FATHERS BUILD SOLID FOUNDATIONS
INTRODUCTION: A Father’s Most Important Responsibility
Show “Dad’s Duct Tape” video clip (bluefish TV)
As we could see from the video, fathers have many roles and responsibilities. Not only that, but we can be quite resourceful in finding ways to fulfill them. Our wives and neighbors might not always call it “resourcefulness,” but we sure are proud of it!
Seriously, now, what is a father’s most important responsibility? Love God? How? Teach and train his children in the Lord? But what does that mean? What exactly are we to teach them, especially when we still have so much to learn ourselves? And with so many competing ideas and theories out there, how are we to know which are the right and best ones and ways to pass them on?
You see, God’s Word is very clear that a Father’s most important responsibility is to ensure that his wife and children live lives that are a fragrant aroma before our Lord ! Like it or not, God has appointed husbands and fathers to be the ’Master Builders” of the family, and it is we whom He will most hold responsible for the condition of each one as well as the whole! In some cases, for a variety of reasons, that male role may be absent or negligent. In that case, the mother or primary caregiver must seek God’s strength and wisdom to fulfill this role.
In all cases, nothing of value and nothing lasting can be built unless a solid foundation is first established. Matthew 7:24-27. That foundation of solid rock is a clear and correct understanding and life application of the Word of God in ALL areas. In short, that foundation is sound doctrine! Fathers, caregivers, how sound is your doctrine? In understanding? In living? How intently or well are you transferring it to your family? On what is their faith built and how effectual is it?
Romans 10:10-21
A living faith is one which not only hears the Word of God, but which ceaselessly strives to understand and live it as well!
WHAT IS SOUND DOCTRINE?
Let us simply ’break it down’ for a fuller understanding.
“Sound,” as an adjective, comes from the Greek hugies which means “whole, healthy.” It is from this word that we get our English “hygiene.”
“Doctrine” comes from the Greek “didache,” which means “teaching.” In the active form it refers to the act of teaching and in the passive form it refers to that which is taught.
“Sound Doctrine,” then, may simply be understood as healthy, wholesome teaching which – when applied – results in healthy, wholesome lives!
WHY IS DOCTRINE SO IMPORTANT?
The recently deceased Jerry Falwell once lamented: “We’ve lost our way of thinking biblically. . . We’ve lost our biblical mind, and we have not put something better in its place. . . Why are so many Christians shallow? Because they’re not in the Bible. Why are so many Christians defeated by sin? Because they don’t think scripturally. . . The Bible is not just a slogan to put over your desk, or to hang on the walls of your home. . . We do not understand doctrine, because we do not know the Word of God. Why is the sin of Christians not corrected? Because they are not in the Word of God. Why are the men of God not perfect? Because they do not know God’s standards of perfection. Why is the church not doing good works? Because they do not have a Bible mind. . . What is the greatest power needed by the Church today? It is not the power of money from fund-raising, it is not the power of great crowds attracted by advertisement, it is not the power of excitement that comes from rhythm bands in the church. The greatest power is divine activity that takes place in the heart of the person who opens himself to the Bible. . . The believer doesn’t have a chance to live for God if he doesn’t have a biblical mind.” (From his sermon, “How Then Shall We Recover Our Biblical Mind.” www.sermoncentral.com)
Let us outline this more fully through Scripture itself:
1.) Sound doctrine is necessary for spiritual growth.
1 Peter 2:2
Like newborn infants, desire the unadulterated spiritual milk, so that you may grow by it in your salvation, since you have tasted that the Lord is good.
2.) It keeps us from sin.
Psalms 119:11
I have treasured Your word in my heart so that I may not sin against You.
3.) It protects us from silver-tongued false teachers.
Romans 16:17-18
Now I implore you, brothers, watch out for those who cause dissensions and pitfalls contrary to the doctrine you have learned. Avoid them; for such people do not serve our Lord Christ but their own appetites, and by smooth talk and flattering words they deceive the hearts of the unsuspecting.
4.) To be without sound doctrine is to be deceived and powerless.
Matthew 22:29
Jesus answered them, "You are deceived, because you don’t know the Scriptures or the power of God.
5.) It is the difference between godliness and godlessness; gain and loss.
1 Timothy 6:3-6
If anyone teaches other doctrine and does not agree with the sound teaching of our Lord Jesus Christ and with the teaching that promotes godliness, he is conceited, understanding nothing, but having a sick interest in disputes and arguments over words. From these come envy, quarreling, slanders, evil suspicions, and constant disagreement among men whose minds are depraved and deprived of the truth, who imagine that godliness is a way to material gain. But godliness with contentment is a great gain.
6.) Sound doctrine completes us in Christ.
2 Timothy 3:13-17
Evil people and imposters will become worse, deceiving and being deceived. But as for you, continue in what you have learned and firmly believed, knowing those from whom you learned, and that from childhood you have known the sacred Scriptures, which are able to instruct you for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is inspired by God and is profitable for teaching, for rebuking, for correcting, for training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.
