Fathers, you know that you are the appointed leaders in your home. God has given you the... Fathers, you know that you are the first to go. As your family rolls along, it's your responsibility to make sure you're staying on the road, you avoid dangers for your family. This is indeed a daunting task. especially these days where the environment for fathers is hostile. This morning we're going to drive past a warning sign. God put it in His Word, put it by the side of the road, you might say, long, long ago for fathers of every generation to learn this lesson. It's a warning that we fathers would do well to heed It's found in Colossians chapter 3. It's just one verse, verse 21. It might seem simple and straightforward, but I think it has a latitude of application. I preached this message actually twice before when I was thinking about it, looked up the records, and I don't think since 2002 I've preached it, so I'm thinking most of you haven't heard it. We have a whole swath of new, younger fathers in our congregation, and my prayer and hope is that this will benefit you and benefit your home as you think through what God would have you hear. So let's turn there and read it together, and then do what we usually do, and that is to take it apart and try to think about it, put it back together again, and apply it. Colossians 3, verse 21. Do not exasperate your children so that they will not lose heart. It's interesting, isn't it? The Letter of Colossians contains many really important doctrinal truths. I'm gonna give you just a quick survey to set the context here. It's such a rich book, I will not do it justice, but just a few notes. In chapters one and two, Paul was teaching the Colossian Christians about Jesus Christ, and particularly about his supremacy over all other philosophies and religions in the entire universe, really. The supremacy of Christ over the entire world is really the theme of those first two chapters in particular. There he's warning them not to give an inch to false doctrine, not to diminish Christ in any way, not to turn to any other doctrine or form of teaching because Christ is fully sufficient. In chapter 3, Paul exhorts the church to seek the things above, then, where Christ is and says our life is in Him. If He is supreme and great, then all of our life is in Him. And then he begins, as we read in our scripture reading, to delineate what that life in Christ is all about. Love and patience and forbearance and putting aside sexual immorality. It rises to somewhat, I think, of a climax in chapter 3, verses 16 and 17, where he says, let the word of Christ, see, richly dwell within you, and then sing with thankfulness in your hearts to God. When you understand Christ and His life, and you understand you're in Him and He is in you, then all of that reaches inside of you, and now there's something inside of you that is so wanting to express itself, you sing full of the Holy Spirit, full of the Word of Christ, and you kind of just let it out. You can't help but let it out. Christ is so important to you. At that point in the letter, Paul turned his attention toward particular groups within every local congregation. Back then, the only difference now is we'd have to sort of take the concept of slavery and apply that to our employment. Many of you would probably have no problem thinking of it that way, but it's not really slavery. They're really not comparable in some sense. In other sense, there's some things to glean, and masters, of course, to bosses. In chapter 3, verse 18, he instructs wives to be subject to their husbands and says that's fitting in the Lord. In verse 19, he says, husbands, love your wives, serve them sacrificially, don't be embittered against them if they do wrong. Chapter 3, verse 20, children are told to be obedient to their parents, both mom and dad, to please the Lord. Slaves are commanded to obey their masters and do their work not necessarily for their bosses, but looking beyond their bosses and realizing that every little detail that they do, whether they're being watched by an earthly boss or not, they should do it all to the glory of God. That has a lot of application. And then the masters are told to be just, knowing they have a master in heaven who watches how they treat their slaves. In the midst of all of that particular and targeted instruction comes verse 21. Paul gives a specific warning to fathers. It's a warning. It's not really a word of exhortation. I was asked once by one of the men, why is it on Mother's Day the messages are so encouraging towards mothers and then Father's Day comes and it seems like double barrels are aimed at the dads? I'm just the expositor of the text. I didn't write it. He gives a warning to fathers, and this verse, dads, is for us. God is warning us not to provoke our children to anger. Why not? Because that leads to their discouragement, and there's an awful lot in children losing heart, an awful lot in that. So here we are again to gain some wisdom this Father's Day to avert exasperating our children. I include myself in this exhortation. There's three simple parts. First, who the warning is directed toward. I know you know that, but I want to emphasize that. Second, what the warning means. That actually takes a little bit of refining. And then third, why the warning must be heeded. Who, what, and why. is our outline for today. It's only one warning sign. Scripture has other warnings for fathers and has other exhortations for fathers, but this one is important. Let's not drive past it too quickly, like a bright yellow sign, you know, on the right hand of the road. Sometimes we just sort of You know, don't worry about them, but then that's why people get into accidents, right? And so we want to make sure that we consider why is that warning sign there for dad? Stop and consider that this morning. If we go down the road with our family, what will happen if we don't heed this sign, right? So first, who the warning is directed toward? Just one word. Paul addresses the fathers, pater. That's the normal word for father in Greek. It's used many, many times. Of God the Father, also used of human fathers. Some believe that