The Making Of A Man Series

The Making of a Man…

Series: Surviving the School of Hard Knocks

June 18, 2000

Somebody sent this to me over the internet, and I thought it was pretty appropriate for Father’s Day. It’s called…

REASONS TO BE A GUY…

Phone conversations are over in 30 seconds flat.

You know stuff about tanks.

You can open all your own jars.

You can go to the bathroom without a support group.

You can leave the motel bed unmade.

You can kill your own food.

Wedding plans take care of themselves.

Your underwear is $10.00 for a three-pack.

You can quietly enjoy a car ride from the passenger’s seat.

Car mechanics tell you the truth.

You can quietly watch a game with your buddy for hours, without ever

thinking, "He must be mad at me."

You don’t mooch off other’s desserts.

You don’t have to stop and think of which way to turn a nut or a

bolt.

You are unable to see wrinkles in your clothes.

The same hairstyle lasts for years, maybe decades.

Your belly usually hides your big hips.

You can ’do your nails’ with a pocketknife.

You have freedom of choice concerning growing a mustache.

Christmas shopping can be accomplished for 25 relatives on

December 24th in 45 minutes.

You can read this list and not know you hurt anybodies feelings.

Now, if you’re a woman this morning, you may not think some of those things are advantages…

And the reality is that it takes a lot more than being able to “belch on cue”… to be a man! It takes even more to be a Father!

Someone defined a “DAD” as a person who is forced to endure childbirth without an anesthetic…

A person who growls when it feels good, and laughs very loud when he’s scared ½ to death….

A person who gives his daughter away to man who isn’t nearly good enough… so they can have grandchildren that are smarter than anybody’s!

The fact is, before you can be a great dad, you have to learn how to be a great man.

This morning we’re starting a new series entitled, “Surviving the School of Hard Knocks”. It’s really going to be a study on the life of a man called Joseph in the bible.

Joseph is a young man with a very painful past – and very little of it was his fault. The story of what Joseph did about it, is a message God wants to get across to us…

So he dedicates more than 1/4th of the book of Genesis (chap.37-50) to his remarkable life.

Now because you can find out a whole lot about a man by learning about his dad (and because today is Father’s Day!)… We’re going to start out this morning by spending some time looking at Josephs family background, and especially his dad… Jacob.

Now Jacob probably wouldn’t win the “Father of the Year” award from the local Canaanite Kiwanis Club.

For starters, he was a rat! The bible describes him as a deceiver, in fact, even his name lit. meant, “chiseler” or “deceiver”. Now you have to admit, you’ve gotta be pretty bad, if your own parents name you “deceiver”!

But Jacob lived up to his name starting in Gen. 27 where he deceived his brother Esau right out of the family birthright. By linking up with his mother Rebecca, he tricked his father, (Isaac) and gained the blessing.

When the deal was exposed, Jacob had to run for his life because Esau was trying to kill him. He fled to the land of a relative named Laban and fell in love with his daughter Rachel.

Now there’s a biblical principle in Numbers 32:23 that says, “you may be sure that your sin will catch up with you.” (LB) And that was certainly the case here, because in Laban… Jacob met his match!

Laban told Jacob in Gen.29:19,20 (READ)

The problem was that Laban was having troubles getting rid of Rachels (well let’s say…less than beautiful sister, Leah.) So he cooked up a scheme, and after 7 years of hard labor, Laban tricked Jacob into consummating their marriage with Leah instead of Rachel.

The result? Jacob had to work 7 MORE years in order to win the hand of his true love.

After 14 years of hard work, he finally gets to marry Rachel, but there’s only one problem… Rachel was having trouble getting pregnant! Leah could only bear 4 children, and since having kids was the way family’s survived in those days…

Jacob decided to sleep with their hand-maidens. And so now Jacob had 4 wives! (and you think you’ve got problems!)

So here we’ve got this patchwork family of a husband and 4 wives, (3 of which the man didn’t even love, and didn’t plan to marry!).