Tag Archives: children

November 30, 2010

Our liberties are in a box in a TSA warehouse, along with 10,000 nail clippers.

By Pooka

Doug Wilson rocks on this one.

People should speak up even more.

So I’m linking to it in hopes someone else catches the breeze.

Touching Sensitive Areas, or TSA For Short

I think the whole TSA imbecillity is an offense on our privacy and our dignity. It elevates a group of people out of the requirement to act with common decency and respect. It violates any consideration for the sensitivities of people who have been molested, exploited or traumatized by human hands on their bodies. And children? C’mon, man! Kids do NOT need to suffer this insanity.

It’s all over YouTube and the rest of the net. DJP has put up a little bit too:

TSA Grope’n'Porn

FOOEY on this stuff. I’ll drive if I have to. I don’t want MY 5 girls under the camera OR the hand.

So the BIG question: How to render unto Caesar when this really isn’t Caesar’s? I’m not willing to concede that the Gov has employed an acceptable method for waging the war on terrorism.

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October 2, 2010

Un – Parenting

By Pooka

The GTY blog, which I cruise around from time to time, had a post that tweaked my participatory interest.

“The Pressures of Parenting, Part 2″

There were 3 questions after a short audio clip on the subject:

(1) How have you seen churches cater to the self-esteem parenting movement (e.g., parenting classes, youth programs)? Be specific.

(2) God has provided every social institution with a means to promote order and discipline—to the government, the sword; to the church, excommunication; and to parents, the rod of correction. What happens in society, in the church, and in the home, when God-ordained authority refuses to implement discipline? What are the parallels?

(3) Parents, what advice would you give to a mom or dad headed down the road of self-esteem parenting? Is it too late for them to turn around? If it’s not too late, what practical changes can they make?

Here are my (expanded) responses:

#1. Youth programs when I was a teen focused on how to “get along” in school and peer groups while maintaining a Christian image. We talked about tricks to avoid getting into drinking or drugs or situations that put us at risk for premarital sex. It was mostly practical maneuvers and how to talk and act among peers so that we did not offend while maintaining our “witness.” Nowadays, my own kids have been in churches that fill huge rooms with couches, promote slovenly behavior and casual, even irreverent places that directly oppose the solemnity of proper worship services. They talk about good uses for the internet and cellphones. It’s legalistic at best in most of the churches I’ve seen. At worst, it’s group fun with ice-breakers and soda-pops. Teaching avoided the clear presentation of sin and grace. Instead, youth pastors have taught my kids how to use verses from the Bible to keep themselves out of trouble. Pastors, when they rarely approached the subject of parenting, talked about family time (dinner table tradition) and how to “talk to kids” in order to build rapport with them and get them to trust us and build friendship friends.

So there was plenty of candy and other treats, treatises on how to dress or how to date, slouching and texting, the latest pop-xtian praise session (Passionately Breathless in the Garden Cuz I’m Lost Without You to Rock Me Funky). It was almost the same when I was a kid, except we had the fold-up steel chairs and had to read our Bibles along with the rest of it. One time, I remember going to my grandparents’ church and we showed up at Sunday School in time to hop in the Church Van for some shopping (!). I remember the grape Hubba Bubba most from that day.

-Related: I was listening to Focus on the Family recently: about elementary aged kids who dressed and acted like adults. The guidance to parents about “keeping them children during their child years” was prefaced with “DON’T tell your kids NO outright: that will cause their hearts to harden and they’ll rebel.” Sounds like some of the teaching in my past.

You know what happens when you affirm your kids’ “right” to be liberated, themselves, feminist or whatever and simply give them advice about what God would prefer or what would best serve them in their lives? Without telling them “NO, That’s WRONG!” they don’t ever learn what sin really is. You have just affirmed their own impression of their status as free men, free to do and think as they please for there is no governing standard. Meaning they’re slaves to sin, in the end.

