Fathering Unto Maturity

FATHERING UNTO MATURITY

Introduction:

1. Responsibility for children, is seen as belonging to the mother.

Fathers spend about a third as much time as mothers in providing direct child care.

A review of research in 186 societies found that fathers have "regular, close relationships" with their children during infancy in only 2 per cent of these societies.

In some parts of West Africa, contact between men and very young children is seen as taboo.

A Jamaican study found that a man’s involvement with his children fell significantly when his children lived elsewhere, particularly if they lived in the home of another man.

A study in Chile found that by age six, about 40 per cent of children born to unmarried adolescent couples are unacknowledged and abandoned by their fathers.

Economic support from fathers also declines when marriages fail.

In Argentina, only 36 per cent of divorced fathers make regular child support payments.

In the United States and Malaysia, 40 and 50 per cent of divorced fathers, respectively, pay no child support at all.

In Japan, 75 per cent of divorced fathers have never paid child support.

In Barbados, a study of eight-year-old children born to adolescent mothers found that those whose fathers were involved in their upbringing did much better in school than those whose fathers were not.

2. The importance of Fathers have been greatly underestimated in America.

The statistics are sobering:

40 percent of boys are being raised without their biological fathers, according to Newsweek magazine.

85 percent of people in prison grew up without a father.

70 percent of school dropouts and 70 percent of teen suicides came from fatherless homes.

Kids without fathers are more likely to live in poverty; to suffer emotional, health and social problems; to become teenage parents; and to smoke, drink and take drugs, according to "Experiments in Living: The Fatherless Family" by Rebecca O’Neill.

3. God is our real father.

Although my children belong to me biologically I am not their real father.

a. I am only fostering them through this life temporarily until they go home.

b. If you were babysitting someones children, you would take every effort to return them to their parents unscathed in any fashion.

c. I can only father them to maturity.

God can father us to maturity.

I. Our Father educates us.

Bok’s Law: If you think education is expensive, try ignorance.

A. God has revealed the rule of his house.

1. We all have certain general rules in our homes.

a. NO FIGHTING. When the girls start to fight we often ask, “Is this helpful, or hurtful.

b. We learn the rules very quickly especially if they are enforced.

c. Illustration.

During the Victorian era, one how-to-do-it-right manual was Lady Gough’s Book of Etiquette. In this volume, putting books by male authors next to books by female authors was forbidden - unless the authors were married.

Source Unknown.

2. God revealed his rules as mankind matured.

a. In the age of the patriarchs, God instructed the Fathers to answer for their families.

b. In the Mosaical age, God handed down 613 rules.

c. In the Christian age, Perfect Law of Liberty.

Jam 2:12 So speak ye, and so do, as they that shall be judged by the law of liberty.

3. God knows what we need to learn.

A young boy once approached his father to ask, "Dad, why does the wind blow?", to which the father responded, "I don’t know, son." "Dad, where do the clouds come from?" "I’m not sure, son." "Dad, what makes a rainbow?" "No idea, son." "Dad, do you mind me asking you all these questions.?" "Not at all, son. How else are you going to learn?"

Source Unknown.

B. God teaches through the example of his son.

1. Jesus grew up in an average home.

2. Jesus was obedient to his Father. Luke 2:49

And he said unto them, How is it that ye sought me? wist ye not that I must be about my Father’s business?

3. The Father loved Jesus.

C. God give pop quizzes.

1. We will be tested in this life.

2. He will help us pass.

The setting is Ohio State University about six or seven years ago in a huge lecture hall (approximately 1000 students) for a Calculus final.

Apparently this particular calculus teacher wasn’t very well liked. He was one of those guys who would stand at the front of the class and yell out how much time was remaining before the end of a test, a real charmer. Since he was so busy gallivanting around the room making sure that nobody cheated and that everyone was aware of how much time they had left before their failure on the test was complete, he had the students stack the completed tests on the huge podium at the front of the room. This made for quite a