The little three-year-old girl and her five-year-old brother would say their nightly prayers together. As many children do, they had to bless every family member, every friend, and every animal (current and past). For several weeks, after they had finished the nightly prayer, Kelli would say, "And all girls." As this soon became part of her nightly routine, to include this at the end, Dad’s curiosity got the best of him and he asked her, "Kelli, why do you always add the part about all girls?" She responded, "Because we always finish our prayers by saying 'All Men '!"
Today is father’s day and while our message is for “all men” its not hard to find some applications for all the girls as well. Since we’re studying the life of David I decided we would jump ahead in his story to see how David handled fatherhood. Turns out he didn’t always do so well. I’d like to be able to tell you that David was an exemplary father and he set an example that we can all follow today. However, because the Bible is a record of historical fact and not a work of fiction, the authors of the Bible do not gloss over the sins and shortcomings of its heroes. So this message will take the form of a “cautionary tale,” that is, how NOT to do fatherhood. David’s big weakness in fatherhood is one that’s common to many of us men today and that’s passivity. David was a passive, uninvolved, unaware, CLUELESS father. As a result, he reaped a lot of heartache and grief from the actions of the children that he ignored and neglected.
A lot of us men today are PASSIVE men.
Example: A letter to Ann Landers illustrates the plight of families brought about by men who are missing from action.
“Mother ran our family. Daddy was a wimp. If anyone is at fault, it's him. Almost all my teachers, from nursery to high school, were women. The male teachers were all effeminate. In one school the only male employee was the janitor. I was disciplined and rewarded exclusively by women. I learned early where the power was and I wanted to be on the winning side.”
In my opinion, most of our men in this church are a-typical in this regard. I’m greatly encouraged at the involvement level of fathers with their families that I see, as well as their involvement with the church. However, having said that, we still need to be REMINDED from time to time of the importance of being PROACTIVE in our parenting. We live in a culture of passive men and since we are swimming AGAINST the current of our culture we need help.
Personally, I will tell you that passive parenting is a perennial challenge in my life. My father was a good man. I’m proud of him and I appreciate the advantages that he gave me in life. But he was a passive father and I inherited some of his tendencies. I’m a conflict-avoider by nature. I don’t want to get involved. If the kids have a problem let them work it out. If the wife has a problem, let her work it out. Just let me live in peace.
When I went to college I had the opportunity to see a more proactive approach to parenting modeled for me. I was also taught proactive parenting in family living class and I’ve been reading books on Christian parenting and Christian family living ever since. Over the last years twenty-five years that I’ve been a parent I continue to try to revisit and reinforce the lessons of proactivity because they don’t come naturally to me. For those of us who tend to be passive, we have to realize that proactivity is not something we simply master and then move on to something else. We need to take our medicine every day. I need reminders and constant reinforcement or I fall back into passive and negative patterns. So sermons like this one are good for me and I trust they’re good for some of you as well.
Lets observe David’s experience this morning and allow him to remind us of the perils of paternal passivity.
