for. Many people today have lost the sense of fulfillment that there is by accomplishing something gainful and useful. [00:24:29] Another thing that my parents taught me, my father taught me this in different ways, is the importance of forgiveness. One time I remember he got a phone call. Somebody called collect. I don't know, can you even still do that or not? Make collect calls. Well, he got a collect call to receive a balling out. And he paid it. Somebody wanted to vent their criticisms to him. I think it was about him. [00:25:02] And he accepted the collect call. Of course, he didn't know what it was about. I don't know what he would have done. But he hadn't spent many times, many tears over that issue. Another thing that I remember that he did that taught me something about forgiveness I don't know how to say this in five words But the time was when there was a division in the church At Fairhaven and Hebron started My father was an excavator And you can imagine the sentiments he had about people leaving the church [00:25:37] But he came and he dug the basement for the Hebron Church House. He taught me something about forgiveness. The contrary to that is bitterness. We have a lot to be thankful for when we have been taught how to forgive, how to relate to people that don't think like we do. I learned the security of love and belonging in our home. [00:26:08] We've said here before that according to the books today, we probably did about everything backwards. We didn't verbalize all the things that we are told that we need to today and all those things. The idea is not that we shouldn't verbalize, that we shouldn't express our appreciation, our love. But somehow it's more important to have love than it is to say I have love. And that's what came through. And as a tribute to fathers today, I want to, what's the word, praise, honor, I want to honor every father that comes through to his children that they are loved. [00:26:53] And that they can always come home, they can always come home because he's providing a home for them. there's a place called home and if we can as fathers have a place that is called home and that our children know that when they're out there in this raw world and things don't go well they can always come home that's where they belong what can we give to our families that's greater security than that the last one I'm going to mention is [00:27:25] in our home we learn eternal values we learn that life is temporal we all know that anyway but many times we don't live like we know then we learn that life is temporal today death is camouflaged many people never take their children to a viewing that's cruel but it's very valuable no it's not cruel but that's the idea I believe we do well to maintain that practice [00:27:57] to keep focused on the fact that this life is but for a moment as it were we're on our way to a better place when we have that view, when our goal is to get to that better place we see life as a place to prepare for a better place we pass on something to our children I receive something from my parents that is worth treasuring I am here but for a time I am on my way to a better place and death is a stark reality of that truth [00:28:30] there you see and to each of us if we have not already seen it could well be that we will see one day our father in a box and lowered six feet under then what will we feel at that moment But we're not appealing just to the sentiments or the emotions But the true values that we have received Thank God for our parents, for what they have taught us [00:29:04] We have been taught in many ways the authority of the word of God We do not question, I hope we do not question I've admitted to you that I've had struggles in this area in the past As a young person, in trying to reason out God, I do not question this morning the authority of this book, the place where it comes from, the intent of this book. It is the message from the living God to his creation. [00:29:37] I learned that from my parents as they took literally as they took specifically that what is written here is written for our good it is meant to be put to practice it is not meant to be reinterpreted it is not meant to be reasoned out it is meant to do that's just the way it is and when we do that we find a blessing We find that peace that goes with this vision of being made for a better place than this. [00:30:16] We see the same thing about prayer. Our parents prayed. Many of your parents prayed out of a prayer book. Maybe still do. My parents prayed out of a prayer book. I'm not sure, did we always pray or did we just read sometimes? But that's a little bit beside the point right now. In that experience, I learned that there is a God on which to call. And I trust to each of us it is a personal thing now. [00:30:48] But I know that my father not only prayed out of a prayer book, but he also prayed out of his heart. One day in a very vivid way, well, different times, I saw him sometimes in an unexpected moment. I came on him back there in the parlor praying. I don't know what he was praying about, but one day I know what he was praying about. He was a man that prayed as he went, and we're not saying this morning we shouldn't have a private prayer closet, but it was a life of prayer. When we were coming down out in Plain City, Ohio in a little grass strip in an airplane, when the situation was just about all reversed from ideal, [00:31:29] Finally we touched down but the grass was wet and we were sliding and we were up there just about at the end of the runway There was a big utility pole laying right in front of the airplane And my father said, Lord stop us And we stopped within a couple feet of that pole I learned that you can pray about anything I think that should be a way of life. [00:32:01] Whatever comes, we can pray. I want to honor my parents this morning. I want to honor all fathers that pass on these and many other virtues and character qualities. How can we express honor? Well, probably the greatest expression of honor to our parents is to do what they tell us. Obedience is a tremendous expression of honor that we embrace what they tell us The second thing is we can verbalize [00:32:32] We can give cards Even on Father's Day we can give cards Now this is not a solicit for more cards this morning But we do well to not only say what we sense in our hearts When my mother was on her deathbed She was a woman that never wanted to cause problems for anybody else. And she would lament the fact that she could not take care of herself. But I learned something in that experience when she said finally, [00:33:07] after saying a number of times that she's so much bother, she said, I really appreciate what you're doing to the children. Even though she did not want to be a bother, even though she felt kind of useless and helpless, she was helpless, deep down in her heart it meant a lot to be there. And it was our turn to say, Mom, you used to take care of us. You got up at night. You did this, you did that. It's our turn. We want to do it. [00:33:42] and it meant something. Why do we so often wait to honor our parents until they're no longer here? That's the thing that we want to say in this is to verbalize our appreciation that is to do it while we can, while it can still be appreciated. And there is then the care of our parents in old age when they cannot take care of themselves, when they ought not take care of themselves, When it is our privilege, I trust that we will never lose the vision [00:34:17] That we are responsible, that we want to, that we provide care for our aged parents There may be times when a nursing home is a necessity for medical reasons or whatever But by and large, and I'll admit to us that it takes effort There's interruption in plans, it may make changes in plans May require changes in plans. It may require changes in lifestyle to honor our parents in their old age. [00:34:49] But the Bible still says, honor your father and your mother.