BluefishTV.com video "Thanks Dad"
Is anyone willing to share what you learned from your dad?
What do we Learn from our Fathers?
One of my most vivid memories growing up was when we would go camping and my dad would have me pick up our campsite and he would tell me to ’leave it better than we found it.’ That became kind of a life philosophy for me. Leave it better than you found it. I guess you could say he taught me responsibility.
There’s so much that dads do that make us what we are today, whether it was dad’s discipline, teaching us right from wrong, encouraging us (1 Thess. 2:11-12), teaching us hard work, .
It’s unfortunate that dads don’t get a lot of credit for what they do, and in today’s culture with high rates of divorce and children born out of wedlock the role of fathers has become minimized, virtually to the point where they are seen as unnecessary anymore. They’re viewed as only good for bringing home the bacon, but if mom can make just as much money as dad, what good are they now? People don’t even think twice nowadays about raising children without a father. I read this week where the number of children living at home without their biological father is around 34.5% (over one out of every three). And what’s even more unfortunate is that dads aren’t seeing their own importance and their own God given responsibility, and are choosing not to play a significant role in their child’s life.
According to fatherhood.org which cites several studies; they have found that children raised in a fatherless home are:
Į Five times more likely to be poor
Į More likely to turn to crime and end up in jail
Į Increased chance of early sexual activity and pregnancy;
Į Alcohol and drug use
Į Twice as likely to drop out of school just to name a few
Spiritual Practices
In terms of spiritual practices or faith habits, such as attendance at worship, another study found that fathers make a significant impact on their children. If both your parents worshipped with you regularly while you were growing up, there’s an 80% likelihood that you’ll worship God regularly as an adult. However if only your mother worshipped regularly with you, there’s only a 30% probability that you’ll worship regularly as an adult. If only your father worshipped regularly with your dad, the likelihood that you’ll worship regularly as an adult increases to 70%! What that tells me is that dad has a great influence on us in our faith walk with the Lord.
Is a father important? I believe the answer to that question is a resounding, yes! Even a secular news magazine recognized the importance of fathers. The cover article in the February 27th, 1995 issue of U.S. News & World Report concluded that:
"More than any other factor, a father’s presence in the family will determine a child’s success and happiness."
This isn’t to say moms aren’t important in our faith. Last month, on Mother’s Day, I shared about the influence mother’s and grandmother’s have on their children’s and grandchildren’s faith. We looked in the Bible at Timothy and the influence his mother and grandmother had in his faith upbringing which eventually led him to come to faith in Jesus Christ, and then become a missionary even though his dad was not a Christian (2 Tim. 1:5; Acts 16:1-3). Obviously moms play a significant role, but children, as a general rule, tend to follow their dads faith practices.
We can see why God’s plan, his ideal, is for families to have a mother AND a father, so children grow healthy and happy.
Well done dads who are here this morning, who have taken (if your kids are grown up) or are taking your responsibility to raise your kids in faith, and to model it for them because their little eyes are watching. I know God will bless you and your kids for your efforts.
Honoring Father (and Mother)
But this morning’s message is not so much what we learn from fathers but what we as their kids can do to honor our dads, or the memory of our dads if you have lost him already. We are told by God in the fifth of the Ten Commandments to "honor your father and mother." The fact that one of the Ten Commandments refers to this should alert us to how important this is to God. The Apostle Paul, in our Scripture this morning, reminds the Christians in Ephesus that just because we are set free from the Law through Jesus Christ, doesn’t mean we can ignore it. This commandment is just as valid and important for us today as Christians as it was for the Israelites who first received it.
On Father’s Day it’s a good time to remind us of our responsibility to honor our fathers as well as our mothers.
What does it mean to honor?
The Greek word for honor also means to revere, to respect. So to honor our parents means to act in a way which demonstrates courtesy and respect, to speak well of them whether in public or in private conversation, not to complain about them or put them down (even if they deserve it). Do you know what God’s punishment for cursing your parents was in the OT? Death (Ex. 21:17). They took it seriously.
In other words, what we did at the beginning of the message is honoring to our dads, remembering the positive contributions they have made to our life to make us who we are. Do we tell our fathers what they have meant to us before it’s too late and they’re gone?
To honor means obeying your parents and following their teaching if you still live in their household. The word can also mean to show respect by financially supporting them, usually in reference to their old age. In other words we honor them by caring for them.
Caring for our Parents in their Later Years
Listen to what Jesus criticized the religious people of in his day.
Mark 7:10 (NLT) "Moses gave you this law from God: ’Honor your father and mother,’ and ’Anyone who speaks evil of father or mother must be put to death.’ 11 But you say it is all right for people to say to their parents, ’Sorry, I can’t help you. For I have vowed to give to God what I could have given to you.’ 12 You let them disregard their needy parents."
