Father knows best?

This week’s contribution to the “In the Family Way” series is probably the most difficult for me. That is due to two things. First, Jesus didn’t say a whole lot about the role of husbands and fathers in the family circle. Since I am convinced that as a preacher I must begin and end with what Jesus said, I am challenged by the lack of Jesus’ direction on the matter.

Second, my own failure, discouragement, and deep disappointment as a dad make me feel unqualified to tread these grounds. In 2009 I searched out the matter and wrote extensively of my search and discovery in a blog I called “Patriarch’s Journal.” Now in great bewilderment I second-guess everything I thought I knew. I admit at the outset that I am searching as much as ever before and wonder if father really does know best.

I am not alone in my confusion. Today men struggle to find their place or simply give up in dysfunction and frustration. Our culture provides no real guidance.

The 1950s television series “Father Knows Best” portrayed dad as a lovable but slightly irrelevant guy. So did “Leave it to Beaver.” As time went on TV dads become more and more irrelevant and even the object of ridicule.

In real life feminism regards traditional fatherhood as “male dominance.” Our institutions (even the church) have become more feminized and men are being conditioned to be more like women – gentle, feeling, and in touch with the “inner self.” Expressions of true masculinity are looked down on. Gender roles are muddled and confused. And father doesn’t really know anything at all. Sit down, shut up, and write the check.

I mentioned that Jesus didn’t say much on the subject. In fact, at times he appears to be anti-family. He warned that he came to bring a sword which could divide families along generational lines. He told a young man who expressed interest in following him but also had reservations about leaving his father, “Let the dead bury their dead.” The kingdom takes precedence in Jesus’ mind, and as with everything else seeking the kingdom first brings other things into balance.

Lest we come to the conclusion that Jesus is anti-family let us remember our series text from last week, where Jesus referred certain Pharisees to the creation account for guidance on marriage and family. He quoted from Genesis chapters one and two and made it clear God created the genders for family and that he wanted them to join in matrimony to reproduce their kind. Societal order for the home arose from that. It is clear Jesus did not want Pharisees to disrupt that to suit their own lusts.

It is also instructive that when the “rich young ruler” approached Jesus for instruction on gaining eternal life Jesus quoted the Fifth Commandment among others. Honoring father and mother is important to the kingdom. More on this week after next.

I’m wondering if Jesus didn’t say much on the matter because he really didn’t have to. “Family values” were deeply ingrained in his first century Jewish culture and he needed only to address its excesses. Leadership of the husband and father was given and considered necessary to provide order and stability. This wasn’t in a context of male domination as many assume. It was in a context where most of the world regarded women as possessions. God’s people were to regard them as human beings to be cherished and protected.

Paul the apostle had more to say of these things because he was in the mixed up pagan world. My favorite of his writings on the matter come from Ephesians chapter 5 where husbands are told to love their wives as Christ loved the church, and gave his life for it. Self-sacrifice, unconditional love, and attention to nurture and health are part of that responsibility.

Perhaps the most instructive of Jesus’ teachings on the matter comes from the parable of the two sons, one a prodigal and the other loyal but ungrateful. We tend to make the prodigal the focal point, but I want to direct our attention to the loving father who did not flinch when the younger son offended him so greatly by asking prematurely for his share of inheritance.

While others would have written off the ne’er-do-well, dad watched every day for no telling how long for the prodigal to come to his senses and come home. Dad was there ready to welcome him home unconditionally. Though the boy would be fortunate to be hired on as a servant, when he did come home dad restored him to family.

There is enough here to restore faith in the fact that led by the Holy Spirit and informed by Scripture, maybe God intends that father know best.

I am again convinced that God has a design for the family. Paul explains that because man became first he is the head of the family, as Jesus is the head of the church. Not more important, but first in order, first in responsibility.

We men must overcome our age-old battle with passivity, which causes us to shrink away from responsibility. Adam suffered from it, and so do we. Especially in the face of continual challenges to our masculinity. We are first in responsibility, charged with giving our lives and sacrificing our possessions so that we can provide, love, and nurture our families.

It turns out God the Father knows best, because he created us, and he designed us from the beginning to emulate him, just as the father in Jesus’ story of the prodigal emulates him.

The challenge for us men is to be the men and fathers God made us to be. To do that we must know God, love like Jesus, and be led by the Holy Spirit. Put the kingdom first, and see how other things come into place.