#2. Kids with no discipline get a clear message that there are no boundaries. Result: a mushy quality to the Law and towing the mark. There’s no positive statement about what is wrong and right. That means there’s no clear grasp of what sin means. That makes it hard for them to understand a need for the Gospel. The problem perpetuates itself as kids grow up without clear standards. They have no tools for applying discipline in their own families or society (or church). Therefore the truths of sin and redemption get more and more confused.

#3. Advice? Repent. Realize the sin of this form of parenting and take it to the Lord in prayer. Ask for forgiveness and for direction to correct the problem. Take action!

–1. If your church is not actively combatting the irresponsibile and syncretistic philosophy of this age with clear Biblical teaching, bring the subject up to the pastor or leave for a church that does keep up the fight.

No joke, if your church is failing in this area, they’re failing in all areas. You can toot all day long about how loving they are or how close-knit they are. You can parade around town with all the service badges you’ve earned through working with your church. But you’re not a part of a church that is faithful to the Word of God. Your church should be preaching THE WORD as the First Thing. This means teaching absolutes.

–2. Read the Word! Focus on cause and effect. Rebuild understanding of the Law and what Christ does to deal with failure to keep the law.

–3. Be honest with the kids. Explain what’s wrong and what you’re going to do about it. Parents are sinning against their kids in this situation. This means we have to address the problem with the kids.

–4. Seek guidance from church.  (see advice 1)

–5. Finally, find hope in the Lord, for He really is faithful and knows all that is going on in you and your kids.

If you’re a parent trying to parent faithfully, you’re going to see, if you don’t already, how painful and depressing it is to raise kids. They’re sinners, just like you. They’re going to disappoint, defy, rebel and sometimes make all your hard work look like it’s wasted. If you aren’t putting your faith in Christ and His faithfulness, you’ll give up or worse. Stay in the Word, keep yourself immersed in the Gospel that you need to hear Every Single Day!

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October 1, 2010

It's All Messed Up

By Pooka

Everything seems to fail at some point or another. Our successes even seem to rot before our eyes. Our kids not only drive us to distraction but present insanely impossible problems that we as kids experienced (That we somehow have lost the ability to deal with or comprehend somewhere along the way). Our drive and dedication rarely pay out dividends that fairly correlate and when they do, the fanfare and sunshine fade all too quickly. We do the wrong things, hurt people, damage ourselves incessantly no matter how high-and-lofty our motivations. Our motivations, though we believe with all our might to be right, consistently boil down to flawed and self-centered things of frustrating fiats.

Sometimes we have genuine cares for others, trying our bestest to lift them up out of the mire of the world, protect them or feed them the tools to succeed, especially where we are conscious of our own failure. But we fail at that, too. Isn’t it all just a big cycle of failure?

Can you identify, in your life, one persistent quality or action of your own that has a timeline that evades the rot process entirely? I propose that it cannot be done.

IF we start from a fundamentally flawed foundation, we will always always end up with a failed result. Things will not turn out right. The end state will still be flawed, just as the beginning was flawed.

Truth Claim Here: Everything that is wrong is wrong because of sin. Everything that is wrong is wrong because we are sinful people living in a sin-cursed world.

Stupid religious freak. Quit waving it around in public. What you think is right doesn’t have to apply to me because it’s only true for you.

Um. Ima letcha finish, but first: Re-read everything before the IF paragraph again. Is that true or not true for everybody?  For those who are not NPCs, who think and live, do we not see this everywhere? Regarding those we perceive to cruise along, oblivious bastions of success or happiness, do not the observers see the truth that NPCs are walking fail-factories as well?

Yeah, whatever. Just because I don’t have all the answers, and nobody else does, so we mess up. A lot. Nobody is perfect. Nobody is “all that” so there’s nothing we can do about it but keep trying.

This wickedness and evil hasn’t gone away. It’s only got worse. Worse by driving deeper and deeper into our culture and personalities and spirits. In this era, it has so permeated us that we cannot even stop to listen to reason, to the thundering whisper that something isn’t right, much less come to grips with the undeniable fact that I, you, them, we’re all so messed up, so dead wrong, so just plain dead that there is no hope of attaining a recovery.
Yep. Just like a treadmill, it keeps rolling but you don’t get anywhere. And if you fall, it keeps rolling, doesn’t it? There’s no hope. None. All you get to look forward to is another round of going nowhere with no horizon of completion or really living in view.

