HEAVENLY FATHER IN A CAN

Let me say from the outset, this lesson is an unusually long one.  I thought it could be divided in two, and I tried, but it didn't work.  The Coronavirus pandemic sat us back on our heels as far as our study goes, and I believe there is an exciting study awaiting us at the end of our study into fatherhood. I'm just waiting for God to reveal it.  What I mean by that, is that I'm waiting for him to reveal the source material, a book, a guide, whatever.  So, with that disclaimer out of the way, lets get back into our study of fatherhood.

There is only one YOU, and there will only be one father like you. Even if you tried to follow a step by step process from a father you admired, YOU would be the variable that changes things up. I can give you my three “C’s” of a relationship, and it would play out much differently than what I’ve done in my family.  One thing is a constant between all of us; You are the only one who can reveal the heavenly Father to your children.  Your words, and actions will shape your child’s image of what a father is. This in turn will shape their view of their heavenly Father. The good thing is,  you don’t have to be perfect to do this job, you just have to accept the role and be wise in carrying it out. If I had to give only one piece of advice to fathers, it would be the same advice that David gave his son Solomon: Get wisdom.  (Proverbs 4:4-9)

The greatest gift you can give your child is wisdom.  I know you thought it was love, but love without wisdom is a cancer that destroys a child’s ability to know real love.  Don’t get me wrong, if you love your child as God loves you, you will give them wisdom. Being a good father is loving your child enough to impart wisdom, and live wisely before them. I know, everyone thinks that love is the most important thing for a father to have, but I would hope that love was a no-brainer.  A matter of fact, I would assume in most cases that the ability to love your own child is a natural reaction. I’ve seen lots of fathers over my lifetime be given their newborn baby child, and watched with joy how that little bundle of life can tame even the most physically strong manly man.  Every man comes to terms with their physical strength, raging hormones, and clumsiness when they are given their newborn child. Within your huge, powerful hands, there is a fragile life, and you are overwhelmed with love and tenderness.  Suddenly, you are a father.  It is a Big deal!!!!  It is also scary stuff.  While most people can quote (1 John 4:8b)  God is love, very few people realize He is more than love.  Loving OUR children is in our DNA, because our DNA is God’s DNA.  Just as God is more than love, we have to be more than love.  

So, if we are the father that reveals the heavenly Father, how do we do it?  We’re far from perfect. We aren’t all mighty.  We aren’t eternal.  We aren’t ...God.  

Exactly.  As I’ve said before; Embrace the fail!  Let it humble you to the task.  Not only did God entrust you with knowing Him, but now as a father, you are entrusted with revealing the one true Father to your children, dare I say, His children.  For all practical purposes, you are ‘Heavenly Father in a can.’  Let that rest in your cranial cavity  a little while.  You will fail, but you will also succeed.

I’m not a sociologist, psychologist, or highly trained child development teacher.  What I know about raising tiny humans comes from experience, both bad, and good.  God doesn’t ask you to be God to your child.  He alone is God, and  He is the only one who can be God.  However, you can be a father, which is way better than trying to be God.  Why do I say that?  Because I don’t know how many times I’ve heard a father say to their child “I’m the boss of this family you’ll do what I say without any questions.”  We think because God appears to demand unquestioning strict obedience to Him, we as fathers must do the same.  NOT SO!  Godhood is not what being a father is all about.  As I said earlier, as men we aren’t perfect, blameless, all knowing, or any other description of God’s unique nature.  We are fathers, and have a responsibility to rightly reflect fatherhood in such a way that our children can see God as Father.  It is as FATHER that God is kind, merciful, full of compassion, and gracious.  It is as God that He is a deity beyond our knowing.  I prefer to know Him as Abba, Father, and fear Him as God. Many old school fathers would rather practice the inverse.  They want their children to fear them, and then hope that they’ll come to know them. As I’ve said before, if you allow yourself to be the disciplinarian, and momma gets to be the nurturer, your child will not have a healthy view of the Heavenly Father.

