one phrase in the song we just sang. Live for the good of others. That's really what we're here for, isn't it? Live for the good of others. You know, many times I find myself living for the good of myself. That feels better to the carnal man. But really, we're here to live for the good of others, and this morning I'd like to look at fathers and mothers living for the good of their family. I don't have a traditional Father's Day message prepared. If you remember I preached on godly homes here a while ago and I'd like to have part two today which is relating to the fathers quite heavily. So you can call it what you want but It is a continuation of godly homes that I had a message on back in February. Most of it is to the fathers, but to the rest of us, don't just turn the other way. We are all living a life, and every one of our lives leaves an impact on someone. whether we have children or not. It might be your nieces and nephews. It might be your Sunday school class. Somebody is watching you. The title today is Fathers Turn Your Hearts. Fathers Turn Your Hearts. Turn to the book of Colossians chapter three. The book of Colossians chapter 3. We'll be reading verses 18 through 25. I invite you to stand as we read from the Word of God. Colossians chapter 3 verse 18. Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands as it is fit in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives and be not bitter against them. Children, obey your parents in all things, for this is well pleasing unto the Lord. Fathers, provoke not your children to anger, lest they be discouraged. servants obey in all things your masters according to the flesh not with eye service as men pleasers but in singleness of heart fearing god and whatsoever ye do do it heartily as to the lord and not unto men knowing that of the lord ye shall receive the reward of the inheritance for ye serve the lord christ but he that doeth wrong shall receive for the wrong which he hath done, and there is no respect of persons. Thank you, you may be seated. God ordained or designed the home in such a way that it is to be a beautiful haven of peace for all those who dwell there. In verse 18 it talks about wives submitting to your own husbands. It doesn't say that you should submit to men in general or to some other woman's husband. It says your own husband. Submit to him. Verse 19 then talks about the husbands. Love your wife. Again, not love other women or some other woman. or some other man's wife. You are to love your own wife. Our love for her prompts her submission to us. Verse 20, children obey your parents. Again, your own parents. Listen to instructions carefully with the intentions of taking action. Obedience, not in a half-hearted manner or I will do it later once I feel like it. Prompt, cheerful obedience, blesses your parents. And here it says, it is well pleasing to the Lord. Verse 21, fathers provoke not your children. again your own children. Provoke not your own children to anger by being inconsiderate, too demanding, or by continual fault finding. That little twig is to be bent and guided with love and firmness and caution. That twig is not to be broken and crushed. lest they give up and feel it is impossible to please you. Following these instructions on building godly relationships in the family, Paul brings in verse 23. And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily as to the Lord, and not unto men. Whatever it is, work from the heart. Do it heartily, labor cheerfully and diligently as something done for the Lord. Family relationships. Friends, we cannot improve on God's design for the family. God designed it in a way that when we all work together, there can be peace. and blessings innumerable in the family. And to fathers it seems that a lot of the responsibility in having the family function properly within God's design lies squarely on our shoulders. Love your wife. She then more easily and readily submits to you. Provoke not your children. Provoke not your children to anger. You know, your loving, consistent life, your words and actions will win your child's heart. And they respond in love and respect. and obedience to you. Husbands, love your wives. Fathers, provoke not your children. Today in this world we have a dire need of godly fathers. There's a shortage. I read that there's 37% of the children in this nation are not living with their fathers. There's a drought in this land for godly fathers leading out in the home. God is depending on you and I as fathers to make known the truth to the next generation. Isaiah 38, 19 says, The father to the children shall make known thy truth. Our life is our way of transmitting this truth to the next generation. The message you have is your life. You know, if your son or if my son or your daughter would live the way you live, if they would love the way you love, if they would talk the way you talk, would they be able to pass the truth to the next generation? What I worship, I pass on. What I worship, what I focus on, is what the next generation is going to pick up on. You know, today people worship many things. We worship money, we worship possessions, materialism, and on and on. Idols are in the heart. In the Old Testament, idols were statues. They went to some high place by a grove of trees and worshipped a statue. Today