The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. – Genesis 6:5

There you go again. You quoted some of that Bible garbage. Why in the world should I listen to that drivel. It’s all a mess of rules and made-up stories and garbage. It has some sick idea of a deity that kills entire races of people, tells people what to do and makes them bow down and submit. There’s nothing worthwhile there and it certainly doesn’t apply to modern day.

Sure thing. Take a second look. Just look at it from the position of what it says about everything being messed up. Look at the incredible descriptions of people who lie, cheat, steal, subvert, corrupt, fail, underachieve, chicken out and pretty much screw up everything they touch. Tell me again that it’s just made up junk. Tell me it doesn’t apply to modern day. Tell me there isn’t a touch of truth in there.

The only document that clearly depicts the condition we’re in is….. Guess!

That’s it for today. I’ll do some more soonly. Maybe this will start reaching out to someone.

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August 12, 2010

Welcome To The New Sodom

By Pooka

Any Christian with a discerning eye should probably already have at least an inkling of the comparison of Sodom to Pretty much all of the planet today.  Here’s an article from Grace To You (Click the link):

Raising Your Family In Sodom

“Brace yourself, believer. You’re going to keep seeing this fire-storm of opposition against the family. Soon, many people will consign Christians who uphold a biblical view of marriage and family to the same moral category as white supremacy groups, and they’ll consider any effort to oppose homosexuality as a hate crime. In fact, it won’t be long before this blog post becomes a violation of law, under “hate speech” legislation.”

My own thoughts:

Ponder this, ponder the definition of marriage and family that is presented in the Bible, then ponder what Christians face when their homes and places of worship are smack-dab in the middle of a world that resembles a collection of Moabs with capitol cities just like Sodom.

Nevertheless, it’s our duty out of love for Christ and His Truth that we become increasingly discerning, ruthless even, about what we’ll tolerate in our own lives.

Will we continue to consume the media that makes a mockery of God’s ordered creation?

Will we play with the toys of the world which make women into men and men into women, raise babies completely out of touch with what real parents and real families are?

Will we be part of organizations that promise to be tolerant toward everyone, inclusive of any idea, but persist in “allowing” nothing except that which God has declared unrighteous? This includes the churches and their leaders who downplay the holiness of God and focus on anything but the Truth of the Word and our obligation to live according to it.

Godlessness in the Last Days

But understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty. For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power. Avoid such people. For among them are those who creep into households and capture weak women, burdened with sins and led astray by various passions, always learning and never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth. As Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses, so these men also oppose the truth, men corrupted in mind and disqualified regarding the faith. But they will not get very far, for their folly will be plain to all, as was that of those two men. — 2 Timothy3:1-9

I am reminded of the last verse of Judges, prelude to Elimelech’s departure into Moab:

In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes. — Judges 21:25

There is a king in Israel. He is Israel. We have a king, and he’s given His faithful subjects the directions they need to remain faithful. The Bible is right here, growing dusty on our shelves and the church is right down the road, with a place reserved for us. Christ doesn’t pander to the masses or tolerate their corruption of His kingdom. He’s not “tolerant” or into “liberated” thinking or theology. Neither are those who love Him and are called by His Name.

So, if you’re in Christ but hangin’ out with the world, maybe it’s time to remember who owns you, repent and run after Him. If you don’t know Christ, however, then He doesn’t know you and you need Him. Still, the answer is the same: Realize who is King, repent and run after Him.

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June 29, 2010

Important Interruption

By Pooka

I have interrupted the Carefully Planned Posting Schedule at LAH to bring this to the masses (I found it via bob.blog via a twitter stream I followed… Call it Providence).

It’s absolutely important.

http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=12714406&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=0&show_portrait=0&color=00adef&fullscreen=1

Dad Life from Church on the Move on Vimeo.

