Father's Day Challenge

Father's Day is here and with a child of my own on the way, I find myself seeing things through the lens of a father. One such thing hit me when I was reading the Bible with my wife. We're currently reading our way through the Old Testament and we recently got to the book of Judges. To say what I need to say warrants a summary of the events leading up to Judges:

God heard the cry of His people in Egypt, asking for deliverance from the suffering they'd endured as slaves. In response, God called Moses and commanded him to lead the nation of Israel out of captivity into the land He had promised to Abraham. God then miraculously paved the way for Israel, leading them Himself with a pillar of smoke by day and fire by night, protecting and providing for them in the desert. God continually proved Himself to be faithful and caring and showed His power by multitudes of miracles. Despite this, the nation of Israel grumbled and complained, rebelled and sinned over and over again. Yet God remained patient with them and sustained them, committed to loving them... God gave them instruction on how to live and how to purify themselves and set them apart so that he could dwell among them despite their sin. Although it was not all without consequence, as He did not allow that generation to enter the promised land, but instead they wandered the desert for 40 years until they all died off.

With a new generation of Israel at hand, Moses retold all that God had done for their parents' generation and performed a second giving of the Law, detailing all that God had told them and dedicating them to the Lord. Shortly after, Moses died and God commissioned a new leader, Joshua, for the nation of Israel. It was up to Joshua to finally lead Israel into the promised land and take it for them to dwell in. God again proved Himself over and over again with miracles and victory. Joshua 21:42-45 says:

"Thus the Lord gave to Israel all the land that he swore to give to their fathers. And they took possession of it, and they settled there. And the Lord gave them rest on every side just as he had sworn to their fathers. Not one of their enemies had withstood them, for the Lord had given all their enemies into their hands. Not one word of all the good promises that the Lord had made to the house of Israel had failed; all came to pass."

Israel's response was appropriate: worship and praise. Joshua renewed the covenant between Israel and God and dedicated the people again to serving the Lord. The book (and life) of Joshua ends saying, "Israel served the Lord all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders who outlived Joshua and had known all the work that the Lord did for Israel" (24:31).

So now you're probably wondering, "What does any of this have to do with Father's Day?" Well, the story of Israel continues in Judges, and not long after the whole nation of Israel served the Lord comes what I would call the single most damning verse in the Bible for fathers...

"And there arose another generation after them who did not know the Lord or the work that he had done for Israel." (Judges 2:10)

How did this happen!? The rest of Judges and most of the books following could be described as the downward spiral of the nation of Israel. Rather than being known for serving the Lord, they will now be known for their apostasy and unfaithfulness. In the course of ONE generation, the entire nation fell away!

The responsibility for this failure lies not on the priests, not on a single leader, but on the fathers of the nation of Israel. In the great "Shema" from Deuteronomy 6, which every Israelite knew by heart as it was essentially the team motto, it says: "And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children..." This responsibility belongs to the father to teach their children about God and His word. But what we see in Judges is a failure of epic proportions.

As a [soon-to-be] father, I see this as a challenge. A challenge to teach my child, to dedicate her to serving the Lord, and to leading her spiritually. And not just my first baby girl, but all my future children as well. It's not good enough for one generation to serve the Lord... the other generations must follow suit. And it's the responsibility of the fathers to make sure that happens. We can't expect the youth pastor or the mother to do this for us. It's the fathers that need to step up and lead their families and read Scripture and pray, and maintain that conduit to God. If a father sits at home and watches football while his wife takes their kids to church and she is always the one investing in their spiritual growth, that father is not a Godly man. A Godly man will fight for his kids' spiritual health, because he knows that there is nothing the enemy would like more than to prevent a father from raising the next generation to serve the Lord.

I don't ever want anyone to say about me: "And there arose another generation after him who did not know the Lord or the work that he had done for them." That's not the legacy I want to leave as a father. I'd rather take the example left by Joshua... "But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord..."

So today I issue the same challenge Joshua did to the nation of Israel:

Choose this day whom you will serve...

Standing and praying at the street corners...

Sometime after Easter, I decided to start reading through the Gospels again, and I began in Matthew. I got to Matthew 6:5 and something struck me and grabbed me... A simple verse that itched somewhere in the back of my subconscious, requesting my attention...

"And when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites. For they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, that they may be seen by others."

Now, my whole life, I have never once seen someone in church or on the street corner praying loudly for attention or to present an appearance of spirituality. But that got me to thinking that fallen human nature doesn't change much over time, but society and culture does...

So I wonder if this doesn't still happen... Maybe people still DO stand on street corners and pray loudly for attention? Maybe I'm just blind to it? Maybe... maybe I do that??? And suddenly this simple verse I had scarcely glanced at before caused me to look deeper at myself and the world around me. And where before I hadn't seen it, looking again, I saw evidence that maybe this is still happening... But the primary venue it takes place at now is through the Internet and social media. In a way, social media has become our street corner. It is where people gather and mingle. It's where we speak and present our worldview to others. And how often do we tweet or write status updates with just a Christian song lyric, or a verse of Scripture, or repeat some other Christian witticism?

Firstly, I'll say that this isn't inherently bad. Secondly, I will admit that I am guilty of this. If a particular song, or verse, or phrase from a book or sermon catches my heart, I'll often quote it. Knowing that I do this, I challenged myself to examine why. And my conclusion was that most often, my posts are because I am impacted by the love/majesty/grace of God and I just want others to see Him like I do. Or I may think that the particular quote would be encouraging to others. When I'm most impacted by God, it's generally from a place of humility (and often brokenness) before Him. So I'm not trying to blast or judge anyone who is openly spiritual in the social media venue. There's nothing anything inherently wrong with spirituality on social media. I'm just challenging us all (including myself) to think before we step out on that street corner...

Who is this for?
Why are we saying it?
Will people benefit from this?
What is my purpose in posting this?

Because if it's not for God's glory...
if we're not saying it to worship Him...
if our friends and followers won't be uplifted or impacted by it...
and our purpose isn't the advancement of Christ's Kingdom...

Well then maybe we'd be better off saying nothing at all. Maybe we're doing it to be seen. Maybe we're just an obnoxious clanging cymbal making too much noise.

Maybe we're just praying loudly on the street corner...