Father's Day (6-19-05)

Father’s Day 2005
Bible Study Time 6-19-05

Psalm 127 says:

Psalm 127:1-5 (NKJ)
1 Unless the LORD builds the house, they labor in vain who build it;
3 Behold, children are a heritage from the LORD, the fruit of the womb is a reward.
4 Like arrows in the hand of a warrior, so are the children of one's youth.
5 Happy is the man who has his quiver full of them;

As I read this verse, my first thought was that a house can not be build without God’s help. However, that’s not what the verse says. It says that if we try to build a house without God, that house will count for nothing. Our labor will be in vain.

Of coarse, that is true of anything that we do. People accomplish all kinds of things in this life, and many great things are accomplished by those who do not know the Lord at all. But what will their labor be worth in the long run? What will it be worth in eternity? The Bible is clear that only those things which are done with Christ and through the power of Christ will have lasting value.

At Mt. Sinai, the Lord was angry with the children of Israel because they had built and worshiped the golden calf. The Lord said to Moses:

Exodus 33:1-3 (NKJ)
1 "Depart and go up from here, you and the people whom you have brought out of the land of Egypt, to the land of which I swore to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob . . .
2 "And I will send My Angel before you, . . .
3 ". . . for I will not go up in your midst, lest I consume you on the way for you are a stiff_necked people."

Then the Bible says:

Exodus 33:7 (NKJ)
7 Moses took his tent and pitched it outside the camp, far from the camp, and called it the tabernacle of meeting. And it came to pass that everyone who sought the LORD went out to the tabernacle of meeting which was outside the camp.

Apparently before this time, Moses’ tent was in the middle of the encampment, and when the people brought their concerns to Moses, he would go into the tent and the pillar of cloud would descend upon the tent so that everyone would know that Moses was meeting with God. But now, Moses had moved his tent outside the camp, and the people knew that God was no longer willing to meet with Moses within the confines of the camp. The camp had been defiled by sin so Moses moved his tent outside the camp; far from the camp, the Bible says.

Apparently, it was some time after that Moses said to the Lord:

Exodus 33:12-17
12 . . . You say to me, 'Bring up this people.' But You have not let me know whom You will send with me. Yet You have said, 'I know you by name, and you have also found grace in My sight.'
13 "Now therefore, I pray, if I have found grace in Your sight, show me now Your way, that I may know You and that I may find grace in Your sight. And consider that this nation is Your people."
14 And the Lord said, "My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest."
15 Then Moses said, "If Your Presence does not go with us, do not bring us up from here.
16 "For how then will it be known that Your people and I have found grace in Your sight, except You go with us? So we shall be separate, Your people and I, from all the people who are upon the face of the earth."
17 So the LORD said to Moses, "I will also do this thing that you have spoken; for you have found grace in My sight, and I know you by name."

How wise Moses was to realize that his only hope for accomplishing anything worthwhile with his life was dependent upon the Lord being with him. He said, "If you don’t go with us, I don’t want to go."

Well, that is the same concept that is expressed in Psalm 127:

Psalm 127:1 (NKJ)
1 Unless the LORD builds the house, they labor in vain who build it;

Most seem to agree that this Psalm was written by King Solomon, and if that’s true then he would have been very much aware of the fact that God is more than capable of building a glorious house, for he, himself, was the heir of such a house.

When his father, King David, expressed his desire to build a house for the Lord, the Lord replied that David would not be allowed to build the temple. But then God said, "David, I’m going to build you a house." And God was not talking about a royal mansion, He was talking about a glorious family.

Let’s read the account in 2 Samuel, Chapter 7, beginning in verse 1:

2 Samuel 7:1-6
1 Now it came to pass when the king was dwelling in his house, and the LORD had given him rest from his enemies all around,
2 that the king said to Nathan the prophet, "See now, I dwell in a house of cedar, but the ark of God dwells inside tent curtains."
3 Then Nathan said to the king, "Go, do all that is in your heart, for the LORD is with you."
4 But it happened that night that the word of the LORD came to Nathan, saying,
5 "Go and tell My servant David, 'Thus says the LORD: "Would you build a house for Me to dwell in?
6 "For I have not dwelt in a house since the time that I brought the children of Israel up from Egypt, even to this day, but have moved about in a tent and in a tabernacle.

Then the Lord reminded David of the fact that God had taken David as a sheepherder and had made him the King of Israel. God had cut off David’s enemies and had made David’s name great. Then in verse 11, Nathan says:

2 Samuel 7:11-14
11 " . . . the LORD tells you that He will make you a house.
12 "When your days are fulfilled and you rest with your fathers, I will set up your seed after you, who will come from your body, and I will establish his kingdom.
13 "He shall build a house for My name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever.
14 "I will be his Father, and he shall be My son . . . "

Well, this is the kind of house that the Lord is able to build. I guess that tells us something about how God feels about families, doesn’t it? God promised David a family that would last forever. And not only that, but God promised David that one of his sons would be the Son of God, and that that particular Son would establish the throne of David in an everlasting kingdom.