Jesus was saying they violated God’s command of honoring their parents by not caring for their parents in their old age, and then trying to make it sound spiritual (I can’t help you because I’ve pledged to give that money to God). In a culture which didn’t have Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, God put the task on the kids. Does this mean we can ignore this way of honoring our parents in this day and age because the government does our job for us? Are we honoring the spirit of this command and word of Jesus when we put our parents in a home and then never visit them because it doesn’t fit into our schedule, or it makes us uncomfortable? I just heard of someone this week that drives everyday right by their parent in a nursing home, but rarely stops in. I believe this is not in the spirit of honoring our fathers and mothers. I’m not speaking against nursing homes, I believe they have their place. What I am talking about is failing to honor our parents in their old age by ignoring them.
Honoring Dishonorable Parents
But what if your father (or mother) doesn’t deserve being honored? Perhaps you grew up in a family where dad was absent physically and/or emotionally, or your father was an alcoholic, or abusive. It’s easy to honor your dad if he’s a good Christian man, but what if he doesn’t deserve it. What then?
Notice this commandment does not have a condition attached to it. It doesn’t say, "honor your father and mother if... they deserve it, or if they were a great parent." No, our honoring them is not dependent upon their performance as a parent. It is what we do as children of God.
Personally, I was blessed to grow up with a great dad (although not perfect) whose faith was and is rock solid, and who is actively involved in the church. I remember my friend’s families in high school. One had a dad that was an alcoholic and verbally abusive, another his dad was charged with drug trafficking and was a fugitive from the FBI during our high school days, another his dad was actively involved in church but it turns out, behind closed doors, he had anger issues and was abusive to his family. Only one of my friends, other than myself, had a father who was a good role model, actively involved in his church and most importantly lived it. Looking back it’s not hard to understand why we ended up at my house most of the time. I know for them it was hard to honor their dad. They didn’t even like their dad. A couple of them don’t have a relationship with their dad to this day because of their unforgiveness.
How do you honor your dad, even when he doesn’t deserve it?
There was an article in Guideposts a few years ago called "The Reluctant Daughter" about a woman who grew up with a father who was (in her own words) "selfish," would call her and her siblings "stupid or lazy," would rarely express love or praise to his children, who was prone to "abusive rages and worse", basically she lived in a nightmare, hidden from friends and neighbors. Eventually she broke the cycle, left the house, and married a loving husband (a miracle in itself because most women repeat the cycle), but chose to not have any contact with her father except when he would occasionally call asking for money. Years went by and word reached her that her dad had emphysema and wasn’t doing well. He needed his family, but his family didn’t want anything to do with him because of the pain he had caused them throughout the years. The author, Mary Ann, felt no love or respect for him. She prayed to God to put him out of her mind, but instead she found herself going to visit him in the nursing home, and changed her prayer to ask for God’s help with her anger and feelings of ill will toward her father. The funny thing was in all those years he was almost as cantankerous as always. She continued to visit him anyway, and as time went by she began driving him places (usually to get beer and cigarettes and to visit his parent’s graves). Eventually she even asked him to live with her and her husband, which he did for three months before his death. The interesting part of this story is, even with all Mary Ann did for him, he never really changed very much, he still said mean things, he still drank, and smoked, but what happen to Mary Ann during that time was that she received healing. The anger, the guilt, the sadness was gone for her because she chose to honor and, over time, forgive her dad.
Her story reminds me that you don’t have to have the perfect dad, or the best relationship with him to honor him. We just need to willing to be obedient to the Lord. As Paul reminds us, this commandment is the first with a promise attached to it, "that it may go well with you, and you may enjoy a long life on the earth." Mary Ann now understands what it means, "that all may go well with you," since she was able to come to peace with her father before his death, before it was too late. Her heart is free.
Another quick story showing what happens when you wait too long to honor your father. I’ll never forget when I did Ray’s (Whitley’s) funeral. Little did I know that he had two grown daughters. I learned that they didn’t want anything to do with their dad. In fact, they didn’t even tell him when they had children of their own, Ray’s grandkids. He never saw his own grandkids, at least while he was here on earth. It was very sad. I listened as one of his daughters poured out her heart at the funeral sharing the regrets in a poem she had written, the moments lost which she would never be able to share because she never learned to honor her father, and forgive him for what she perceived he had done to her. Because of the grudge they had against their father they were never reconciled, and never will on this side of heaven.
God gives us his commandments for a reason. He wants us to live at peace with one another.
Don’t wait to honor your parents, don’t let another mother’s day or father’s day pass you buy. Swallow your pride and take the initiative, perhaps in a phone call, a visit, or even a letter, tell them what they mean to you, thank them for what you learned from them. Don’t allow a grudge against them to prevent you from honoring them. If your parents are older, God might want you to honor them by caring for them, visiting them, perhaps even have them live with you. Perhaps your father has already passed away, and you’re thinking this doesn’t apply to me, but how are you honoring the memory of your dad?
