With Father’s Day around the corner, many will not be celebrating. What a shame that fatherlessness in America is rampant. So many children either grow up without fathers or in dysfunctional families. They grow up insecure and unprotected, struggling to feel loved. The Bible says, “You don’t have many fathers.” And while it could be talking about natural fathers, it is referring to spiritual fathers – that person in our lives who helps us locate our identity and become who God intended us to be. Spiritual fathers serve their sons and daughters by helping them to discover, “I’m really, really OK. Whatever other people say about me, I’ve got nothing I have to prove to feel loved and secure in who I am.”
We who have raised children and who follow Jesus need to respond to this crisis of fatherlessness. We have a moral obligation to give out of our abundance to those who feel orphaned. Having raised five kids, I have a burden for those who at their core feel abandoned by their fathers. I think about the subject and write about it all the time (see
these blogs).
God’s heart breaks for orphans of all shapes and sizes and he has chosen people like you and me as his instrument to give them the love they yearn for. Deuteronomy 10:18 says, “He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow.” Psalm 68:5 says he is a “Father to the fatherless, a defender of widows.” Psalm 82:3 tells us to “defend the cause of the weak and fatherless.”
So many of society’s problems can be traced back to this issue of an absentee dad. Where do psychopaths come from? Usually there is a derelict father who has split the scene, leaving deeply wounded children. Interview a group of prison inmates and ask how many of them had good, loving fathers. And the cycle continues: by virtue of their absence from the home (sitting there in their cell), the generational curse is passed on to their sons and daughters abandoned by their daddy. It’s a tragedy that cries out for fathers who follow Jesus to intervene.
Those of us who have been blessed with fathers need to commit ourselves to fill the emotional gaps in the next generation. In the interview below, my friend and covenant brother, Gary Black, describes the essence of spiritual fathering and mothering: We serve our kids and help them get to greatness.
As we know sins of out fathers can pass down to the 3rd and 4th generation – Deut 23:2 tells us that the only generational sin that can be carried down to the 10th generation is illegitimacy or Fatherlessness… what are we willing to do to help stop this?
Job received Gods tremendous blessings found in Job 29:1-11 BECAUSE, among other reasons (v12-17), was “father to the needy” (v16).
“Father to the needy”. Sounds like a great epitaph to me.
Hi Seth, this is my first post on your blog after discovering it a few months ago. I have been so moved by your thoughts about many things that I have included it my list of blogs. I am a child welfare social worker for 12 years and the common thread through most of the families I have dealt with is a lack of a father. It is indeed a crisis of epic measure. I am encouraged that we have a Father who never abandons us (Psalms 27:10). Thank you for raising to call for His Body to step up and be the hands and feet of Abba Father to a hurting world. God bless you and your ministry.
E. Russ – http://www.russmegumikids.blogspot.com
Go to this site and read my book on the fatherless generation. http://www.thecry.us