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June 18, 2010

Broken-Hearted Boldness

By Pooka

If you can’t figure out where to go, this may be of some assistance. It’s a call to realize that our own failures and rotten natures are first things. Countering that is the promise that, because of the cross, those first things and then the misery that surrounds us will ultimately be crushed by His foot. Grace.

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June 17, 2010

Life, Unscheduled

By Pooka

It’s amazing what the world (Satan) has available to make sure I can’t focus on what I think I should.

Two jobs, for instance, really puts a cramp in my time. I should spend more time with the family. Maybe go to the zoo or to the park. Instead, most days of the week I’m crunching in just enough for a quick dinner and then off to job #2. When there is a little extra, I tend to goof it and write or study online, which is good of itself, but not very family-interactive. There are days when I get home from job #1 and I’m dog tired and just want a nap. But that leaves me feeling guilty because of a 2 to 4 hour loss of precious time. There’s always another something else that comes up like Girl Scouts or whatever that invariably separates us into two or three teams spread all over town. It’s pretty discouraging.

Once in a while there’s a whole day of no commitment. And those are the worst. Those days start off with sleeping in (much desired but already cutting off part of the day). Then there’s the obligatory web crawl with a cup of coffee. I call it “starting the day off right” because my surfing is more an hour long cruise through Christian media. That’s not bad at all, save it’s a piece of the formula that usually spells disaster for quality time with my girls.

Al Mohler wrote an article this week on just the digital stuff, and the discussion on commercialization also hit home. There’s so much clamoring for our attention and time that it’s no wonder I’m unstable. I would assume only a very blessed few have managed to escape the floodwaters of our distracted, overstimulated age.

Then we have the usual groping around for purpose during the day, kids going out to play, dad maybe making it to the garage for a project that’s hugely overdue, mom trying to keep up with college or the chef business. There are conflicts to deconflict and things to keep track of. And then dinner arrives and there’s nothing left.

Thankfully, on the empty days, we do get to enjoy tuck-ins, which rarely happen during the regular week. There’s family prayer, Bible study and lots of love before the kids get deposited into the sack for the night. I love that, though it’s sometimes challenging to run smoothly.

But the holes, back to the holes. There’s so much I want to focus on and not enough focus to really get there. I’d write in a tight schedule, but those things always crash and burn. Say, one day a week per kid, a block assigned to go out or focus on just one. And another for the Wife, a date. Yeah, and then where do those happen? Boy, this is a hard one.

I have a commitment to making sure the bread is on the table. That, for now, means two jobs. And I have to make sure I get enough hours at the second one (part-time) to make it worthwhile. That kills most week-nights and often at least half of both Saturday and Sunday. There’s so little time for much else. I’ve managed to block off time for the care of the soul. We are committed to Sunday mornings being Church and Church alone. No work can interfere if at all possible. And I’ve done the same with Mondays so that I, personally, can ensure I’m getting discipleship interaction with the Body. If I were to commit just one day more to not working, where would that leave me?

Now, I’m not whining solely for my own lack of satisfaction. This concern is partially for my own good, but even more for my family. We glorify God when we are fellowshiping as a family. That’s what I believe is the bottom line. We aren’t just a phase of the work-week when we’re together. It is so hard to be homework: chores: dinner prep: showers: tuck-ins: bed during the week and then nearly the same on the weekend.

I’m most thankful that the Lord provided us with a three-week vacation this year with a drive out to Mom and Dad. That gives us no work requirements, no duty, just time together on the road, camping, visiting family along the way and hopefully some really good times loving each other.

I still have to seek some guidance, I think, on the best way to deal with this impossible schedule. I’m tempted, though with a sort of frustrated, maybe irritated attitude, to can my reserved Mondays at Church to another day for a dedicated evening with family. I’m torn on that part. I need need need the external connection that the Fellowship provides. But I don’t have dedicated family in there either.