there is a sense in which when the fathers are addressed, that means that Paul meant to include the mothers in this warning. Fathers and mothers really work together as a team to disciple and train and correct their children, right? However, there was a normal word for parents that Paul could have employed. It's ganus. In fact, he had just used it in verse 20 when he wrote, children, be obedient to your, what, parents. There's that term. For some reason, the Spirit of God did not move Paul to choose that word at this point and give a warning to both parents, both father and mother. The Spirit of God seems to have intended this warning primarily for the head of the home, and that's how we're going to take it this morning. Now, in order to understand why Paul singles out fathers in this commandment, maybe it would help to get a little bit of an understanding about a father's authority in the context of those who received this letter. So we're going to look a little bit at Roman society, and the way the Romans viewed fatherhood, and a little bit at Hebrew society and the way the Jews viewed fatherhood. And maybe with that as a backdrop, we can understand why this particular warning to fathers rather than mothers included. There's no question that The Jewish father's role was crucial in the family. God made it that way. If we were to survey the Old Testament, we'd come across verses like Job chapter 1 and verse 5 and Genesis chapter 12 and verse 8. We learned that fathers like Job and Abraham led the family in family worship. They were also to provide spiritual instruction for their children and not just when they were young. We get a hint of that in Joshua 24, 15, when Joshua, another father, spoke for his family and said, as for me and my house, we will, what? Serve the Lord. In Genesis 24, 4, it shows that Abraham felt a responsibility in that culture to find a wife for his son Isaac. In Genesis 29, 19, with Laban, and in Judges 1, verse 12, with Caleb, it illustrates contracts that fathers entered into to make sure that their daughters were married. Of course, one of the most powerful parental passages, I think, in the Old Testament is Deuteronomy 6, verses 4 through 9, and there it shows both father and mother were to teach their children The Word of God, the Law of God, diligently is the term used there. If you open up the Proverbs, the entire book is about, really, a father instructing his son, or those that are naive, or those that are younger. In the Jewish family, the father's authority was vast. It was great. The father's honor was also expected to be vast and great. One of the ten commandments, think about that, ten commandments given from God's finger, and one of the ten is for children to honor their father and their mother. Honor them. Make sure that they're constantly sensed that they're honored. That's a divine command. In Roman society, through a law called patria potestas, The Roman father had absolute sway over his entire household. He could command them what to do. He could sell members of his family away. He could cast them out. If he desired, he could kill them and have them destroyed. Rather than protecting the weak of society, the Romans found no use for the weak. Being weak was considered useless and pathetic. One Roman writer named Seneca wrote this, we slaughter a fierce ox, we strangle a mad dog, we plunge a knife into a sick cow, children born weak or deformed, we drown. It's a little hard for us to relate really either to the Jewish home or the Roman home because here in America, fatherhood carries much less weight. Fatherhood is a constant source of jokes in our perverse media. Those dads who do attempt to stand up and be counted as what God wants a father to be are scorned by feminists, are made fun of and made to be looking like ogres by Hollywood stars and the movies they construct. by politicians who will shamefully find it more advantageous to speak up for gay rights than the traditional family led by a father. When is the last time you've heard a politician say, I'm for dads leading in the home? But Paul under the inspiration of God's Holy Spirit, knew the importance of the Father, knew the importance of honoring the Father's position in the house. He decided not to dishonor them, but to address them man to man, give them this warning for the benefit of their homes, which God gave to them to lead. Despite the confusing voices that are out there, we must understand that men have been given real authority from God. To refuse to use that authority is sin. To use that authority in a wrong manner is also sin. This warning is about using that authority in the wrong way. God expects us to use the authority, but use it for the benefit of our children. Rather than ignoring or scorning a man's authority in the home as society does, Scripture talks directly to our men and guides them. This is how to use your authority. Be gentle, be kind, and then again, be patient and be humble. And so the fathers are addressed. That's to whom the warning is given. Second, let us consider what the warning means. What does the warning mean? Well, it says, fathers, do not exasperate your children. Again, I say that's like a large yellow sign on the side of the road as you're driving and passing by. It's a warning. You're not supposed to miss it. Now, yellow signs come in different sizes. Ever notice that? Some of the kind of the common ones we see, we don't even hardly acknowledge. There's over there and we just blow right past. You know, curve in the road. No biggie, I've been down this road many times. And you don't even slow down. But where there's been a particularly dangerous intersection or a dangerous curve or something down a mountainside where there have been a lot of accidents before, you ever notice that those yellow signs get larger? It's almost like someone said, you need to put a really big one up there. That's kind of how I view this warning here. A lot of fathers hurt their homes because they don't heed this advice. So I think that this would warrant a huge sign where you'd have to look at it and look at it and go, wow, that is a large sign. Do you see that sign, sweetie? That