Fatherhood - Vol 1 No 6
A soon-to-be father asked Mike, "What is the key to being a good daddy?"
Being a good father
In God’s Providence the professor was late to class today. The students, which included the gray bearded fellow in khakis and plaid shirt, were chit-chatting and a young man said, “My wife is about to have a baby boy and I am going to be a father for the first time. Mike, how many children do you have?”
“I have eight.”
You could hear mumbling in the class about overpopulation and overtaxing the resources of Mother Earth.
“Wow! Eight! Tell me then, what is the key to being a good daddy? I want to be a great father.”
The class quieted as a number of students listened.
“Well, I would say first to love their mama and be committed to her the way the Bible tells us to. If you love your wife the way Christ tells us to, your children will be getting the best gift you can give.”
Not what he expected. “Hmmm. What else?”
“Well, I have learned to remember that you are making memories with your children. They will remember you loving your wife and how you treat her. They will remember the things you say and do. Think about what you are giving them to remember. You give your kids lots of memories through the little, daily things you do with them. You know when my daughter was a little girl she would get on my back, and I would walk her down the stairs. I would say, ‘I have a bug on my back’ and she would laugh. She is now twenty-six years old and do you know what her email is? Daddysbug!”
The girls gushed, “Oh, that is so sweet! I love that!”
You're lying to yourself
“I think I want to raise my children to be Buddhist because that makes more sense to me,” said a veteran student.
“Marcus*,” responded Mike, ”for you to tell me that untruth, you had to first lie to yourself! The little I know about you---being an ex-combat veteran, patriotic, someone who loves his wife and is excited about raising his children---makes me think you are the farthest thing from a Buddhist than anything I can imagine!
Mike went on. “Buddhism’s goal is to have no emotions, no passions, and no personal significance. As a Buddhist you should want to be indistinguishable from everything else. It teaches you to want to be a ‘single drop in the ocean that has no shores.’ You’re lying to yourself. You want to be significant. You are looking for significance. Dignity is one of your personal desires. You are not looking for a way to be unrecognized and unrecognizable. You do not want to get to the end of your life and say you have accomplished the high goal of being nothing and nobody; my meaning is in meaninglessness. Do you raise your children to be meaningless and insignificant?”
Marcus quietly said, “No. But I want my children to fit in and be good for their group.”
“That’s why you need Christianity. We have the goal of glorifying God and enjoying Him forever! I’m supposed to do that as an individual and with other true Christians. I am supposed to come to Christ and deal with my sin through Him and then truly live!”
“Were you raised in a religious home?” another student asked.
“Far from it.” Mike said. “When I was young my family was anything but Christian. No church. We were protected from Christianity by my father. I became a believer while a cadet at The Citadel. When I went to The Citadel, I was all about me. I loved fighting.” He laughed, “And not just for my country! I loved service, the military. Then someone at the Citadel explained to me that I was a sinner and needed a savior and Jesus was the Savior.”
Almost all the class was listening and quiet at this point and looking at Mike.
You have to be perfect
“The guy didn’t have to convince me I was a sinner, but he did have to convince me that Christianity does not make you an ‘improved you’ so you can be good enough to get yourself into heaven. You see, Christianity teaches that to get into heaven, you have to be perfect. Not pretty good, but perfect.”
A young man blurted out, “That’s not true because nobody could go to heaven if you have to be perfect!”
“Well, the Bible says you have to ‘be holy like God is holy.’”
Another classmate said, “So how in the world could somebody who’s sinned like you admit you have, even talk about getting into heaven?”
“You see the answer to your question is that nobody BUT Jesus Christ deserves to go to heaven. That is why He came to earth and lived a perfect life and died as a sinless substitute for all those who would believe in Him. Based on believing on Him in faith, the Father declares us not guilty in His sight because of Jesus work applied to my account. The Judge sent someone who wasn’t guilty to pay the penalty I deserved.”
The class was quiet. No one was interrupting.
Why not Judaism?
Aaron said, “That’s really different than Judaism. In Judaism there is no resurrection, no heaven and no hell. You’re just blessed in this life based on how good you are.”
Mike said, “And can you give me a reference for that from the Old Testament?”
Someone else said, “Yeah I heard Judaism doesn’t have a resurrection.”
Mike countered, “I’m going to respectfully disagree. The Jews would look to the Old Testament as authoritative. Let me give you some references from the Old Testament that show that Judaism is very much interested in the resurrection, and people living with God in heaven and avoiding hell. Many of you have heard many lies about the Christian religion and the Jewish religion, but they are both based in the Bible.”
Mike said from memory, “In Daniel 12: 2 in the Old Testament it says, “Multitudes who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake: some to everlasting life, others to shame and everlasting contempt.”
“Does that sound like there is no heaven, hell or resurrection? People who die and are buried in the dust of the earth will awake, some to everlasting life and some to hell.”
“Listen to Job 19:25-27 which is also in the Old Testament.” Mike opened his Bible that was lying on his desk:
I know that my redeemer lives, and that in the end He will stand on the earth. after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God; I myself will see Him with my own eyes—I, and not another. How my heart yearns within me!
Mike continued, “Job understood that he was going to be resurrected and with own eyes he was going to see God. Then in the Psalm 16:11-12 it says: ‘because You will not abandon me to the realm of the dead, nor will You let your faithful one see decay.You make known to me the path of life; You will fill me with joy in Your presence, with eternal pleasures at Your right hand.’
“So you see that in the Old Testament, the Jews were looking forward to heaven, to eternal pleasures at God’s right hand. They looked forward to eternal life, not decay and death. They fully believed their bodies would be resurrected from the dead to be in God’s presence.”
Someone said, “Then why don’t we follow Judaism?”
Mike responded, “Because that would be like carrying the ball to the goal line and then fumbling it before you scored! The Old Testament is permeated with the believing people of God, the Jews, looking to God to save them by a sacrifice. In Isaiah 53, which was written about 700 years before Jesus birth, the sacrifice is described in detail, and there is no way to mistake it for anyone but JesusChrist. Jews were looking for their Savior, the One who would deliver them from death and as a religion, they fumbled at the goal line. The Jewish Christians picked up the ball and ran with it!”
Why do you believe the Bible?
A young girl looked at Mike and asked, “Why do you believe the Bible? How do you know it’s true?”
“Because I have read it, and instead of my judging the Bible, the Bible judges me. I recognize my place in this world and how I would have no dignity and no restraints unless God had captured me for Himself. It is by faith I believe, but my faith is reasonable faith. Nowhere does God ask you to not be reasonable or to be irrational. That’s not faith. Faith is believing God at His Word and that is the most rational thing you’ll ever do. I love this quote from C.S. Lewis, ‘I don’t believe in the sun because I see it. I believe in the sun because by it, I see everything else.’ I don’t believe in Bible and the Lord Jesus Christ because I can prove everything about them, but everything I know about them has proven to be true without exception.”
The professor walked in and four or five of the students said, “We need to get together and talk more.”
*Names used, except for Mike’s, are ficticious.
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