I’m similarly tempted to quit the #2 job. Not because I don’t want to work or because I don’t like the job, but because of the toll it’s taking on family time. At the moment, there isn’t any. But if I quit, I’m not filling the gap between debt and bread. That seems to be a failure to provide for the family. And that stinks too.

So where do I go? Which one do I choose? Prayer is where I start and that’s where I’m at right now.

Father’s day is coming up and I’m not feeling very successful at fathering.

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June 11, 2010

Commercializing Kids.

By Pooka

This from Challies’ “A La Carte” today. Go ahead and watch, soak it up. I’ve been cryin’ about this for a long time. I think it captures my concerns fairly well. The only thing it may be missing is how media is a double-edged sword that not only creates 360 degree consumer-monsters but that it also makes them fools. It’s miserable to see kids like this and it’s just as bad when I catch myself falling for the trick.

Ima makin this note. Call it a rant if necessary.

Ever notice how little kids get obsessed with certain things?
Maybe with:

  • Fashion
  • Music
  • Stories
  • Friends
  • Grades
  • Cars
  • Action Figures

When is the last time you saw a kid obsessed with:

  • Christ
  • Church
  • Bible
  • Gospel
  • Family
  • Truth
  • Eternity

The world doesn’t teach the second list. The world teaches the first list and it’s an entry level drug scheme to prepare them for the bigger World out there. Kids obsessed with that which is on the first list become adults obsessed with:

  • Self Image
  • Self Expression
  • Entertainment
  • Social Status
  • Work
  • Trophies
  • Idealistic Lives

The second list is kinda funny. Kids obsessed with the things on the second list become adults obsessed with:

  • Christ
  • Church
  • Bible
  • Gospel
  • Family
  • Truth
  • Eternity

I think that this should put a healthy fear or grave concern in the hearts of parents and potential parents. If it doesn’t, something is very, very wrong.

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June 10, 2010

Wait For Him

By Pooka

Micah 7

Woe is me! For I have become
As when the summer fruit has been gathered
As when the grapes have been gleaned
There is no cluster to eat
No first-ripe fig that my soul desires

I have begun to see
The depths of me
They have trickled through
My sight and to
The fragile bowl
Of my desolate soul

There is so little right
In all that I pretend of light
And that which has a holy glow
Is nothing in me to know
Though I deny my hand
Nothing helps me to stand

And so in death I pour
My last breath out on the floor
Pinned by gravity
By the horror of me
And beg with a whispered word
That no-one near could have heard

But as for me, I will look to the Lord
I will wait for the God of my salvation
My God will hear me.

When this finally
This song sweet as spring breeze
Flies into my soul
Twill finally render me whole
And perhaps strongly
That even I can hear me

Who is a God like you, pardoning iniquity
And passing over transgression
For the remnant of his inheritance
He does not retain his anger forever
Because he delights in steadfast love
He will again have compassion on us
He will tread our iniquities underfoot
You will cast all our sins
Into the depths of the sea

How wonderful a name my nephew has. He has such a lot to learn from the prophet Micah. Powerful to save his soul. Powerful to save my soul.

Micah 5

But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah,
who are too little to be among the clans of Judah,
from you shall come forth for me
one who is to be ruler in Israel,
whose coming forth is from of old,
from ancient days.

And he shall stand and shepherd his flock in the strength of the Lord,
in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God.
And they shall dwell secure, for now he shall be great
to the ends of the earth.
And he shall be their peace.

__________________________________________
I have known in my head for a long time that my sin, not that of others against me is the target of my warfare. I must delve within me and know that sin, know it clearly and honestly. I have to realize that, though all around me is corrupt, what God is looking at in my life is my sin and That is what I am about in pursuit of holiness. It is and should be a daunting, exhausting and ultimately a profoundly miserable task.

If one can gaze at the cross with anything less than amazement, grief and maybe even shock at the depth of his own sin, where can he find hope? I had to know my destitute condition before I could realize my redemption. In Christ, I find my hope, for in me there is nothing but darkness and misery. His Spirit brings light to what would otherwise be a murky, lurking soul.