is a large sign. I better do what it says. It really has very few words. If it were a sign, I think you could read it from a distance. Do not exasperate your children. If you think I could stop there, that'd be good enough. Just repeat it loud. Kids would go home from church, Dad, did you hear that? And they would probably twist it Every time they want what they want, they'd say, you're exasperating me, you're not giving me what I want. So we have to understand what this is saying and what it's not saying. To exasperate is the translation of a rare word in the New Testament, erathidzo. It's used only twice, here and in 2 Corinthians 9, verse 2. It means essentially to provoke, to irritate, to agitate, or to arouse in some way. In the Septuagint, which is the Greek translation of the Hebrew Old Testament, erythidzo is used in Proverbs 25-23 where it says, the north wind brings forth rain. You don't hear any anger there, do you? That literally means the north wind stirs up or provokes a rain to fall in Israel. That's a positive use of the term. But here in Colossians, a negative sense is intended. Thus, it is translated by various English versions, Fathers, do not embitter your children. Fathers, do not fret and harass your children. Fathers, do not provoke your children. The previous verse, verse 20, has just commanded children to be obedient to their parents in all things. That obviously gives parents far-reaching authority, wouldn't you agree? Children, you have to obey your parents and everything. Wow. Well, where's the check on dad with all that kind of authority? And the answer is right here. Verse 21 is meant as a check on the use of dad's authority in the home. By the way, dad has an authority over him. Do you know who that is? Christ. He's accountable to Christ. Christ can chastise a father. Christ can spank a daddy. That can happen. I know it can happen. It's happened to me. So, I know it happens. The authority that we have is to be used, but it must be used in love. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I love my kids, we all say. Yes, but you don't always demonstrate that love in a way that really communicates it to children. You're not serving them. They can't discern your heart. They can only listen to the sound of your voice and your action. And sometimes, Even though in our heart we love them a lot and would die for them, we actually end up agitating them or harassing them. Matthew Henry's commentary brings out the meaning of this warning eloquently. He writes, What a picture. One way better to understand this warning is to turn to the parallel passage in Ephesians, which you keep your finger in Colossians 3 and turn to Ephesians 6. You'll find a lot of similarities between Ephesians and Colossians. They're written by the same person roughly around the same time, and they have many of the same themes. In chapter 6 and verse 4 of Ephesians, Paul's condensed warning and exhortation to the Ephesian fathers is written this way. Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. There, Paul uses an even stronger word, paragidzo. It means to rouse to wrath, to provoke to anger, or to be angry with resentment. In fact, it's interesting that in some ancient Greek manuscripts, the same word found in Ephesians was put in Colossians, probably because a scribe used the more common word. The one in Colossians is less common. They used the more common word to try to make sense of Paul's warning and to make it a little bit clearer. But erethidzo is the correct use in Colossians. But either way, with both words, Paul is warning against aggravating children under the authority of their fathers. Fathers, regardless of their intent, who agitate and irritate their children, need to be told, look, you probably don't see what you're doing, so that's why I'm giving you this warning. Now sometimes we fathers do the right thing, and our children get angry anyway, right? I didn't hear any amens on that. That was your opportunity. You're not going to get to me. We do the right thing. We correct them. And in their sin, they don't want that. They don't want to be obedient. They don't see the wisdom of what you're trying to train them by the work you want them to do or by the apologies you want them to make. And they resent you. So this is not meant to correct fathers so that they're scared to ever correct their children. We have to correct our children. And sometimes, even when we do it in a gentle and a humble manner, they get angry anyway. But not always. And one's manner helps a lot in getting across the correction that you want. I know that when I corrected my children and my attitude wasn't right, my attitude was more the issue in their mind than whatever it was I was trying to tell them. Later, you hear them talk and say, why was Daddy in a bad mood? What's wrong with Dad? Did he have a rough day? And I'm like, that had nothing to do with anything. Everything that I said here is what I wanted you to get. Oh, they got it all right. They didn't listen to the words. They listened to the spirit inside. They listened to the tone. They looked at the facial expression. And they know Dad pretty well. And for the most part, they got sometimes wrong, but for the most part, They were right. And my correction didn't work because I needed to correct my spirit before I corrected whatever it was that probably did need correction. So I find this warning to be very important. I've learned a lot about it to try to apply this to my own parenting, to give my children, for example, more room to think for themselves, to explore. to come up with their own ideas, to make their own decisions, some of which are mistakes, to learn from those mistakes, to go live through a decision for two, three, four months and then come back at the end of that and go, that wasn't a good idea. And knowing that they would learn better that way, particularly at an older age, than they would if I just had told them, no, don't do that. I had to learn as a father that I have zeal for God and zeal for the things of God. And I want very much each of my children to follow Christ, to know Christ and how good He is. To not do it because