Father's Day - Bible Baptist Church

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Father’s Day

Text: 1 Thessalonians 2:10-12

Male and female are not identities that are in your imagination. They are biological identities. Some people may be confused because that confusion is funded and supported by money and influential voices. But what everyone already knows is that you are not what you are because you say so or even because you pretend to be so. Just like people who say they’re God’s children aren’t God’s children because they say so.

In 1 Thessalonians 2:7-11 Paul gives male and female qualities both needed for ministry. He talks about being like a mother and being like a father. Unfortunately, these illustrations get lost in a culture that encourages fatherlessness. The corruption of a society is bad in itself, while also putting the people at a disadvantage because we don’t know what these identities mean such as a father.

There are three things that link ministry and fatherhood together and Paul explains both.

Exhorted to walk worthy of God

To exhort someone is to excite them or give them strength, spirit, or courage.
- We love to cheer our kids on. In sports, we will exhort them from the stands!
- Maybe we see something they’re interested in so we pursue it with them. We spend money on it. We help them get what they want.
- Now what about when it comes to walking worthy of God? This was Paul’s ministry to people. He cheered them on as they honored Christ. He pursued what it meant to honor Jesus Christ with them. He spent money on the things of God.
Dad, it’s time to get familiar with walking worthy of God. I have trouble with this often times. What does it look like to honor Jesus Christ with reasonable service to God?
There is enough discouragement. Your children, people, need to be encouraged to walk worthy of the LORD.

Comforted to walk worthy of God

An eight-year-old boy lay in a hospital bed, dying of cancer. He knew it wouldn’t be long. His dad came in the room and sat by his son. The boy sensing it wouldn’t be long now said, “Daddy, am I going to die?” The dad asked, “Why son? Are you afraid?” The boy said, “Not if God is anything like you.”
A father is a stable source of rest.
Sending the Comforter says something about what God’s people need
Empathetic that the Lord would provide his Holy Spirit to help the believer be obedient. Obedience will come with difficulties as the Lord fully understands.
If you believe the Bible, people were not meant to die. Some say death is natural. Corruption and death can feel natural because it is the universal, all-consuming enemy. But it isn’t natural. It isn’t the goodwill of God.
In the midst of this trouble is a fatherly figure who is a safe place of comfort. He lets you know the future is settled. The pain is temporary. It’s OK to use your time serving God here.
Comfort has to do with giving someone a stable place to rest their confidence on.
- Jesus said, Let not your hearts be troubled, I go to prepare a place for you.
- Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort; Who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God.

To be a comfort means people have room to make mistakes. If all your discussions are about how wrong they are, particularly with your kids. You’re demoralizing them.
A friend of mine who is now back in church spent a period of time hating God and living in rebellion against what she perceived as God for a good while. She said she never felt like she was doing anything right. So there came a point in her life when she gave up on whatever was right because it took work, but never good enough.
People get tired of making an effort and being told their effort isn’t good enough. And their efforts will never be good enough.

Charged to walk worthy of God

When I read this I always think of the cavalry commander holding up his sword and saying, Charge! He’s about to give direction to the movement of the army.
Children and Christians need to be given a direction to move in. Listen carefully. More often than not these are patterns of the heart. Not physical movements.
- Dad notices when his child encounters some trouble he/she isolates themselves and starts harboring bitterness. So Dad recognizes a pattern in the heart and gives it godly direction.
- Dad notices when his child is praised for something they can’t control he/she starts to think they are better than other people. Dad recognizes the pattern in the heart and says let’s move this heart issue in a more Christ-like direction.
- You know what this is? This is what shepherding people is like. The CEO model of pastoring an organization is not what the LORD is doing. Pastoring deals with the heart primarily. You recognize heart patterns in people, all different kinds. You encourage the good ones. You try to charge the other if and when possible. Some heart patterns are heart breaking because they aren’t going to change.
Keep your heart with all diligence for out of it are the issues of life
Proverbs 3:11 – Training. Whatever constrains behavior trains the heart.
Sometimes the thinking has to be corrected, or charged in the right direction. Paul tells Timothy to charge them that are rich in this world not to trust in uncertain riches or be highminded. They’ll fall in a trap if they do. The trap is where their trust lies.

Paul will do all three of these things in this letter to a little congregation going through great tribulation. People are being put in jail. The congregation is sometimes harassed. People don’t want to go to work or are too lazy to work.

As a father does for his children, Paul will excite them to continue following the LORD. He will comfort them with a future in Christ without sin. He will give them direction, primarily direction to their hearts. Paul would say the Lord tries the hearts and establishes the hearts in this same letter.