After I put the lesson up last week, I had something happen to me that caused me to do a quick repenting of a thought process I was in. I won't elaborate in this blog, but it caused me to look at my thinking real hard. It's difficult to keep what I'm currently writing from crashing in on what I've already wrote for our lessons. During our meetings on Sunday morning it is even more difficult to keep what I'm currently working on in my head from spilling out onto the discussion. My original lesson for next week was about how we should honor our wives in front of our children. As I read over the lesson I'd written way back in early November, I began to wonder if it wasn't just overkill. So, I pasted it a couple of lessons from now, and thought it would be okay. It wasn't.
I like to think I have learned to listen to Holy Spirit by now, and I do spend a lot of time early in the week praying for direction before I make a post. Sometimes circumstances, and the events of the week will change my direction, but mostly I trust the peace I feel when a lesson goes out.
Tomorrow night I'm going to hand out the promised homework sheet and I'm hoping you give it thoughtful diligence. I'm going to change up how you go about it, because of the lesson I didn't post. How do I know that I got it wrong?
You guys didn't read it. Gasp!!! How do I know that? Because of the statistics in the blogger dashboard. Only one person read it, and I'm not sure it wasn't me. (I need to fix that and isolate myself from my statistics) Laziness on my part. That was when Holy Spirit made it clear that I'd bypassed His order.
Why am I saying all of this? Not because of what I write or say is more important, but because you're not saying anything. Typical 'man' type reaction to things we think we all don't need to have said to us. It's kind of like being a Christian for over fifty years and hearing the same sermon points over and over again. Before long your brain begins to rebel and says; "you don't have to explain that to me. Already got it." I've been trying to crush that way of thinking in myself, and that is why I've tried to give more than the usual amount of time for responses, but I'm not getting any. As men we do it to one another, we do it to our wives, and we do it to our children. ESPECIALLY OUR CHILDREN. Then, we wonder why our wives and children tune us out. It's the typical human reaction to when we know something, or at least we think we know something. I was the same way as a young man. If I already knew something, I didn't want someone telling me over and over again what I already knew. We often think our time is more valuable than that, and why are you boring me with the details. Move on to something new, that I don't already know.
AND that guys, is how I missed on Holy Spirit. Before I moved on to last weeks post, I should have posted the lesson about 'Mothers' where it came at in the mix. WHY? Because before you can have a kid to build, you have to have a wife. I looked at the lesson and I thought it was redundant. Most of it was a rehash of what we'd learned when we went through the "Everyman" series with some minor adjustments for motherhood.
This is my 'mia culpa' for missing Holy Spirit. I thought you guys didn't need to have it explained to you again. You know; who your wife is to God, how she doesn't belong to you, how she is co-equal to you in the family, all that good stuff you understood at the start. Bro. Dave "You don't have to s'plain it to me again." Got it the first time.
Are you willing to put it before your wife and ask her if you got it the first time? Has she had to give you some attitude adjustments since we did our manhood study?
My greatest fear for myself is when I return to the arrogance of my youth and claim that I don't need to have it explained to me. Feminists call it 'mansplaining' which is simply saying 'talk to the hand' without the hand gesture. We men do it all the time, but we don't tell each other what we're doing or why we're doing it. Men 'mansplain' to each other all the time. Instead of reacting emotionally, putting our hands on our hips and saying; "Stop mansplaining to me," we just nod politely or change the subject. EVERYONE of us mansplain, but we don't realize it. Women think we're being sexist when we do it to them, but they don't see it when we do it to one another. We think we are 'rearing' our children when we explain life to them, but we're mansplaining. Preachers think they are doing it when they repeat the same point over and over again. Teachers do it when they think they teach the same thought over and over again. "Did you get it? Do you get it? Understand? Think about it! Let that sink in! Tune in!" I say these catch phrases all the time. These are just a sample of the catch phrases we use when we hope to bust through the barrier of understanding. Jesus said it more clearly than anyone; our eyes are blinded, and our hearing is dulled lest we understand. Every preacher has experienced it, every teacher fears it, that moment when it is obvious you've been tuned out. We all hope we're just reaching that one person, when we are boring a hundred others. It's in the eyes people, and we won't talk about it. A warm room, stale air, repetitious teaching, coffee, donuts, all add up to boredom, which is the one thing I despise. I'd rather be adding to or arguing with another teacher than to be the teacher who no one is conversing with. This is the same way we should see our charge as fathers. That is why I know that Holy Spirit has told me we need to be 'deliberate fathers.' This job of fatherhood should be done as deliberately as we do our money making job. Every morning we need to put on our father hats and wear them till we arrive at our jobs. Then we need to put on our job hats OVER our father hats and remember that our job will leak onto our fatherhood. The little human being you brought into this life only has one father to example the heavenly Father with. If that father isn't deliberate in how they do it, the chances they will find the heavenly Father are minimal. You may turn out a beautiful son, or daughter, but do they have a relationship with their heavenly Father. Which brings me back around to how this all started.
I tuned out my Heavenly Father, and for that I apologize. I don't really know why I messed up, but I did. SOOOO,, we are going to put the motherhood lesson back in its rightful place. Holy Spirit, I'm sorry for missing you. I also hope all of you guys read this with an open heart and didn't get offended with my candor. Fatherhood is too important. If we allow the 'world' to define family, we are giving up. I made it clear from the very start that I can't teach this alone. There are too many of you who are better fathers than I was. You might be thinking that all of this is redundant and why are we even wasting our time on this, but the truth is that I can think of six unmarried 'boys' in our midst who need to hear what may seem obvious to us. I don't have one infant or toddler grandchild to make a difference to. Some of you have do have infants and toddlers running around in your family and this is happening in your lives right now.
When we come to Men's Sunday morning, I hope you've taken the 'Build A Child' homework and sat down with you wife who just happens to be the mother of your children, and discussed what qualities you hope to build in your child. That is where I screwed up. By moving the order of the lessons around, I bypassed including your wife in the deliberate parenting process.
OH, and as an added thought; you grandpas out there might consider getting with your sons and seeing where they put their priorities. Might help you to know how to back them up instead of working against them
Please forgive me for my arrogance, and presumption.
Sincerely, Pastor Dave.
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