A Man And Parenting (Father`s Day)

Happy Father’s Day! We honor all dads on this day - brand new dads celebrating their first father’s day and dad’s who have children or even grandchildren who are parents.

One afternoon, John F. Kennedy and his father Joseph were proudly watching First Daughter Caroline at play. As they sat, no words passed between the two men for quite some time. Finally, the elder Kennedy observed thoughtfully, "Caroline's very bright, Jack." Then, after a pause, he added, "Smarter than you were at that age." JFK adopted a similar demeanor and said, "Yes, she is." Then, after a pause of his own, he added:

Well, dad, like it or not, your child is, to a great degree, going to reflect you – from the way you talk to the way you walk.

When it comes to parenting, that Kennedy scene gets repeated many times, doesn’t it? When things are going well, we take great pride – “that’s my girl!” “Look what I have done!” When things are not going so well, it’s another story – “look at what your son did!”

Recently, through the miracle of the re-run, my youngest son, John has discovered a hit TV show from the 1980’s – “The Cosby Show.” In his book about fatherhood, Bill Cosby wrote,

"So you have decided to have children. You have decided to give up quiet evenings at home when you listened to good music & read good books. You have decided to give up lazy weekends when you just held each other in your arms & assured each other of your love."

"You have decided to give up candlelight dinners where you could finish complete sentences. You have decided to change all your couches into trampolines. You have decided to give up your pursuit of the reproduction of fine art, & start coping with the pursuit of the reproduction of yourself. Why? That’s the baffling question."

He went on, "Poets tell us that one of the reasons that we want to have children is because we desire immortality. Yes, I must confess that I asked God for a son to carry on my family name. And God did exactly what I asked Him to do. But now there are times when I ask my son not to reveal his identity. I beg him, `Make up a name. Tell them anything, but don’t tell them you belong to me, whatever you do.’"

"Immortality?" he says. "Now that I am the father of five, my only hope is that I will live long enough to see all five of them leave home."[i]

Being a father has it’s ups and its downs. I can remember when my children were little I used to dread the thought of them being teenagers - but I must tell you the truth – each stage of their lives has been a joy to behold. As I reach the place in my life where our children are venturing out into the adult world I have learned that Fatherhood is a wonderful and amazing adventure.

Immediately after the service today, John and I will be leaving to travel to Minneapolis, Minnesota to meet Carol there, and welcome back our daughter Nicole, who is returning from a month of work in Swaziland. During that month she has been involved in working with AIDS victims – teaching abstinence, encouraging young Christians to live by Godly standards, and working with the youngest victims of AIDS – the orphans who have been left behind in the tens of millions across that vast continent.

Then next week, on Saturday, our middle child, Andrew, will return from his Summer Cruise with the Navy, where he has had a month experiencing his four options as a Naval officer – Submarine, Surface Warfare, Aviation and Marine duty.

I have watched this past year as John adjusted to being the only child at home with his older siblings off to college. He has emerged from their shadows and is seizing launching into a whole new stage of his life – working, running cross country and track, serving in student leadership and maintaining a 4.0 average.

You may think that I am proud of my children – and you’d be right! But before you get too critical of me – may I remind you that after Jesus went to John the Baptist to tell the world that he was beginning his ministry, God the Father was so impressed by and blessed by His own Son that He broke through the heavens and said, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased!”

I am thrilled with my children – but let me tell you something – all the praise and the glory goes to God alone! It is by His grace that they are who they are…He knows the mistakes, the neglect, the broken promises, the disappointments, the harsh words, the wounds that have been inflicted from father to child – but in His grace He has kept them, protected them and drawn them to Himself, and I am so grateful to Him for it!

I share all of that with you because I want to share with you what I believe is the secret to being a Godly father. It’s not my secret – it is a formula that is found in God’s instruction manual for life – the Bible. In Ephesians, chapter 6 there is a brief, but loaded statement to dads on parenting (by the way, God doesn’t give any advice to the moms – I guess it all comes naturally to them!)

In Ephesians 6, verse 4, we read this: “And you, fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord.” If you have the NIV Bible, it reads, “Fathers, do not exasperate your children, instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.”

In this short statement of instruction, we find what we should not do, and what we should do.

Think about all the things we are told NOT to do as fathers. It starts from the first few moments they are born…

Ø “don’t poke her with the diaper pin!” (I’ll bet most of you have never pinned a diaper in your life!)

I suppose Paul could have listed a whole lot of things that fathers shouldn’t do – but he chose only one – “fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath.” What does that mean? If we are supposed to be careful not to do something, then we really need to understand what it is, don’t we? Well, actually, the NIV hit the meaning right on the head – it means, “to exasperate.” Webster’s tells me that “to exasperate” means, “to irritate to a high degree, to annoy extremely, to provoke.”

There are lots of ways we can exasperate our kids – they get irritated when we are inconsistent, when we say one thing, and do another, when we break promises, when we are overly critical of them, or when we are overly strict. We also irritate them when we are irritable, and we take it out on the family. We need to be careful that our tough days at work don’t automatically translate into a tough day for the family when we get home.