I tell them, but for them to know how good Christ is. And there's a lot of zeal that comes with that. I want them to be obedient. I want them to understand the things that I understand. And I want them to kind of jump forward to the wisdom that I have. And I forget that it took me a long, long time to develop that wisdom. And I'm still learning more, right? And so I need to give them latitude to explore and make mistakes and make their own decisions, or it will just seem like a heavy hand that is on them. And when that's not what I'm intending at all, let them choose their clothing. I don't like it all. Haven't liked it all. Let them choose it. Let them choose their night activities, picking their own friends. Of course, electronics, which has its whole set of issues involved with it. Keeping their room the way they want. Many kinds of everyday decisions. Give them that freedom. Sometimes they learned. Sometimes it wasn't such a great idea and they learned that. And sometimes I learned. I learned you're going to have to trust God through this. You're going to have to pray for them. You're going to have to see God work in their life and let that faith and His grace and His mercy kick in their heart So when they come out the other side, they're like, I get it now, dad. I understand it. That's a hard thing. But really what I was struggling with is do I trust the heavenly father with my own children when I want to stop them from every bad decision? I don't think men in church usually set out to aggravate their children. I don't think they wake up in the morning and say, let me make my child's life miserable today. And yet it happens anyways, and we wonder, why? I just was trying to do the right thing. Well, I believe there are a variety of ways we fathers exasperate our children, and it may be different with different men. I'm not sure which of these apply to different men, and you'll just have to let God's Spirit apply if any of these do indeed apply. The context, you may notice, does not supply any specific scenario. How? How would we exasperate our children? Evidently, it must kind of just fall into our laps if we think about it a little bit, and so we're going to go from the word meaning itself and from experience and other scripture, and we'll deduce some things that we should guard ourselves from, okay? What are some ways we fathers exasperate our children? Certainly abuse. Start with maybe the most obvious one. Both physical abuse and emotional abuse arouses our children to wrath. Slapping them across the face. Striking them with intent to injure or dominate. Kicking and shoving them down to prove one's dominance. Or just holding up a fist as in a way of intimidation. Or the words. Words can be even more hurtful. Partially warning them how bad we will make their life if they don't do so-and-so or whatever it is we want. Or teasing. Teasing beyond the limits. Some of us like to tease. It's kind of fun. But you know that some children enjoy teasing more than others, right? And there's a point where the teasing has to stop, when a person tells you, I don't like that anymore. You have to listen to that, because now they're not in the right mood, they don't like the way it's being done. If you continue to tease them beyond that, you will irritate them. Purposely trying to embarrass them or belittle your children, what you said about them in front of others when they're two, you can't say when they're seven or eight anymore. You have to change the way you talk about them in front of others. Otherwise, they will resent you. They'll say, why is that being said about him? Why is dad embarrassing me? It looks like he's more concerned with explaining why things are in his home so that others think well of the home rather than protecting the feelings of the little one who can't really say too much at that point in time. You know, we grown-ups use sophisticated words in a confrontation. The child says such and such and we talk our way completely around them because we're so much smarter and our vocabulary is bigger, right? But they get it at the end when their mouth is shut. They know something wasn't right there and they don't appreciate it. The second way that we provoke children to anger is neglect. Fathers stir up their children to anger by just not being there for their children. They simply ignore their responsibilities in the home. They're absent too much. And when I say absent, I don't, I'm not referring just to divorced fathers who probably are grieving that they can't be with their children more, or workaholic fathers who could tell their boss no and spend more time with their children. But even the father who's actually home, but his heart doesn't really connect with his children. He's aloof from his family. He watches too much TV. He goes straight to bed. He hides behind the computer screen or heads off to the golf course. It's different for different men. When he heads out to go shopping or to do a chore, he doesn't want the children with him. He's purposefully distant from his children. He prefers his hobbies than the company of his children. It's much easier, I guess. David's lack of time with his son Absalom in the palace in Israel appears to have made that relationship complicated and might be behind what provoked Absalom to resent his father so much that one day he led a rebellion against his father and even was attempting to kill him. Injustice is another exasperator. Isaiah chapter 56 and verse 1 says, Thus says the Lord, preserve justice and do righteousness. Well, that's in the nation of Israel. What about in the home? Justice is an important duty for someone who's in authority. If the one in authority isn't fair, balanced, equal, objective, just, dispassionate, if he's not that way, how can the home be that way? 2 Samuel 23, 3 and 4 says, He who rules over men righteously, who rules in the fear of God, is as the light of the morning when the sun rises, a morning without clouds, when the tender grass springs out of the earth through sunshine after rain. It's pleasant, in other words, to be under the rule of someone who is just. It's very unsettling, on the other hand, to be under