FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH OF VILLA RICA, PCA

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Spiritual Fathering

By

Rev. Todd W. Allen

6/20/04 Villa Rica

1 Corinthians 4:14-21 

               Have you ever wondered how and when Father's Day got into the calendar? It always falls on the third Sunday in June. It all started in 1919 when a Mrs. John Dodd of Spokane, Washington felt strongly that her own father should be honored on a special day. So she spoke to her minister and in her church the first Father's Day was celebrated on June 10, 1919. But the idea caught on.

                The first national Father's Day was celebrated on the third Sunday in June in the year 1922, and all because Mrs. Dodd's father had set the example that had encouraged her faith and life.

Patrick Henry wrote in his will: I have now disposed of all my property to my family; there is one thing more I wish I could give them, and that is the Christian religion.  If they have that, and I had not given them one shilling, they would be rich; and if they have not this, and I had given them all this world. they would be poor."

Patrick Henry knew that being a dad was not just to provide material things for his family. Unless he had communicated the gospel and so taught them by word and example the reality of the Christian faith he would have left them poor and bankrupt spiritually. But if he had given them the truth of the gospel of Christ he would have left them rich even if he had nothing material to leave them. The greatest disappointment of my life would be to know that my own children who were under my care and instruction had never came to saving faith in the Savior.

I came across this true story told in a Christian publication. At the close of his sermon, a pastor in Cincinnati, Ohio, felt led to give an invitation, something he did not ordinarily do. He said, "If there is someone here that is sick of sin, and wants us to pray for you, raise your hand." A young man sprang to his feet and said, "Pray for me, sir. I am sick and tired of sin."

The minister later learn­ed that for eight years the boy had been a wanderer on the earth. The minister advised him to write home and tell his parents what he had done. He did, and after several days of anxious waiting, a letter came from his mother, but it was bordered with black. With tear-dimmed eyes he read: "My dear son: The joy which your letter brought to our hearts was only exceeded by the sadness which was there at the same time, for as nearly as we can figure, the same hour that you found Jesus Christ as your Savior, your father was going out into the skies. All day long he tossed upon his bed. Every little while he would cry out in misery, ‘Oh God, save my poor wandering, drunken son  today!' We would try to divert his attention from your waywardness and sin, but his mind would roam from place to place, and he would cry out in sorrow, 'Oh God, save my poor wandering, wayward boy today!"

Just as he passed away he cried: 'Oh, God, save...’ and he finished the prayer in the presence of Jesus." Down at the bottom of the letter the mother added a note saying, "You are a Christian tonight because your father would not let God go."

This son hearing the gospel and being led to Christ through a Christian ministry answered that father’s prayers. This is usually the way God does it, and who should or would have a greater concern for a child than a father or mother?

               In the scripture we have read today the great apostle reminds the Corinthians that he was their spiritual father. He said:  ¹⁴I do not write these things to shame you, but to admonish you as my beloved children. ¹⁵For if you were to have countless tutors in Christ, yet you would not have many fathers, for in Christ Jesus I became your father through the gospel. ¹⁶Therefore I exhort you, be imitators of me.

               There is a close relationship between a teacher and

a pupil, but it is not quite the same as that between a parent and a child . The father begets and the mother bears the son or daughter. It is not simply a relationship of teacher/student. The teacher/student relationship usually ends with the class or course of study. But as Paul says to the Corinthians, even if you were to have countless tutors in Christ, yet you would not have many fathers; for in Christ Jesus I became your father through the gospel. He felt that this entitled him to admonish them about some things going on in the church and to urge them to follow him in living out the faith. There was a spiritual bond between the Corinthians and himself because he was the minister God had used to bring them into the Kingdom of God.

               When a first grader arrived home on the opening day of school his father asked him, "Did you learn anything at school?" "Sure did," he replied, " I learned that I'm the only kid in my class who doesn't get an allowance.

Whether rightly or wrongly perceived parents can be examined by the children in the light of information they receive. Paul’s respect and esteem had suffered in Corinth because of detractors and critics. In this letter he felt it important that he remind them of his love for them evidenced in his ministry to them in the beginning when he personally became their spirit­ual father through the gospel.

There can be no greater love evidenced for a son or daughter than a love for their soul that leads them out of the darkness of sin, misery and death into the matchless love of Jesus Christ. This goes beyond the physical caring a father would be expected to have for his children. This is Christ-like love that sees the deeper and far more important need of salvation applied to sinful child­ren.