we have idols in our hearts. When there is something in my life that is between God and I, it becomes an idol. It's what we focus on. It's what we worship. It's where we spend our time. And what is in my heart or what I worship is what I transmit. to my children." Children develop their view of God Almighty by how they view their father. What am I focusing on? What is my life? Noah was a father who lived in a very ungodly society. There was sin and wickedness all around. Noah was a father who walked with God and somehow he was able to transmit truth to the next generation and they were spared when the waters came. Oh how we need that today, fathers and mothers who walk with God despite the evil society that we live in. You know, when fathers fail, the homes fail, the churches fail, and the nation fails. We need godly fathers. God has instituted the home, the family, as a vital part of transmitting truth. and also of the preservation of the church and nation. It's God's design. That we are faithful and that we transmit truth. It preserves the church and the nation. We need a revival of godly fathers. And I bless the Lord for all the godly fathers I see here this morning. We need every one of you. God needs every one of you. God needs, God wants every one of you. Looking at verse 21. Fathers, provoke not your children to anger, lest they be discouraged. Turn back a few pages to the book of Ephesians. Ephesians 6 verse 4, And ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath, but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. I don't know why Paul is picking on the fathers that we provoke not our children. Do the moms, the mothers not provoke their children? I don't know. But twice he is writing to the fathers not to provoke their children to anger. Now what are some things that we do, we tend to do that provoke our children, that rouses anger in their life. That causes them to resent the father in the home. The first thing I have down, I don't know, do I have all of them? I'm sure I don't. Or are they in the proper order? But number one is anger and impatience coming from dad. You know, children make mistakes. They're in that learning process. We tell them what to do and how to do something, turn our back, and when we come back, it's not done the way we told them to do it. They in their little mind didn't quite process what you told them. And you respond in anger. It has the potential to discourage them. To stir up anger in our children. Did you know that a carnal response out of dad brings about a carnal response from the child? It works that way every time, I think, or very closely. It also works the opposite way. When you respond in kindness and love, they respond that way too. Try it. Number two, unforgiveness of their mistakes. Belittling or reminding them of past failures for days after it happened. Making fun of what happened or comparing them with other children in front of others. Don't do it. It's so easy, we tend to do that, I do. Well, why did you do that? Your brother never did it that way. It becomes discouraging. They lose confidence in their dad. The third way that we can provoke our children is being too demanding or inconsistent. Johnny gets punished today for throwing a stone at the cat. When yesterday he did the same thing and we turned our back and ignored it. Be consistent. Disciplining according to our feelings or in anger. Or correcting them for things they do that we do ourselves. is not being consistent. And it hinders respect. The fourth one, continual fault finding. Continual fault finding. No, don't do it like that. Or why didn't you? You fill in the blank. Or I told you so. Instead, try praise or commendation for a job well done. Thanks for washing my truck yesterday. Show interest in their life, in their hobbies, in what they have interest in. Maybe it's a piece of wood or a stick or a leaf or a flower. Be interested in what interests them. The last one, how we provoke our children is lack of clear direction and leadership. Lack of direction and leadership. You know, they at times squirm and wiggle and they try to get out from under that direction. But in the end, children feel secure when they know where the boundaries are at. Make clear boundaries for your children. They become frustrated when they don't know what's expected of them. And they misstep and you lash out. They hadn't known where the line is at. It is frustrating for them. Children generally respond well to firm discipline and direction if they can sense your love, if they can sense acceptance and appreciation and understanding on your part. Again, fathers, provoke not your children, but guide them, tenderly guide them with love and respect, and your children will respect you as well. One quote I found was, the family is held together by love, authority, and obedience. The family is held together by love, authority, and obedience. Fathers, provoke not your children, but rather turn your heart towards them. but rather turn your heart towards them. Turn to the last book of the Bible or the last book of the Old Testament, Malachi. Chapter four. Fathers, turn your heart towards your children. Malachi 4, verse 5. Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet. He is prophesying of John the Baptist here. Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth. with a curse. Here is the key to raising godly children. Fathers, turn your hearts towards your family. When John the Baptist came, he had a central message. What was his message? Repentance. His message was repentance. Prepare the way of the Lord. Prepare men's hearts for the Lord. Repentance. This prophecy indicates that when John the Baptist comes, he is going to turn the fathers back to God. He's going to turn mothers and children back to God. And repentance is when we have been going the wrong way and we turn around and we go the other way. We don't do the things we used to do. We don't say the things we used to say. We respond differently when we hit the wrong nail with the hammer. We repent. We turn to God. It brings about a turning of our heart. We change. When John the Baptist comes with his message of repentance, he will turn the hearts of the fathers to his children. My friends, God's Word is saying here that when we repent before God and our families, Our hearts will turn towards our children. And notice that if we do that, the children's hearts will turn towards their fathers. Oh, how we long to have the hearts of our children. There's nothing on earth that we'd rather have than the heart of our children. For when we have their heart, we have their love, we have their will, we have their affection. We have it all. But wait. Too many times we don't like the price tag. We don't like the price tag. Repent before God and the family. Am I not the one that's right? Am I not the one in control here? Leading out? You know, many times we're too self-righteous. We're too arrogant to admit that we're wrong. Too arrogant to admit that we are wrong in front of our family and before God. We're too important. We'll lose the confidence of our family if we say we're sorry we were wrong. And you know what? We try to demand respect. We try to get their heart some other way. Only to discover that we have lost it. Maybe I'm the only one that's been there. When we turn our hearts to our children, they will turn their hearts to us. Unless we have their heart, we will not be able to transmit truth. Unless we have their heart, we can teach and teach and teach and teach. And no truth will be transmitted. The key to raising a godly family is to get the heart of the child and to keep the heart of that child. You know, it is very natural for us to get the child's heart. When they're little, when they're young, when they're babies, we almost naturally get the heart. But my friends, we can easily lose that heart at a very young age and never get it back. If we are to be godly fathers and mothers, we must get the hearts of our children at a young age. and keep those hearts. Luke 117 is the New Testament scripture that relates to the one in Malachi. It says, and many of the children of Israel shall he turn to the Lord their God And he shall go before him in the spirit and power of Elias to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just and to make ready a people prepared for the Lord. In order to prepare our children to meet the Lord, we need to get their heart. When we have our child's heart, we know what's going on in that child's heart and life. We take an interest in the child. We are able to teach that child and give direction to the child. Preparing that young heart Preparing that child to give his heart to the Lord when the Spirit of God calls him to do so. You know, we cannot. We can give direction. We cannot change the child's heart. Only God can change the heart. But we can be very instrumental in bringing that child to the feet of Jesus. How do we keep the child's heart? How do we keep the child's heart? I listed three, you probably have others. Number one is to love them unconditionally. Love them for who they are. They're not perfect. Seems like they're all different. Love them anyways. Love them just the way they are. Even when they disappoint you, love them anyways. True love is sacrificial. We go out of our way to do what we can to provide for their needs. You know, a loving relationship in a family takes time and effort. Play with your children. Play, take time to play with your children. Work with your children. Work side by side. Don't get them to do the dirty work and then walk away. Work with your children. Be their companion and friend. Be their best friend. Take an interest in their life. Have them feel your love and the warmth of your heart. love them. But let me tell you that true love is not a permissive love or an indulgent love. You just let them go. Sometimes love is tough and it requires that we discipline the child. We give direction to the child. You know, if you want to ruin the child and lose his heart, Just let Him go. Let Him do exactly what He wants to do. And you have lost His heart. We do not lose the heart and the affection of the child when we discipline Him fairly and consistently. Rather, we gain it. Rather, we gain the heart. The second way of keeping a child's heart is to communicate. Let that child know that he or she is very important to you. That he or she is in your family because God placed them there for a reason. And that you appreciate them. Communicate. Listen to your child. They have lots of stories, take time to listen. Talk to your child. When your child does something, thank him, praise your