the rule of someone who is not just, doesn't keep his word, doesn't do the right thing. John Piper, commenting on Colossians 321, explains, unpredictable, impulsive, hostile discipline makes children fearful, bitter, deceitful, and discouraged. They don't know where or why the explosion will come next. They say to themselves, what's the use? How can I hope that being good is any better than being bad? And so the spirit of moral hope is broken, and in its place comes calculated, deceitful, discouraged maneuvering. Very insightful. Carl Spackman, in his book, Parents Passing on the Faith, adds this, We should not, of course, become so paranoid over the possibility of angering our children that we never correct them or discipline them or do anything that might make them angry with us. Our children will get angry with us from time to time, just as we will get angry with them. But when we habitually and unnecessarily provoke them to become angry with us, or when we regularly allow them to go to bed with feelings of resentment against us, we are developing angry young men and women. Favoritism is another agitator. Resentment towards parents is almost certain if one child can tell that another is preferred, as with Jacob and Esau. Each parent favored a different son, resulting in great anger, great jealousy, and resentment, and, yes, trickery. Sometimes fathers play favorites unknowingly. Assuming that one child does not want any hugs because they don't hug back all that well, but they still appreciate the hug a lot and yet you stop giving it to the one and keep giving it to the other who does hug strongly back. Or preferring to play ball with the boy but never cooking or sewing or anything with the girl. Or vice versa, adoring the girl and always criticizing the boy. Or the father compares one child with another constantly. Why can't you be more like your older sister? Or the father gives one child more opportunities than another, other things being equal. Or praises the accomplishments of one more openly to the guests in the home. Did you know that I have a son who does such and such and the other son's maybe not doing that and so they're not talked about as much. If you don't think that children recognize those things, think back to your own childhood. Think back to when people constantly overlooked you, when teachers played favorites with others, and that outspoken child seemed to always get the attention while you, the quiet one, got overlooked. Think about how you felt. Now think about your child. Overprotection is another irriter that grows stronger over time. When they're younger, They don't mind it as much. As they get older, the pressure builds up in them like a volcano waiting to explode. These are fathers who are striving hard to do the right thing, usually. They want order in the home. They want consistency and discipline. They probably read books on discipline, and they want it to be consistent. But they're very slow to trust their children, to give them opportunities, to allow them to learn through failure. You know, God, our Father, protects us, yet He gives us much freedom to try things and fail. A lot of us have tried things and failed, and God does not throw us off or cast us off, and we grow wiser through that. God's way of parenting is wiser than ours. If the children have the feeling that they're fenced in, that you won't let them do this or do that, then they won't thrive under your management. They will eventually resent never being given an opportunity or not soon enough or not often enough. They can't develop their independence. They can't express themselves in the home. When they were younger and they were unfairly restricted, there wasn't too much that they could do about it except throw a tantrum or withdraw into a make-believe world. But as they got older, even in elementary grades, resentment began to set in. By high school, if dad doesn't change, the resentment is complete and the relationship is damaged. A father who keeps too tight a rein on some children will not be appreciated. Instead, that father will be sadly rejected. Some fathers become, in the eyes of their children, heavy weights and burdens, not wings of which to fly and face life. In other words, with all of the problems teenagers and those going into their 20s face in life, all of the different temptations, bullies, difficult people to deal with, unfair teachers, things that scare them, their dad, who's trying to help sometimes, becomes a worse trial than any other trial they face. Wise leaders, on the other hand, let people develop and thrive under their leadership. They're not afraid to let others make decisions, make choices, and learn from them. Then there's the father who's over-demanding, or some would say over-critical, pushing too hard for achievement, having unreasonable expectations for behavior. Dad, look at the picture I've drawn. You know the illustration. Yeah, I could use a little more color, son. Learn to stay in the lines when you color. Dad, did you see my basketball shot go in the hoop? Yeah, but you know, son, you were in the wrong place and you shot it too far out. Dad, here's the paper I wrote for school. Wow, you have way too many run-on sentences in here, son. Of course, it is right to expect our children to do good work, to do a thorough job with chores. You don't want to be able to tell your son, please go clean something up, and they don't learn to clean it all up. I get that. You want them to do a good service for God in church. You want them to learn that character. That's not wrong. Our children must never grow up lazy. And often they, they act lazy and we want them to work harder and children will get angry. Even if you force them to do the right thing, finish your homework, you know, come on, finish the homework, right? You left half the room messy, finish the room. But you have to think about this on steroids, right? To put them, a heavy load of chores on them when they have very little chance to play day after day. To expect them to do four hours of homework after they had seven hours of school. There's so many other things that they want to try in life as well. To expect