A study once disclosed that if both Mom and Dad attend church regularly, 72 percent of their children remain faithful in attendance. If only Dad attends regularly, 55 percent remain faithful. If only Mom attends regularly, 15 percent remain faithful. If neither attend regularly, only 6 percent remain faithful.

Paul included in his ministry a concern for the material needs that believers can have. He helped take up offerings for suffering Christians at Jerusalem, but his primary concern was for the spirit­ual needs of men and women, and even when he sought material help for suffering saints he made his appeal on the basis of their love for Jesus Christ and their commitment to Him. As he said of the Christians in Macedonia, who had begged him to be allowed to participate in the offering for suffering believers, he told the Corin­thians, But they first gave themselves to the Lord and to us by the will of God. 2 Cor. 8:5 

Paul saw that his primary and first obligation was to serve Christ as a steward of the mysteries of God and he reminded them, it is required of stewards that one be found trustworthy. (1 Cor. 4:2). 

So the apostle follows up his work in Corinth with this and another letter with the promise to return to see them if the Lord willed it. His concern was for their spiritual health and development.

        He is not only a spiritual father; he is living out the gospel just as he had taught it to them. His love for Christ is verified by what he has suffered for Christ's sake and the gospel. He does not boast about his credentials, his education, and his superior gifts. No. He asks them to follow his example, which grows out of the teaching he has brought to them. So he sends Timothy to them to bear witness to his life and conduct. The Corinthians needed this witness to them because they had listened to inferior teaching from men more of the world than of Christ.

                  Timothy knew of Paul's consistent teaching and manner of life, and knew that he had never wavered in his truthful proclamation of the gospel. Paul practiced what he preached and Timothy's testimony would recall to their recollection this fact. The lesson for us all is that Paul not only taught and preached the gospel. He lived it out in the face of opposition and persecution. He was a spiritual father to many and he leaves us a fatherly example of how we are to be spiritual fathers and mothers to our charges.

                 One elder statesman of a Christian church has devoted himself to a fifty-year study of Christian and non-Christian families. He says that in American culture today most young adults following Jesus Christ either come from non-Christian homes where they were converted to Christ in their teenage years through a dynamic youth ministry, or they come from homes where they grew up in love with Jesus because mom and dad were so in love with Jesus that love permeated their lives. It passed through their pores. Very few believers come from homes where there was a kind of indifferent, apathetic commitment to Christ. He said, “This is not my idea. This is the result of this study.” -- Ron Lee Davis, "Introducing Christ to Your Child," Preaching Today, Tape No. 92.

                 It is sobering and thought provoking to suggest that, in American culture, the chances are better for a child growing up in a non-Christian home to become a Christian than for a child growing up in a home that has an indifferent, apathetic commitment to Jesus Christ.”   Deuteronomy 6 suggests that a love for God must permeate the parent.

                 Someone has wisely said: A child is not likely to find a father in God unless he finds something of God in his father. We can all follow the example of the apostle Paul. We can make it a priority to be spiritual dads and moms. We should be seeking for the fruit of the preached Word and be as nursing dads and mothers to those placed in our care. And we can live the life before others that will commend both us and our gospel message to them.

                 Both Eli and Samuel had disappointing results with their children. Yet, God punished one for his ineffective parenting and blessed the other. 

                 It is the faithful process of parenting, not the end results that God evaluates. I like the remembrance Charles Spurgeon had of his mother’s influence in their family by quoting a prayer she offered in which she said, “Now, Lord, if my children go on in sin, it will not be from ignorance that they perish, and my soul must bear a swift witness against them at the day of judgment if they lay not hold of Jesus Christ.”

                 Spurgeon’s mother believed she had faithfully taught and lived out the gospel before her children. If any of her children continued on in sin, having failed to heed her instruction and witness, she would be guiltless in their eternal loss before the bar of judgment.

I came across this prayer by a Christian Dad that could be any Dad’s prayer:

Dear God, my little boy of three

Has said his nightly prayer to Thee;

Before his eyes were closed in sleep,

He asked that Thou his soul would keep.

And I, still kneeling at his bed,

My hand upon his tousled head,

Do ask, with deep humility,

That thou, dear Lord, remember me.

Make me, kind Lord, a worthy Dad,

That I may lead this little lad

In pathways ever fair and bright,

That I may keep his steps aright.

O God, his trust must never be

Destroyed or even marred by me.

So, for the simple things he prayed

With childish voice so unafraid,

I, trembling, ask the same from Thee.

Dear Lord, kind Lord, remember me.