See Gollum in the Lord of the Rings story. There’s not much better graphic example in literature today.

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May 19, 2010

Ordinary Fathers 2

By Pooka

Continued from the first part…

I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry. – 2 Timothy 4:1-5

I want to sort of take inspiration from Mr. Mahaney’s opening prayer at the start of his session; to make it my own for a moment. He seems to pray with a confidence and a familiarity that I do not feel that I have. Blame me and my lack of faith and trust in God and his desire for me to pray. I guess it’s good that I can’t bring myself to approach the throne with any sense of confidence in myself, but it’s equally not good that I don’t really approach him with confidence in him – his acceptance of me in his son, Christ Jesus.

Lord, you know how much I want to serve my beloved children and my fair Wife. You know that I believe your gospel and how much I want to apprehend it every day. I pray that you would step into my wayward attempts to communicate this Gospel to them and to live out my life as the example they should emulate.

When they grow up, I want my girls to know what their husbands to be should be. I want them to know, right off, when they meet their men that they are their God-given men; the ones with whom they can worship the Lord as a couple. I want them to trust that their husbands are precisely the ones who should be the ones helping them raise their own children the right way, in the admonition of the Lord. Let them see that in me first, o Lord.

And my wife, let her enjoy the husband that you intend for me to be, faithful to the Word and devoted to her, bringing the Gospel to her in love and dedication that can be likened to Christ giving himself to the church. Make our marriage like that sacred moment in time. Make me that willing to give and sacrifice.

But in all that, o God, let me not operate this desire in my limited time-frame but instead in yours, all in faith and in your patience, for mine is inadequate. Let me imitate you, by your grace for I have nothing of my own that will lend to anything good.

I know, I absolutely really know that my patience and endurance are at their lowest most of the time. I’m reminded of this commonly by my own blow-ups and moments of despair. The uncontrollable confusion, quips, snaps and furies that accompany my human and self-centered attempts at teaching or disciplining my family reflect my lack of that hugely important quality of patience.

We, as fathers, live in the frame of months, weeks, days, hours, minutes and seconds. Our great God operates in the frame of Eternity, Epochs, Eras, Generations, Decades, Years and Seasons. It is impossible to expect, nor hope, for opened eyes, reformed hearts, even living response from those I am trying to reach within my time-frame. Not that such things can’t happen, since the Lord has a hand on the dial of eternity, but it’s not for the sower to expect the fruit after the first watering of his crop.

I have got to keep that in my mind. I need to drill a hole in this thick skull and stuff it with all the texts on patience and endurance in the Bible. Starting with the ones about the Lord and finishing with this passage in Timothy. If there’s one thing I could choose to communicate to my family, after the saving Gospel of Jesus Christ, it would be patience and endurance. That is what makes everything work. In order to have love, there must be patience. In order to have order, there must be patience. In order to grow faith, there must be patience. In order to read all my jumbled thoughts on this blog, there must be patience (snicker).

Ordinary fathers. With ordinary kids and ordinary Wives and ordinary selves. My hang-ups are to be attacked in haste, not my past, not their hang-ups nor their past. When they grow up, will my girls look back at a war-zone filled with the detritus of countless battles engaged between our wills and our patience and our individual worldly characters? Or will they look back and see the Gospel taught, lived out in love and discipline and devotion? Will there be a peaceful, peaceful no matter how colored by sin and unfaithfulness, scene in the rear-view mirror?

I wrote recently on Holistic Approaches, which bears on my thoughts once again:

We live our lives in the light of the Promise, the Hope of our salvation. We reach out in submission to the Great Commission that directs us to preach the Gospel to the world. That all means we’re outside our homes, in the world, interacting and interfacing with all that is around us. This is good in that we have the countless opportunities to witness not just through proclamation of the Word but through becoming living examples of Christ. “Little Christs.”