them to sit by and watch others at play when they're not being disciplined. That sometimes is over-demanding, and it frustrates, and you will not hear that frustration as much from the younger children. They have no avenue in which to express themselves, but as they get older, and as they see things going on in other homes, they will begin to resent what you're doing, and they'll be aggravated. Often, over-criticism comes from dads who mean well. As I said, they want their children to turn out fine, to achieve well in life. They want to push them to succeed. They know what it's going to take if they're going to get into a good college. They see problems and habits. They want their children to avoid them. And so they constantly point out the faults with good intent. But just because it's easy to correct children does not mean we should do it as often as we do or as casually as we do. Nobody, and I do want to repeat that, nobody likes to live with somebody who's always pointing out their faults. Do you? Do you choose as a friend someone who every time you meet them is pointing out what you're doing wrong? How long would you keep company with someone who's always correcting you and seldom enjoying you? Well, there are many other ways that fathers exasperate their children. We really don't have time to cover all of them. One would be, I'll just mention these, withdrawing love, saying things like, Daddy won't love you if you don't do what he says, turning a cold shoulder when they don't obey, being slow to forgive, giving them, you know, a week of emotional pain before you embrace them, making them feel guilty rather than forgiving them. Here's another one, arguing with the wife. You say, what's that got to do with the kids? Everything. Sometimes nothing upsets children more than to hear their parents arguing at home. It's so unsettling to their lives. Do you not understand that even if they don't act like you are the security in their home and they act like they're independent and they would never admit they need mom and dad, you are indeed their security. And when you're at each other's throats and you're arguing, they hear it. In another room, somewhere, they hear it. They know it. They see it on the faces. Every couple argues. Every couple goes through hard times. But when it's on and on, you don't get those problems resolved. Fathers, you don't think that you need I should say, husbands, you don't think that you need to go to counseling and get that resolved, or to get accountability with a brother and sister in Christ. You don't know the damage you're doing in your home, because you won't tell anyone in church, but the kids hear it. This lack of stability can affect them deeply, more than what first meets the eye. Homosexuality can ruin children. Having two moms, neither of which acts female, having two dads, neither of which acts masculine. When they grow up, not even when they grow up, when they're younger and they start to look at normal homes, who follow God and nature, all that can do is that they feel cheated, they feel abnormal, they feel dirty. Nature will teach them if no one else does, and they'll resent that. Breaking promises. getting their hopes up about something and then dashing them to pieces. Well, we'll do this next weekend, son. Next weekend comes and can't do it. And some things come up and you have to teach your family, you know, something does come up at work. Or, as we've had in our own home, a lot of illnesses. And sometimes you can't do all the activities that you wish that you could do. But I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about breaking your word, saying you're going to play a game, saying you're going to drive them somewhere, saying you're going to show up for something, and it's really iffy whether you will or not. They know that by the time they're 8, 9, and 10, they know whether or not dad will be there for them or not. Treating older children like they're younger children, sometimes we forget how different a 16-year-old is from a 9-year-old, how different a 12-year-old is from a 7-year-old, how different a 21-year-old is from a 16-year-old. and we don't adjust the way we talk to them with the time and experience that they have. I know, children always think that they're older and more mature than they actually are. I get that. But even so, in their own eyes, as they view themselves that way, you have to respect them. You have to grow up with them. Now, these actions and attitudes by fathers, if they're not changed, lead to the third point in our outline, and that is why the warning must be heeded. Why? Look at the last part of the verse, that they may not lose heart. God always has a reason for His warnings. If you see a big giant yellow sign by the side of the road, it's probably because there are some cars that went over the edge and down the ditch, and maybe some of them off the cliff. And the damage is irreparable. The damage is not reversible. And so, The warning sign is so important. It's not God's will that your children put into your home lose heart. This verb means to be discouraged, or here's another way of putting it, spiritless, as if the wind was taken out of their sails and they've given up. They've given up on the home, they've given up on the relationship, they've given up on obedience, they've given up on the hope of ever being heard. A child who has lost heart has given up trying to please his father. He or she becomes listless, sullen, or moody. Over time, there can even develop hatred toward a father. The child has the feeling that the father just does not care. Oh, he says he cares, but what he really cares for is his job. What he really cares for is his accomplishments. What he really cares for is his reputation about how others might view his home. What he really cares for is his life, his advancement, but not me, not my feelings, not my aspirations, not my thoughts. And so the child loses heart. Children who have been provoked to wrath over a long period of time express their anger usually in one of two ways. some will seethe inwardly because they do not know how to express their emotions or because they're too worried