Paul gives an almost identical caution to us as dads in Colossians 3:21, where he wrote, “Fathers, do not provoke you children to anger,” then he followed it with these words, “lest they become discouraged.” The great danger of us exasperating our children is that they will become discouraged, their spirits broken. We need to encourage our children, speak praise into their lives as well as discipline. See the promise and potential in them, and let them know what we see.

A little nine-year old boy got tired of practicing his piano. His mother heard that the great Paderewski was coming to their city to do a concert. She bought two tickets, dressed her boy in a tiny tux, and went to the concert. When she sat down, she began talking to some friends. The boy looked up on stage and saw the big, shiny black Steinway piano, with the bench in place and the lid of the keyboard open, and he thought, “boy, would I love to play that!”

So he slipped out of his chair, walked down the aisle, went up the steps, over the piano, and began to play “Chopsticks.”

Well, the people down front said, “Who…Who is…Hey, Stop! Get off the stage!”

Paderewski was in back getting prepared, and heard the commotion and the piano being played. He sized up the situation in an instant, and slipped out from the curtains without the boy seeing him, slipped onto the bench next to him and started to play an improvised melody that went along perfectly with “Chopsticks!” Then he turned to the boy, smiled and said, “Keep playing, don’t quit, don’t stop!”[ii]

When was the last time we encouraged our children? Praised them for their great sense of humor, their loving heart, or their abilities? When did we last encourage them to go for their dream, press hard toward some goal, or unleash their potential? When she was a little girl, Nicole told us one day that she was going to be the first missionary on the moon! We loved it! Today she is studying to be a missionary in Africa. Our son, John, has a dream of designing a new and revolutionary energy source for the world – through magnetic or nuclear or some other energy source – and he’s got the science and math skills to do it! I think that’s incredible! He works on experiments around the house, and I am just amazed and impressed by it…but I sometimes make promises to help, and I don’t follow through. Dad – you can’t begin to imagine the importance of encouragement in your children’s lives – they desperately need your encouragement – your stamp of approval, your praise!

After telling us one thing that we should NOT do, Paul gives us three things that we should do:

We must “raise them up.” Take a quick look over at Ephesians 5:29. In that verse, Paul is talking about how men take care of their own bodies. He says, “No one ever hatews his own body but he feeds and cares for it…” That phrase “feeds and cares for it” is the same Greek word that is translated in this verse as “raise them up.” It means, “to nourish up to maturity.” Did you hear that? “To nourish up to maturity.” It is not enough for us as dads to nourish our children physically by providing food, shelter and clothes. We must also nourish them emotionally and spiritually.” [iii] Sure, today we have day-care centers, schools, churches, scouting, youth athletic leagues – all designed to help raise up our kids – but in God’s eyes, that job, dad, belongs to you, and He expects you to “raise them up.”

We must “raise them up, in the training…” This is the second thing we should do. This is a strong word in the Greek that means, “discipline, even by punishment.” Sadly, we live in a world that has forgotten the meaning and place of proper discipline and punishment. Young people break the law, and the courts let them off with a slap on the wrist, and then we wonder why at 17 they are still breaking the law! The same is true in our homes. If we do not train our children, with consistent and appropriate punishment, then we will have no one to blame but ourselves when they grow into undisciplined, reckless adults. The problem here, dads, is that way too many of us have left the discipline and training to our wives. That is not only unfair to our wives, but it is unfair to the kids as well. The need the security and the self esteem that comes from being disciplined by their fathers. To leave it to mom says, “you are not worth my effort.”[iv]

Of course, our punishment and our discipline needs to be appropriate, and it MUST – hear me on this – IT MUST BE PRECEEDED BY THE ENCORUAGEMENT WE TALKED ABOUT A MOMENT AGO! To discipline without encouragement is to break the spirit – it is to provoke to wrath – the right of a dad to discipline is predicated on the responsibility of dad to encourage.

Third, we are to instruct. Verse four concludes, “bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.” Dad, your responsibility to raise your children requires encouragement and discipline, but it also needs words of instruction. The entire book of Proverbs, the greatest book of wisdom and instruction ever given, is actually a book of instruction from a father to his child. When the Supreme Court outlawed prayer in schools, the Washington Post published a cartoon that showed an angry father waving a newspaper at his familyi and shouting, “What do they expect us to do, listen to the kids pray at home?” Well, YES! As fathers, we need to stop passing the buck of educating our children to our wives, ours churches, and our schools, and take the responsibility that is ours to instruct our children. Fathers, the Bible places that responsibility squarely on your shoulders.

Being a father is difficult – we are going to screw it up sometimes - it’s a lot of work – but anything in life that has value requires work, and sacrifice and diligence.

Let me encourage you today, dad. Some of you are struggling with trying to get it right – some of you have simply abdicated the whole “parenting thing” to your wives. Don’t let this greatest opportunity in life get away from you. Take it seriously, don’t give up, love your kids, encourage them, don’t frustrate them, nurture them, discipline them and instruct them – most of all pray for them, and by God’s grace the return on your investment in their lives will be the greatest legacy you can leave on this earth.

A Man and Parenting