AS a quick review, there are some ground rules that I believe will help any Christian father be a wise, loving, and good father like our Heavenly Father.  First of all you must understand that your job as a father is just as important as your job providing money, being a husband, being a church member, or any other number of tasks you think you must do. When I counsel couples before they get married, I make it clear to them what their job as spouse is by showing them what they would do without their spouse. I don't know how many times I've heard young husbands say; "My life was great before I got married!"  Then they proceed to tell you all of the exciting things they did, the women they had, or the party life they gave up.  Which I would quickly call them out on.  I would quickly remind them that if they'd never got married, they would still need to go to work and make money.  They would still need to go to Church and serve as part of the community there.  If you weren’t married you would still engage in hobbies, and pastimes.  Your job as husband is not what you bring to the table, but what you bring to the person who sits at the table with you.The same thing is true when you become a father.  Instead of having only one person to be concerned with, you now have one, two, three more lives to be concerned with.  Now you have a serious job title, father.  Your job as a father is always a work in progress, and doesn’t end once they leave home. However, in my opinion, the first five years are the most critical years of your child’s development.  Later, they’ll discover if you are a good husband, pastor, church member, worker, or any other number hats you think you have to wear.  The only role that will be imprinted into their brain long after they’ve grown older is the role of father you embraced when they were tiny children.  

So, let’s get back to the wisdom thing.  While God didn’t get really explicit about how to raise a child, He did give us this beautiful book of wisdom called Proverbs.  Within this marvelous volume is infinite wisdom to guide you, and eventually guide your child in the affairs of life.  Everything to do with human nature is in that book.  To me, there is no greater self-help book a man can read than the book of Proverbs.  Living a life of wisdom will carry you past the winds of feelings, passions, emotions, tragedies, failures, successes, and victories that are life.  Within the book of Proverbs are the revelation of who God is.  HE IS WISE and JUST above all else.  He is JUST because He is wise.  Without wisdom, you could love your child with all of your heart and lead them straight to the pit of hell. It is wisdom that gives love its balance.  Good isn’t measured in love, but in wisdom.  Picture in your mind the indulged (spoiled) child.  You know they are loved!  You also know that they are loved too much.  They were showered with love without limits.  Every whim, every desire, every grasp of their hand was rewarded with what they wanted.  Then, suddenly life happens and they are rudely confronted with the knowledge that the world doesn’t spin just for them. A spoiled child makes you feel pity for them, not the parents. Wisdom would have limited their grasping hands, and muffled their tantrums.  Love without wisdom is like eating too much candy. 

  

Yes, get wisdom above all else.  It will keep you, and it will guard them.  Wisdom will make you a good husband, father, and teacher.  Let love empower your wisdom, but never let it overrule it.   This is how our heavenly Father describes himself.  Wisdom will help you when your child doesn’t know what they want or how to get it.  It will help you to explain life’s most difficult moments when love seems to be a million miles away.  One of the biggest problems with people who don’t know the wisdom of God, is that they try to frame this world in terms of love only.  I don’t know how many times I’ve heard the statement “If God is love, then why… “ enter any number of cruel misunderstandings that can be thought up. 

 

Without wisdom, every disaster, restriction, or roadblock in life appears to be a cruelty.  When you have God’s wisdom as the guide of your life, your children will be reassured, and comforted through the worst storms.  They will learn that through adversity comes strength. They will learn that love comes from struggle, and wisdom through experience.  They will learn to accept denial as easily as success.

 

Wisdom dampens the fires of our emotions, and steadies our thoughts until we are able to process the circumstances we find ourselves in.  Wisdom helps to explain the struggles, and give insight to the problems.  Wisdom lifts us above the circumstances, and frames our life in terms of truth.  Wisdom removes the rose colored glasses, and allows us to see clearly.

  

As a father, wisdom will help you to respond to your children instead of reacting to them.  Wisdom will help you to frame the boundaries of their life, as well as giving you boundaries to your own life.  Wisdom will help you to have better relationships with those around you, especially your family.  Wisdom will help you to be a better husband, which is the first quality your children should see.  Wisdom will help you to be a better son, to the father who may not have given you wisdom. 

 

So, how do you get wisdom.  First, ask for it.  (James 1:5)  Then, read a chapter in Proverbs every day, for the rest of your life.  WHAT?????   Yes, a chapter a day.  Eventually, they will be written down into your brain so that in any circumstance, you will have wisdom available to you.  If it is in your heart and mind, wisdom will guide everything you do.  Yes, it will even color your love with truth.  Wisdom comes from doing things God’s way.  Doing things God’s way will then be associated with you to your children. Almost every child will say that their daddy loved them, and then you get the ‘but,’ followed by a long list of complaints about your lack of parenting skills. ‘Dad was too strict,’ ‘Dad was too easy’  or ‘Dad wasn’t there.’  However, I am convinced that no child can ever complain about a father who made wisdom their goal.  If you seek wisdom, I promise you will hear your child describe you as the wisest, most loving man they know, and they will come to you for counsel.  They will probably do it sooner than later.  

  

SEEK WISDOM.