that if they express their emotions, there will be too much consequence and harsh criticism. They begin to withdraw, and they really don't care anymore to listen or be listened to. They just kind of pull back. If that goes on and on and on, ultimately, particularly if there's some other bad influence that comes into their life, they can commit suicide. Or they can act out their anger in other ways apart from the home. They can get in with the wrong crowd and begin to act out the expression that they want to. Maybe it leads to violent crime, to rape or murder. Of course, this never excuses them for their sin. God will hold each child accountable for what they know and the wrong choices they make. A father never makes someone angry. A father never causes someone else to sin. But he can be the agitator. He can be the underlying reason. They have to make their own life decisions, and their own life decisions will have their consequences. And if they don't learn the easy way from the wisdom of their father, then they will eventually learn. They'll learn the hard way. Many people who sit in prison have learned their lesson. But they still have another 5, 10, 20 years to go before they're let out. But they learn. Society will teach them the discipline their father tried to teach them, and they ignored it and ignored it and spurned it, and they eventually learn it. Far better to learn from the father. And that's why, fathers, we have to be particularly careful with our manner. We want them to learn from us. We want to forgive them. We want to help them through trials. We want them to grasp the power and helpfulness of faith. How terrible, then, to be a father who provoked children away or inward from that. Of course, the other way that people react to this is to explode outwardly. They become hot-tempered persons. They constantly confront and yell and shout and then turn away. And, of course, the proverb says, stay away from people such as this. Either way, the child loses, and you lose also. Because when a child loses heart, when they're very discouraged, you lose. You lose your ability to teach them because they don't want to listen to you anymore. You lose your opportunity to help train them because being around you is too disheartening. They can't take your presence anymore. You lose their affection because they don't enjoy you anymore. you lose their trust because they don't believe in you anymore. You lose their desire to fit in with the family because they found friends that they now think of as family. And with their friends, they're led into foolish behavior. You end up losing everything that you didn't want to lose. You end up losing everything that you so desperately wanted everything that you thought your heavy criticisms or unfair expectations or over-strictness or wrong use of authority would produce, you lost it all. There's something else even more important that you lose. Under those conditions, a child is less likely to be open to the Christian faith. Do you understand that? Because, you see, they gain their understanding of Christianity and the Heavenly Father by watching that one on earth who bears that same name, Father. D. Martin Lloyd-Jones put it this way, what if God dealt with us as we often deal with our children? Oh, the long-suffering of God. Oh, the patience of God. Oh, the amazing way in which He bears with our evil manners as He did with those of the children of Israel of old. There is nothing more amazing to me than the patience of God, he writes, and his long-suffering toward us. I say to Christian people and all who are in any way responsible for the discipline of children and of young people, let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus. And let the same love be in us also, lest we provoke our children to wrath and thereby involve them and ourselves in all the evil consequences of our failure. When Paul warns fathers to not discourage a child, he does not mean that we should build up their self-confidence. I hope you're not thinking I'm teaching a self-esteem sermon here. That's not the point. The opposite of losing heart is not a proud, self-determined, self-esteeming heart. We see where self-esteem leads in society. Kids that think so highly of themselves, they can't receive any correction. That's where we've come, with a whole generation that's listened to the self-esteem teaching. Where has it led? To people that are more productive, as we were promised? To kids that are going to have better character and do more? No, they're absolutely a generation that's lost a wash in themselves. consumed with their own pictures, consumed with their own little statements, consumed with every little moment what their thoughts are, to tweet about this and that. Self-esteem teaching just threw gas on a fire and made it worse. That's not what this is about. Nor is the lack of hope in the child's eyes to be replaced with the glitter of hope of things in the world. That's not where I'm getting either. We want our children to have hope in God, not hope in money. Hope in the Word of God, not in their worldly education. Hope in heaven, not in popularity with friends. Hope in the promises of God, not in some fantastic career they hope eventually they'll get to. Hope in the Holy Spirit, working in their lives and satisfying all that they want in life so they can see how wonderful life is with the Holy Spirit, not indulging in drunkenness and becoming comedians in order to find their life and sexual promiscuity and all those things they dive into because their life is empty, because they were never filled with the Holy Spirit. Fathers, the good news about arriving at a warning sign is that your family car, so to say, has not fallen off the cliff yet. You can still avoid the danger. There's still time for correction. As long as your child is living, there's time for correction. You can build godly hope and encouragement into your children. You can change. How? Listen more to your children's thoughts and feelings. Play more of their games. Enjoy more of their company. Praise them for the good efforts. Find something in which to praise them for their good efforts. Notice the