The Father's Role in the Family

Summary

On Father's Day the church gathers to thank God and to honor fathers. The message centers on the father's role in the home and opens with Deuteronomy 6, where God commands His people to keep His word in their hearts and to teach it diligently to their children - at home and on the road, when lying down and rising up.

The preacher stresses that a father cannot be replaced. He points to how children who grow up without an engaged father suffer, and warns that the enemy deliberately attacks what holds a family together. Every man is called to be a priest in his own home, responsible not only for daily bread but for the spiritual life of his children.

Drawing on Malachi, Mark, Ephesians and Proverbs, the sermon calls children to honor their father and mother - the first commandment with a promise of a good and long life - and calls fathers to be both physical and spiritual fathers who raise wise children walking in truth. There is no greater joy for a father than to see his children living for God.

Key Points

• God commands fathers to keep His word in their own hearts and to teach it diligently to their children wherever they go (Deuteronomy 6).
• A father's presence shapes a child's whole life; his absence, or being present yet 'dead' to the family, is a deep tragedy.
• The enemy targets the family and tries to destroy what holds it together, so fathers must take their God-given place.
• Every man of the house is called to be a priest, responsible for the family's spiritual life and not only its material needs.
• Honoring father and mother is the first commandment with a promise: a good and long life on the earth.
• A righteous father raises his children well and rejoices to see them walking wisely in the truth.
• Ideally a man is both a physical and a spiritual father, feeding his children the bread of God's word.