child for what he did. Don't flatter, just be sincere. Thank him for a job well done. It brings an atmosphere of acceptance and love when we do that. The third one, take time off for your child. Take time off for your child. Spend quality time with your children. Who or what on earth is more important to us than our family? Our money? our business, our friends, our business associates? No, we treasure our children above all that. Above all else, do we not? At least, that's what we say. How important Is your family to you? Is my family to me? We keep a calendar to be sure nothing important is forgotten. We have lots of appointments and we write it down or keep tab of it somehow so we don't forget. How many of those entries say, fix Caden's bike, change the leaky faucet, read stories to the children. What is more important? We're up early, we're off to work, there's things pressing in on us, we need to get things done. We work hard all day, we come home in the evening, sit down, we're tired, we're ready to eat and rest, and the children come and they want to do all sorts of things. They want our time. But we try to shrug it off. How much of our attention do they actually get? A businessman wants to meet over lunch tomorrow. We say yes and feel obligated to be there on time for the meeting. The little girl comes up and says, I need your help with this. And we tell her that maybe tomorrow night, thinking that, well, if we have time, we might work it in tomorrow night. When friends call us and tell us they will drop in on Friday to see us, we do everything to prepare for that meeting. We want to see them. We do our best to meet them. When our children announce, Daddy, on Friday we want to, and we say, well, we'll see once, when the time comes. When others seek our attention, we stop and see what they want and we try to help. When our children pull at our sleeves and say, daddy, look at this, we answer, oh yes, and we hope they turn away and forget about it. Maybe I didn't paint a fair picture, I don't know. We do things together. We eat together, I trust. We spend time at the kitchen table together. We spend time around God's Word having a daily family devotion. We go to church together. We do special things together as family. I'm just reminding you that one of the most important things we have to do in life is to spend time with our children. With our family. God ordained it that way. He designed it that way. He put children into our care. I don't know, is it to test us? To prove us? Or make us see that we are responsible for these young souls? When we do our part, it makes it easy for everyone involved. God has placed many duties and responsibilities on us as fathers. I'm not saying that we should quit our jobs just to be with our families. We have bills to pay, there's things to do. I'm just saying, set your priorities straight. Spend time with the ones you love. Win their hearts. Be there for them. We really do love, and I know you do too, our children above anything else in this world. Our spouse, our family is more precious than all the money in the world. God help us as fathers to give our families what they deserve. In conclusion, fathers, provoke not your children, but turn your heart towards them. Turn your heart towards them, and towards God as well, in humility and repentance. Be broken. Be in humility. We're not to be dictators, but simply be leaders, godly leaders. Compassionate hearts is what we need. going out of our way to provide for those in our care. And they, in return, will turn their hearts towards us, creating a beautiful haven of peace in our home. And I know as children grow older, they still have that biggest and most important decision to make in life on their own, and that is to follow Christ. We cannot make that decision for them. Every child has to make that on their own. But let us be instrumental in leading them to Christ. May God give us grace to raise godly sons and daughters in our families. In order for that to happen, We need moms and dads who walk with God like Noah did. Let's kneel and pray. Holy Father, we come to you today. Thank you for your blessings to us. Thank you for being God. Thank you for the design of family, of home, where mom and dad and the children live together in a beautiful relationship, and the home can be a haven of rest and peace and security. Oh God, help us as fathers, especially today, to have our hearts turn towards you and towards our families in humility and brokenness and repentance. For then you can use us in a mighty way to build christian homes that bring glory to you and are a witness to this world who is so much in need of godly fathers oh god we pray for the many children in this world think especially if the north star children who hardly know who dad is that you would somehow provide for them and may the seed of truth that is planted into their lives each Tuesday evening somehow sprout and grow and bring forth fruit in their young lives. We thank you for each one that is here. God, we pray you would be with us as we go from here. Help us, Lord, to always have our heart turned towards you and that our lives might bring you glory and honor through all that we say and do this coming week. We give you glory. We thank you for who you are. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.