Commitment, or devotion, to the Gospel is taking a holistic approach toward living, not just verbal soap-box triage in whatever case may be the crisis of the day. Persistently living in the grace of our Lord, emulating Christ, prepares one for the hiccups and meltdowns of our daily lives. I need to pray, first off, in season and out of season, for the means to survive and ultimately apply the Gospel wisely and with peace. I need to get myself conditioned to that graceful approach to life in general, which is a result of the complete patience of rest in the Gospel, that will provide me the quiet trust in the Lord that he will fix the problem. All I ever succeed in doing, if indeed it can be called success, is control the problem and perhaps prevent collateral damage. Rarely enough do I truly make it even that far.

If I do not cultivate this ministry of patience, where else is it going to surface? The lack is already apparent in my daily life. It’s not something I need to be warned about anymore. I know what I need to do. Now I am about that pursuit. I’m seeking the counsel and prayerfully working to submit to the Word on this matter of patience and endurance. I know it’s pride and self-righteousness and so those must be crushed under foot. Not my foot but that of Christ, laid at the foot of Him Who Saved me and crushed to nothingness, less than dust beneath his holy foot. That’s what I’m praying for, to relieve this self-serving impatience and controlling attitude. I’m praying that it be replaced in full, to overflowing with Godly love, patience and endurance.

I’m unworthy as a father, I have come to consciously realize. I’m unworthy as a husband. I don’t feel any better about this to know that everybody else, every other steak-slinging, football-hurling, dry-shaving hunk-o-flesh out there is unworthy too. Mahaney stresses that we need to be amazed at our calling. We need to learn marvel at God’s patience with us which should put us right where we belong in relationship to our own patience with our families. We need to seek grace to imitate God’s patience only after we have marveled at God’s patience.

“Aren’t you grateful that He does not treat us as our sins deserve?”

And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ. – Philippians 1:6

Here’s what’s next. I have to take confidence in the sovereignty of God here. Ordinary fathers don’t produce extraordinary results. The Lord does this. He works in us daddies and husbands to produce a heart that is filled with love, a spirit drenched in patience and a sharp, wise mind that is filled with the Gospel. That alone is a supernatural act of God: a miracle in and of itself. Fathers neither desire nor deserve this miracle on our own. Just as he gave his son as the sacrifice that atones for sin, so does the Father freely give this to us.

for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure. – Philippians 2:13

Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen – Hebrews 11:1

And he works in our families to bring them to his throne in faith and submission. It is not for an ordinary father to save his children but only to pray and preach and love and pray. It is for the Only Extraordinary Father to do the work of growing and harvesting the crop that resides in my home. And I must be faithful to rest in that comfort. I could not bear the guilt if it were my ultimate responsibility for their rebellion any more than I can take any credit whatsoever for their conversion.

I can only pray like crazy, praise the Lord for his sovereign will in my life and that of my family. I can count our many blessings and live day in, day out shod with the boots of the gospel of peace. And read Romans 12:1-2 every chance I get.

I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

An aside: Bible study at church tonight was about obedience and then the will of God. These were the last two lessons in the Grace To You “Fundamentals of the Faith” study series. I followed the discussion, had good notes, had no trouble with the theology or the practical bits. What came to mind was the short part about obeying in love, serving the Lord from the heart.

I wrote a few thousand words on this in my study of 1st John 2 years ago. Lamentably, I realize that my love and passion for Christ, not to mention my family, fall far short of my desire for wisdom and knowledge. I know the Lord is working in me to desire and love. I know this because I have the great desire to love in me. I sure don’t express or act on it well. I’m working on it.

If I could have the characteristics of any of the great teachers around today, I’d pursue C.J. Mahaney’s. He has a quality that resounds with passion and grace and humility and love. More than the analytical, fiery preaching, cutting wit and winning smiles of many, I would have the publicly self-denying humility of this man, his apparent fervent or heartfelt devotion to the Lord’s work in church and family. I’ve heard a number of his speeches and interviews and he’s… so… alive… in his life. Amazing. That’s God’s grace in a man. So I want him to be my hero. I wouldn’t know what to say to him if I met him. I doubt he’d let me say much of what I think of him now, for he would sniff and dismiss it all, if I understand him from what I’ve heard so far.

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