small things they do. Laugh at some of their mistakes. I know you can't laugh at all of them. Be consistent with loving, predictable rules in the home. Make discipline appropriate to the offense, not burdensome. Keep your promises. Be a man of your word. Don't make the promise to sound like you're a caring dad when you don't have a plan to fulfill it. Give your children an opportunity to experiment and try new things and go new places. Yes, some of them you won't like, and let them fail. And most important of all, fill your children with the wonder of what it means to follow Jesus Christ. Don't make your devotions at home the same old rote devotions over and over. Jesus died for your sins. You should love him. Jesus died for your sins. You should be appreciative. Teach them the wonders of the cross. Let your mind be transformed by the word of God so you have more to say. If you struggle with how to say it, then get a good, solid book. By the way, don't go to the Christian bookstore. You don't know whether it's solid or not. Come ask somebody else. Get a good, solid book and read it with your children. when they see that you're sincere and obedient, that you show love in the home, that you confess your sins, that you're patient and kind and gentle, that you're real. Do your children know what your sins are? Do you confess your sins to your children when you're angry and shouldn't have been? When you indulge in too much of your games and this and that? Does it come out of your mouth? That was a poor choice of the use of my time. I shouldn't have spoken to that person in the parking lot that way. Do you do that? That's being real, right? You tell them how Christ forgives you, how Christ loves you, how Christ has been patient with you. Do you tell them how when you tried other avenues of sin to try to fill up your life, why that didn't work so they can learn? No, drunkenness doesn't help. No, being into yourself doesn't help. Or whatever the idol is, drama, or sports, or music, whatever becomes the idol, that you can't love those things more than you love God and enjoy God. Teach them how your mind went through that process and you arrived at, I love Christ. Show them that. And do it gently. Do it with a tone that doesn't say, see how bad you are. Do it with a tone that says, do you see how much Christ can mean in your life? If you're here today and your father never filled you with that kind of aspiration and hope, it's not that you hate your father now, maybe you've lived many years and You've kind of forgiven Dad for his weaknesses. You've gotten more perspective on life. But you still remember he messed up in some ways. Maybe he wasn't there enough for you. Maybe he had a bad habit. Maybe he split the home. Maybe he didn't like you. I want you to know what your Heavenly Father is really like, if you would let him be your Heavenly Father. In Matthew 6, 8, Jesus said, your Father in heaven knows what you need before you ask Him. And He wants you to ask Him. What kind of a father is it that stands on the brink of answering a prayer he is waiting for you to ask? And he wants to give you what you ask. or because he's wiser, something better than what you ask. 1 John 3, 1, Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed upon us, that we should be called children of God. Just think on that, that the eternal Father has elected and chosen you and saved you and now calls you his own child. Meditate on that. 2 Corinthians 1, 3, Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort. Your Heavenly Father is there to provide mercy for you if you are a sinner. He's there to provide comfort for you if you are suffering. That's who He is. That's His character. And for those of you who have ignored the Heavenly Father, James 1, 17, every good thing bestowed, every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow. God is perfect in character and never, ever changes. He doesn't flicker at all. He's the same and He's constant. Every good thing you have in your life, the Heavenly Father above gave to you. If that doesn't convince you that God has been looking out for you and God has been caring, you need to rethink the whole way you're thinking. You've been blaming Him for every bad thing in your life and not thanking Him for every good thing that was brought into your life. Are you here this morning and you're not so sure that God is your Heavenly Father? If you don't follow Jesus Christ and don't believe in Jesus Christ, you haven't given your life to Jesus Christ who died on that cross for you, who rose from the dead. If you don't place your faith in Him and Him alone, then God is not your Father in the sense of saving you. God is not the Father who will receive you into heaven, but is the Father who will be your judge to reject you. He has given away for every last one of you to come to Him and receive full pardon for your sins. That way is Jesus Christ. Come to Christ, bow before Christ, confess Him to be your Savior, your Master, your King, and God will pardon all of your sins. He will warmly embrace you. He will never reject you for Christ's sake. He will always be your loving and holy Heavenly Father. And that you can have today, this Father's Day. Father, we pray that for every man and every woman that they'll come running into your arms through Jesus Christ, for that's the only way anyone can be accepted. For there, your anger was satisfied, the debt fully paid, and only there we come back and find full forgiveness, full pardon, reconciliation with you, an eternal, unchanging relationship, and to be able to taste not just your goodness from creation, but your goodness in the recreation, to be born again, and to have life in the life to come, everlasting life, and in the kingdom that follows. Blessed be your name, O God, our Father. Teach us to be better fathers. We ask it in the name of Christ, and for his sake, amen. And as we prepare for the child dedication, I invite you all to stand. We're going to sing Sweet Hour of Prayer. Prayer is one of the greatest gifts, one of the greatest tools in the toolbox of a father. And as Pastor Leek was saying, God is listening, and he wants us to ask.