When the Lord Jesus came to earth 2000 years ago, He was born in the city of David. He was born of the house and linage of David. Everywhere He went He was called the Son of David. The children of Israel had been waiting for the fulfillment of David’s promise. They were looking for the Son of David who would come to establish the throne of David in an everlasting kingdom.

Solomon was a son of David, but he was not the Son of David that the nation of Israel was looking for. Solomon was a picture of the Son of David in that God allowed Solomon to build a glorious temple, and God established Solomon’s throne in a glorious kingdom, but the glories of Solomon’s kingdom, which was indescribably glorious, will not even hold a candle to the glories of the future kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Men, you may have guessed already where I’m going with this, since this is Father’s Day. God has given men a tremendous responsibility when it comes to building a house. When it comes to establishing a family. A wife is a gift from God. Children are a gift from God. As we read in Psalm 127, children are an heritage from the Lord. They’re like arrows in the hand of a warrior, and happy is the man who has quiver full of them.

It’s important to realize, however, that God wants to reveal His glory through our families. It’s not his goal for us to have mediocre families. Wayne Schoonover, my brother-in-law, often reminds people of the old proverb which says, "Beware, my son, of good enough."

Truly glorious families don’t just happen. Glorious families are the result of God’s blessing. Men, we need to be like Moses when Moses said, "Lord, if you don’t go with us, I don’t want to go." We need to pray that God will give us a good plan of action for creating a family which reveals the glory of God.

For Father’s Day I was given a movie which I have to admit I have already watched. In this movie there was a man who gave advise to men who really wanted to get off to a great start with that special girl. The movie impressed me with the fact that we, as men, often don’t have a clue when it comes to the various needs of the people that we live with every day. We need God’s help. If we ask, we will receive because God wants our homes to reveal His glory.

Sometimes families have needs which are just overwhelming. Sometimes problems seem to be beyond any solution. But if God can take a shepherd boy out of the field and establish his family as the greatest family of all time, He can do miracles for us too.

We need sensitivity to the needs of each member of our family. Some people think, "All my family needs is more money. If we just had more money everything would be just fine." That is obviously false because some of the richest families are also some of the most miserable.

God gave some great advise for fathers in Ephesians, Chapter 6, where Paul said:

Ephesians 6:4 (NKJ)
4 And you, fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord.

When Paul says "bring them up", that tells us that this is something to which we need to pay special attention. We need to be constantly observing and monitoring to see to it that the needs of our wife and children are being met, both physically and spiritually. As we do this we are to pay particular attention to their training and admonition.

The greatest education, the greatest training, our children will ever get is the training they get at home. From the time they’re born, they’re watching and learning, and most of what they learn in this life will occur before they ever start to school. But the word for training in Ephesians, Chapter 6, really refers to specific instruction. It’s the kind of training that supplies the nourishment needed for growth and maturity. Fathers need to be teaching their children about everything, but especially about the word of God. In Deuteronomy 6, God said to Israel:

Deuteronomy 6:4-9 (NKJ)
4 "Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one!
5 "You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength.
6 "And these words which I command you today shall be in your heart.
7 "You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up.
9 "You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.

Our children need to know that the word of God is our book of instruction for how to live this life. I was at Six Flags Over Texas this week, and I saw some young people from a certain church. They all had on T-shirts which said something like, "Life is much easier if we learn to read the manual." And then it had a picture of an open Bible.

The Bible is our instruction manual for this life. We need to read it, and we need to teach it. Especially as fathers, we need to teach it to our children because it can make the difference between eternal life and eternal death for our children.

God promised David that one of his children would be the Son of God. What a tremendous promise! One of his descendants was going to be the Son of God. Well, we can lay hold of that promise too because the Bible says that when our children accept Jesus Christ as their personal Savior, they become the children of God. When they believe that Jesus Christ died on the cross for their sins, and that He was raised from the dead so that they could have eternal life, they become the Sons of God.

This is specifically stated in Ephesians, Chapter 1, where we read that we who trust in Christ have been predestined to adoption as Sons by Jesus Christ. Men, we as fathers have a tremendous opportunity to teach the word of God to our children so that they can become the children of God.

Our communities here in southwest Oklahoma are blessed to have many godly fathers who take the responsibilities of fatherhood very seriously. Even this morning, I can think of so many men who have and are bringing up their children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. I just want to say thank you to those of you who are listening this morning, and I hope you have a very happy Father’s Day.

It’s been a pleasure being with you this morning for Bible Study Time. I’ll look forward to being with you again next week at this same time.

Write me at: jimjoan77@juno.com

Church links:
http://www.peacechurch-ok.org/
http://www.eleventhavenuechurch.com/
http://gracebiblechurch-fw.com/