Repeat six points.
HOW DO WE GET IT?
Let us go back to Romans 10:17-21.
So faith comes from what is heard, and what is heard comes through the message about Christ. But I ask, "Did they not hear?" Yes, they did: Their voice has gone out to all the earth, and their words to the ends of the inhabited world. But I ask, "Did Israel not understand?" First, Moses said: I will make you jealous of those who are not a nation; I will make you angry by a nation that lacks understanding. And Isaiah says boldly: I was found by those who were not looking for Me; I revealed Myself to those who were not asking for Me. But to Israel he says: All day long I have spread out My hands to a disobedient and defiant people.
To live a life that is firmly established in sound doctrine, which is pleasing to God, requires both understanding the fullness of His Word and living in obedience to it! To do so, we must (These points adopted from main sermon points by Gerald Flury, “Faith Comes By Hearing,” sermoncentral.com ):
1.Know It.
- Our foundations start, but do not end, with knowledge of the Scriptures.
- This knowledge is what builds, sustains and brings joy and strength to our faith.
- President Woodrow Wilson once said, “I am sorry for men who do not read the Bible every
day. I wonder why they deprive themselves of the strength and the pleasure.”
- The great evangelist, Dwight L. Moody, once confessed: “I prayed for faith, and thought that
some day Faith would come down and strike me like lightening. But Faith did not seem to
come. One day I read in the tenth chapter of Romans, ’Now Faith cometh by hearing, and
hearing by the Word of God.’ I had closed my Bible, and prayer for faith. I now opened my
Bible, and began to study, and Faith has been growing ever since.”
2.Stow It.
- It is not enough just to “know” God’s Word. We must understand it and keep it! It must not
just be seen or heard, but believed, received and treasured!
- Jerry Vines said, “An unread Bible is like food uneaten, a love letter never read, a buried
sword, a road map unstudied, gold never mined.”
- Mark Buchanan, in his book Your God Is Too Safe, writes: “Curious times, these. There is simultaneously a glut of the word of God and a famine of it, a drought and deluge. We have every translation of the Bible you can imagine – the NIV, the NEVG, the KJV, the NKJV, the SASR, NRSAV, the preacher’s bible, the worshiper’s bible, the spirit-filled believers bible, the left-handed bald gypsy fiddler’s bible... (The last was made up.) You can have it in hardback, paper, leather, cloth, in pink, red, oxblood, turtle shell, iridescent orange, psychedelic paisley, with maps and charts and indices and appendices and concordances and holograms of the temple in the back, and a little sleeve with a CD-ROM that takes you on a guided tour of the Holy Land. The food is out there – and it’s a banqueting table. We’re just picky eaters. Oh, we’re buying bibles. And sometimes we’re even reading them. But there’s not much evidence that we’re studying them. We’re nibbling, not devouring. And you are what you eat. . . Borderland is a virtual colony of biblical anorexics and bulimics, where appetites range from everything BUT the truth.”
3.Sow It.
- Once we know it and stow it, we must sow the Word of God into the lives of others – starting
with our immediate family!
- How can we love God absolutely or love others sacrificially, if we do not share and spread
His greatest gift?!
- Remember what we read earlier? Romans 10:14-15
But how can they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how can they believe without
hearing about Him? And how can they hear without a preacher? And how can they preach unless
they are sent? As it is written: How welcome are the feet of those who announce the gospel of good
things!
4.Show It.
- We must know the Word of God, stow away His sound doctrine, and sow it to others that they
too may benefit. But neither ourselves nor others will truly benefit unless what we know,
stow, and sow is also what we SHOW!
- James 1:22 But be doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.
WHAT DO WE DO WITH IT?
Simple, once we know the Bible with our minds, stow it’s truths in our hearts, and sow it’s goodness in the world, we must show it in our lives: our actions, attitudes, thoughts and emotions. In other words, having obtained sound doctrine, we must continue to test it against further study of God’s Word and continue to live it through obedience!
It’s much like going to the doctor when you are sick. After a thorough checkup and diagnosis, the doctor will give you an appreciate prescription, or remedy, to be fully healthy and happy. You then go to the pharmacy, wait long in line and pay way too much money to get your prescription, and then go home and put the painfully acquired medicine in your medicine cabinet – right alongside all the other painfully acquired and little used medicines (because, after all, you’re a man)! You appreciate the doc’s looking out for you, briefly confess to yourself that he probably knows what he’s talking about, but then stubbornly decide that you don’t really need it – you can just tough it out on your own (while you whine to your wife and play helpless, that is)! Now, why bother the doctor if you’re not going to follow his directions?
Know, Stow, Sow & Show!
Intro/Promote “Faith Comes By Hearing” campaign
BENEDICTION/INVITATION:
