Reading: Deuteronomy 32:1-6
I suppose that I’m like a lot of us… I’ve always wanted to please my father, but many times I have felt like I just never could. …that I never could quite live up to his expectations.
• My Dad has always loved baseball. Some of the only toys he had as a kid growing up in the 50’s was a ball, a bat and a mit… and that was just fine with him. He grew up playing baseball with the fellas in the neighborhood; his heroes were Mickey Mantle, Ty Cobb; even when he was too old to play he was out on the field in the church league… until a separated shoulder benched him for good! (He was safe, though!) So, when I was 4 or 5 I can remember him taking me down to the ball fields and signing me up to play baseball! I was going to be an all-star! I was going to follow in his steps! The only problem was… I hated it! And I wasn’t any good at it. So, they put me way out in the outfield where I could stomp on the ants and practice throwing my glove up in the air & catching it.
• My Dad was an engineer before he retired. I thought that was pretty cool until I turned 7 or 8 and realized that he didn’t drive trains… he drove a desk; in an office building… engineering whatever engineers engineer. Since then, about all I’ve learned about it is that it involves numbers and a lot of math. I hated math. I can remember nightmares as a kid… the teacher would ask, “a train going 60mph leaves Atlanta at 1pm and another leaves at 2pm going …” AHHH! Dad always pushed me in math and some of the greatest fights we would have revolved around him trying to help me with my math homework! I always did okay, but I never enjoyed it and it never came easy to me. I know that frustrated him.
• Sometimes I felt that I never would measure up to his expectations for me… but then I became a father and began to understand a few things differently!
Happy Father’s Day! Fathers, I hope you’re enjoying your special day… you deserve it! (sorry we don’t have flowers for you this year.) We have taken a lot on the chin in recent years… its not easy being a father. We get beat up by a lot of folks in our society and told pretty often that we’re not doing a good job. But most of us realize how important the role of fathers are in the family! That’s why I want to encourage you, fathers, to keep on keeping on!We’ve got the biggest responsibility in the Universe and we need to be encouraged and praised for what we are doing right!
o The Bible says to fathers, “Don’t exasperate your children, but raise them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.” (Eph. 6:4)
o Someone once said, “anyone can make a kid, but it takes a man to be a father.” AMEN, indeed!
• Ken Canfield, heads the National Center for Fathering, compiled a list of comments from kids about their dads…
o “Without my father it would be like a ball without any air inside it. Whenever I’m feeling sad, he comes and cheers me up by telling me a silly joke or buying me a pack of baseball cards… My dad is a hardworking man, but he still has time for me.” --6th grader
o “He is a Frito-Lay man. That is an important job. Because Frito-Lay means chips which is food. That is so important because that you could not live without food.” –1st grader
o “He comforts me when I am not okay. He sacrifices his time when I want to do something special and he doesn’t want to… He always listens to my side of the story. He treats my mom very nicely which makes me feel wanted.” --4th grader
I wanted to talk about Dads this morning, not only because it is Fathers’ Day, but also because I want to talk about God as being our Father. We’re continuing our series on first principles, “First Things First”.
• Last week I introduced this series with THE fundamental, most basic tenet of Christianity… “There is a God!”
• But, as I mentioned, that’s not exactly “earth-shattering” news. Even the pagans of ancient Athens believed in gods…
• Most people even today believe in a god… but what kind of god do they believe in?
• Today, I want to look at this claim a bit closer and observe that not only is there a god… but He is different from all the other so-called gods out there!
• The one, true God is a loving Father (hence the text read a moment ago.) He is not some impersonal force… not some detached designer who created the universe and then left it to spin on its own! He is a loving father… a parent who is concerned over each & every one of his children!
6 Is this the way you repay the LORD, O foolish and unwise people? Is he not your Father, your Creator, who made you and formed you? (Deuteronomy 32:6 NIV)
Isn’t it remarkable… in contrast to all the other so-called ‘gods’ out there, the Bible describes OUR God in such personal, familial terms… and its that way all throughout Scripture!
• From the Exodus event..
29 Then I said to you, "Do not be terrified; do not be afraid of them. 30 The LORD your God, who is going before you, will fight for you, as he did for you in Egypt, before your very eyes, 31 and in the desert. There you saw how the LORD your God carried you, as a father carries his son, all the way you went until you reached this place." (Deuteronomy 1:29-31NIV)
o I love that image of God carrying Israel in his arms… out of Egypt and into the Promised Land.
• To Jesus, our elder brother, calls out to God from the garden…
“Abba, Father, take this cup from me. Not my will, but yours be done.” (Mark 14:36)
o Abba was an intimate term. Not the more formal, “Father” it is more like Poppa or Daddy.
• And we are described as children of this “Daddy”… Abba.
Because you are sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, "Abba, Father." (Galatians 4:6NIV)
Think about all of the qualities that these descriptions convey… protector, adoring parent, encourager, benefactor….
I’m afraid, though, that many of us develop a view of our Heavenly Father that is shaped more by how we experienced our earthly fathers than by these pictures painted in Scripture.
• And unfortunately, not all of us experience that kind of father in this life… EVEN the best of men aren’t perfect and fall way short of the ideal! I know I do!
• For example, maybe your father was a strict disciplinarian. It is likely that you came to a view of God in the same terms. God is there to punish you when you do wrong. You’ve spent so much time being afraid of God, you’re not sure you want to get to know him.
• Maybe your father found it difficult to express emotion… and so you have difficulty seeing God as being loving, or tender or gentle.
• On the opposite extreme… maybe your Dad spoiled you rotten. He never disciplined you and maybe you’ve seen God as that over-indulgent parent. When it comes down to it, he wouldn’t really let me go to hell… he just loves me too much for that and so I’ll do whatever I want to.
• Like it or not… our views of God are often shaped by our experience of our Earthly fathers.
There are a lot of images presented in Scripture of God as a father, but let’s zero in on the story of the Prodigal Son again in Luke 15 this morning.
• We referred to this story last week and you’ll remember I told you about this kid who just couldn’t take the rules at home one more day and so he tells his parents. You know what his dad told him, “As long as you’re living under my roof, you’ll abide by my rules.” Okay, fine then. The young man decided he’d had enough and he would leave. He was old enough to take care of himself. He didn’t need Mom & Dad’s protection anymore. He didn’t need their guidance. So, he left. He packed up his things and headed for greener pastures… in the pursuit of happiness. His Mom & Dad pleaded for him to stay, but he still he left. Rejecting their authority, their guidance and even their very presence… he went off in pursuit of a life on his own, without Mom or Dad… “as if they didn’t exist.”… no rules, no curfews, no responsibility… you know the rest of the story, right?
14 After he had spent everything, there was a severe famine in that whole country, and he began to be in need. 15 So he went and hired himself out to a citizen of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed pigs. 16 He longed to fill his stomach with the pods that the pigs were eating, but no one gave him anything.
• He hits rock bottom! Life on his own wasn’t what it was cracked up to be!
• Many in our world today similarly reject the guidance, the protection and even the presence of God the Father… and create a living hell for themselves.
• Despite scientists, philosophers and self-help gurus who may want to tell you otherwise… life on our own—without God—isn’t all it is cracked up to be!
17 "When he came to his senses, he said, ’How many of my father’s hired men have food to spare, and here I am starving to death! 18 I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. 19 I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired men.’ 20 So he got up and went to his father.
• Now, Dads… what would you do? What would you say?
o Change the locks on the door?
o “I told you so!”
o “You’ve made your bed, now you’ve got to lie in it!”
o Take him over your knee?
Notice what the father does…
"But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him. (v. 20)
• He doesn’t wait for the boy to even get all the way home!
o Instead, he runs out to meet his son as soon as he sees him coming!
o As soon as he first sees that the boy has turned around and is coming home… the father runs out to throw his arms around him!
• He is filled with compassion & love… he throws his arms around him and kisses him! He is SO glad that his son has come home!
• Have you ever noticed that the kid hasn’t even apologized yet?
o All of this even BEFORE the first “I’m sorry”; or “Dad, you were right.”; or “Dad, I really blew it this time… can you ever forgive me?”
o BEFORE any of that… the father has run out to welcome his son home! Then comes the apology.
21 “The son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’
22 “But the father said to his servants, ‘Quick! Bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. 23 Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let’s have a feast and celebrate. 24 For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’ So they began to celebrate. NIV
• With the apology accepted, the father welcomes the son back into the home, back into the family and its time to celebrate!
THAT is a remarkable image of a loving Father! Is that an image of God that you have?
• I have to say, that I’ve not always viewed God in those terms. I used to see God more as that great Cosmic-killjoy who made up all of these rules that I had to live by, designed to take all of the fun out of living! I saw him as that all-seeing eye who was always watching me, observing my every move, ready to strike as soon as I messed up!
• Wayne Kilpatrick shared this thought with us on the Men’s retreat a few week’s ago because that was how he used to view God, too… that is, until his grandchildren came along.
o They came to live with Wayne for a few months while Wayne’s son was building a new house and so he got to spend a lot of time with his grandchildren.
o On the retreat, Wayne spoke of how he enjoyed watching them run and play around the house… of how he couldn’t take his eyes off of them.
• Is that the “all seeing eye” of God? God watches us… watches over us NOT because he’s waiting to lower the boom… but because he can’t take his eyes off of us?
• We are his precious children and we are each one dear and special to him!
o My in-laws have a wall in their den dedicated to their 17 grandchildren and 1 great-grandchild. A picture of each one of them is carefully framed, meticulously hung and proudly displayed on this wall—there are so many, there’s just about no reason to even paint the wall because its pretty well covered with grandkids! I don’t know what they’re going to do! They’re expecting 2 more great-grandkids by Christmas and I they don’t have any more wall left!
• Imagine what God’s den must look like… with each of our pictures adorning the walls… each one carefully framed, meticulously hung and proudly displayed!
o Think about when God has company! I bet the angels just hate coming over… he’s always talking about the kids.
o “Hey, Gabriel, let me tell you about….”
THAT’S a God like no other! THAT’S the God of the Bible! THAT’S the God that we worship this morning!
That’s also the God that I learned a whole lot about when I became a father!
• You’ve probably heard this song written by George Strait before… it sums it up so well!
• {Love Without End, Amen} by George Strait
38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Rom 8:38-39 NIV)
I still want to please my Dad… still want him to be proud of me, still want him to accept me… its just now I realize that he loves me regardless.
• I don’t have to be a professional baseball player… I don’t have to love math or even know what an engineer is… my Dad loves me because I’m his son.
• I hope that’s a lesson I’m passing on to my boys.
I still want to please God… still want him to be proud of me, still want him to accept me… its just now I realize that he loves me regardless.
• He’s still got rules and I still need to live in them… but now, you see, I understand that he loves for who I am… for who he created me to be and nothing can change that.
• And even when I’ve turned by back on him and headed off for that far country, He has longed for my return… and he has welcomed me back into his warm embrace when I have turned and headed home.
Do you need to come home this morning?
That’s what repentance is all about… turning from the direction you’re headed and coming home.
That’s where you belong. Its where you will find a loving Father.
