Real Fathers in the Real World--by Linden Malki

                         
"Fathers" are not fashionable in some parts of our culture; partly because our experience of fathers is not always healthy.  Once when I was looking for a Fathers' Day  Bible story, I realized that the number of  healthy fathers with good children described in Scripture is very small. We see more examples of failed fathers than not, and it is probably because human fathers are just that: human beings, with the limitations that implies. What should we expect from our fathers?  I was fortunate to have a good, godly father, not perfect but close enough. We had neighbors who were alcoholic fathers, abusive fathers, absent fathers, and my mom used to encourage the neighbor kids to play in our yard because she didn't trust some of the other parents. The contrast between human fathers and our Heavenly Father is almost enough to wonder why God chose that identity. Human beings were given a lot of freedom; we are capable of great evil, and also of great good. The best of human fathers use the "father" image of God as a pattern for their lives and their responsibility for their families and their communities.

Fathers are supposed to be strong, good examples of the appropriate authority in their communities. This can get out of hand with fathers who don't recognize that they are responsible as well for respect, and gentleness as well as strength, and knowing how to use their strength for helpfulness and appropriate authority rather than ego and inappropriate power. The best fathers realize that they are servants of God and answerable for their attitudes and how they use their authority.  Unfortunately, we live in a culture that includes the increasing belief that fathers are unnecessary and/or dangerous. In some cases, it leads to families without fathers available, and women without respect for men; and to boys and men without a sense of responsbility for anyone, including themselves. This also can lead to a disrespect or rejection of the idea of God, who is seen as either powerless or evil--or nonexistent. There are even political groups with the avowed intention of eliminating the family; although it was tried by early communist societies and was abandoned as unworkable.

The Biblical ideal is for men who recognize their need for a relationship with God that recognizes the primacy of God in human society, and learning from this relationship to have a Biblical relationship with their families and society. It is interesting that the New Testament advice describes this as husbands who love their families, and wives who respect their husbands. I have seen commentaries who point out that husbands who love their families will not mistreat them, and wives who are loved will not be afraid to respect their husbands. Scripturally and historically, families who put God in His proper place in their lives will find that putting God first will normally allow the rest of the relationships to work properly.

God Created One Family--by Linden Malki

Most creatures on this planet live in families. No living creature--including us--can survive without some sort of relationship; without it we will die alone. It is family that builds generations, where relationships enrich our lives and insure the survival of our kind. We see God watching Adam and proclaims that "It is not good for man to be alone", and God created every living thing to live in some sort of relationship with an appropriate companion.

We read of God calling a man named Abram to be the "Father of a nation" that ideally will have God as the ultimate Father, with Abram as the human counterpart in of His plan. What makes it interesting--as well as scary--is that we are all created to be God's children, but we are also each different in some ways, but also are each able, if we pay attention to our Creator, to relate to each other. Basically, whether we like it or not, we are all members of one family, and we can, if we follow the rules, live together and build a society. We have often not done a good job of this. Too often we have paid too much attention to our superficial differences and not enough to our common humanity.

We tend to pay too much attention to ourselves and are not willing to learn from God and other people. (I cannot forget my husband's favorite description of conversation at its best: "If I know this, and you know that--think how much we both know!" That was one of the  reasons we were able to live together and work together for 41 years, despite having grown up half a world apart.)

The NIV Bible uses the word "Father" (describing both God and our human fathers) 1103 times. It is a word that always implies a relationship, and one that is part of a hierarchy. God is the not only an authority figure, but one that implies a two-way relationship. When it is used in reference to a human father, again there is both an implication of authority but also a very close relationship with at least two other people: at some point, in order to be a father, there has to be a mother and a child. The human relationships we see in Scripture go the full scale from loving and caring for his family to being a total failure, which has the bad side of not doing what is required for the family to thrive. Very often a man who fails as a father also fails at anything else he is responsible for, be it a king or a servant. Some of the major disasters in the history of the Israel and Judah are traceable to men who do not live up to God's intention for them, which not only hurts them but also the other people who depend on him. When we can't get along with the others around us, whether they are our families or our neighbors or our enemies, we have failed in the task God created us for--not only during our own lifetime but in our influence on everybody who depends on us. We can create incredible havoc by not understanding our responsibility as creatures intended for good but allowed to mess up when we try to do it ourselves. 

Only God Knows What's Next by Linden Malki

Historically, we have been very fortunate in the past decade or so, to the point that it is hard for many of us to accept the dangers we see all around us. Danger has been a part of human society as long as we have existed, but we have not had so many of them staring us in the face recently. They are not as serious as many of the plagues and wars and invasions and famines that our ancestors have lived with over most of our history, but we have gotten spoiled. We are dealing with a virus that we still don't know as much as we need to know, and a quarantine that has cost jobs, connections with people, and in many cases, mental health. Add to that the police situation in Minneapolis that has triggered demonstrations and major damage to cities that have cost many people their homes and/or businesses.

Jesus had troubles enough with those who did not understand or believe in His teachings, but He did give answers. It almost sounds too easy--if we turn over the stumbling blocks we keep tripping over to Him, they can be removed or transformed. The one that is especially serious at this historical moment is the barriers between people that Paul mentions to the Ephesians, but it is one that can be answered with humility, peace, patience, and love (and all the other graces we are promised--we need them all!)

One of the most difficult situations many people are facing is ultimate reality--whatever comes across our path sooner or later, we will always face generational change--none of us are going to stay here forever. We may fade out peacefully, or unexpectedly; we may have warnings or not, we may be young or old or anything in between. There has been a recent opportunity for our church family and other friends and relatives to share a memorial service for a young man who grew up in the Calvary/Northpoint/Sandals family,who was in an accident recently. It was a privilege for many of us to share Aaron Ensman's life and support his family as they deal with his loss; and to meet or reconnect with other people who also cared for Aaron and his family.

The Mind of Christ--by Linden Malki

Let the mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus--even though He was God, He laid it aside and took the mind of man, humbling Himself.   We are not God, even though we are tempted at times to think we are.  How we think, and what we think, is one of the most important things we do.  What we think controls how we act, how we talk, and how we react to the world around us. When we don't think, we get into trouble. When we put aside thought for the indulgence of "feeling", we usually don't realize that feelings can take us places we may regret. I'm not saying that feelings may not be good, but we need to be aware of what they are and where they lead.

Our thinking can be under our conscious control,  or it can become unconstrained, to where we overestimate our own abilities and blame everything that doesn't work the way we want on everybody else. We are human, and limited by human flaws. If we are not aware of this, or don't want to believe it, we can cause incredible havoc in our wake.  Science at its best is a triumph of the capabilites of human thought, but if it is not constantly examined and checked, we can be led down paths that turn out to be misleading, wrong, or possibly dangerous. It is easy for us to think that if something looks good at the beginning, it will continue to work the way we expect--not noticing that there are unintended consequences that change the expected results. And very often those who think they know everything don't realize how much they don't know--we cannot keep track of everything and everybody, and the more we try the more we get tangled up in other people's assumptions of knowledge. 

Jesus teaches us to examine our hearts, our lives, and our relationships. He is the checkpoint, the One who knows what the results will lead when we can't see them. We need to remember that "Your ways are in full view of the Lord, and He examines all your paths." (Proverbs 5:21, NIV)  Our paths are often not His paths, and our paths usually have more to do with our own assumptions and wants than reality. God is reality, and we can only be truly sure of actual reality when we are in touch with Him.