Confessions of a Church: Absent

The Psalm writer wrote:  Open my eyes, that I may behold Wonderful things from Your law. As we come before a Holy God and hear his word, may we have eyes open to the wonderful and fearful things from his law. May it move us to repent and seek forgiveness, fear disobedience, and live in light of the grace we have received.   This is the word of God.  It is eternally true and applicable for all of life.  

Proverbs 13:1-10 A wise son accepts his father’s discipline, But a scoffer does not listen to rebuke. From the fruit of a man’s mouth he enjoys good, But the desire of the treacherous is violence. The one who guards his mouth preserves his life; The one who opens wide his lips comes to ruin. The soul of the sluggard craves and gets nothing, But the soul of the diligent is made fat. A righteous man hates falsehood, But a wicked man acts disgustingly and shamefully. Righteousness guards the one whose way is blameless, But wickedness subverts the sinner. There is one who pretends to be rich, but has nothing; Another pretends to be poor, but has great wealth. The ransom of a man’s life is his wealth, But the poor hears no rebuke. The light of the righteous rejoices, But the lamp of the wicked goes out. Through insolence comes nothing but strife, But wisdom is with those who receive counsel.

Being a man who must frequently repent of being prideful, believing that the warnings of disobedience we see in scripture must surely be meant for someone else, my first inclination when reading verse 1 of Proverbs 13 was to immediately focus upon the disobedient, stubborn, impenitent son, the scoffer, who would reject the rebuke of his father. How dare he dishonor his father? Secondarily, my thoughts turned to another obvious application: that we ourselves, as sons of God, His children, ought not despise the discipline of the Lord. Jesus asks “Why do you call Me Lord, Lord, and not do the things I command?”. But after a few minutes of mulling over this verse, an application sprung from the text which impacts each and every one of us, and if you are prideful, as am I, you may miss it.

A wise son accepts his father’s discipline, But a scoffer does not listen to rebuke.

The glaring assumption in this verse that we likely pass over because we are very quick to recognize the sins of others, yet are very slow to realize our own, is that a father must discipline and rebuke his son. The principle of “There was no king, so the people did what was right in their own eyes” applies here, in that, as a father whose calling is to rule your home well, it falls squarely upon your shoulders to discipline your sons and daughters from the Word of God. This responsibility cannot fall first to sunday school teachers, daycare workers, public school teachers, the government, or sesame street. The burden of this responsibility falls first upon you fathers.
 
Just yesterday I saw a meme on the always truthful, light-filled, glorious social media platform facebook which stated: 25,000,000 children live in homes with absentee fathers, and most crimes committed in America are committed by people who grew up in single parent homes. Now, it is a fact that anyone can stand here and spew out a long list of statistics to support an argument on any number of positions where crime, delinquency, and fatherlessness are concerned, so I am not going to give you tons of data to sift through. What I will tell you is this: the link between fatherlessness and crime is growing more and more clear. The government, culture, media, feminists, and society at large turn a blind eye to the dangers of fatherless homes, promoting lifestyles which directly destroy families. Generations of children are growing up in homes led by deceived, bitter women, with weak men hanging out in basements content to let mom, her boyfriend, and her girlfriends raise little Johnny, so long as he gets to keep his boat, play x-box on weekends, and can afford season tickets to the local basketball teams home games.

A wise son accepts his father’s discipline. The implication is that you are disciplining your son in the first place. Men, do you often wonder why your sons do not respond as wise sons? Are you left scratching your heads as to why your children can’t seem to do the right thing before God? Maybe a big part of the problem, is you.

You see, being an absent father isn’t simply one who does not live in the same home as his children. It isn’t just the men we see murdering their children at the abortion clinic who are absent from their childrens lives. Absentee fathers aren’t just the men we see walking around like dogs having been whipped by the big mean feminist machine, chewed up and spit out by the #METOO movement.   No. You can be at home 24/7, always physically around, present for the family photos 1x/year, and yet be totally checked out and absent from your child’s life. You can have more children than the Duggar’s, rake in money from your employment which allows all the desires of your family’s collective heart be satisfied, and still be an absent father. You can be the loudest mouthpiece for the patriarchy, and tradition, yet if your days are spent in frivolous pursuits, mindless endeavors, and worldly distractions, to the neglect of disciplining your children, you are essentially an absentee father, who will reap what he has sown: undisciplined children who reject your teachings, have no stomach for your hypocritical rebukes. Children who hate God. You sons will grow up to be unwise, and unwilling to hear a rebuke.

May our Heavenly Father have mercy upon us men who shirk our responsibilities before God in disciplining our sons and daughters. Gentlemen, disciplining your son in not an easy endeavor. It is not for the faint of heart. It is tiring, frustrating, dirty work which demands consistency, repetition, firmness. The discipline of your son demands that you gird up your loins for battle, against the world, the flesh, the devil, the culture, and sometimes your own father, mother, and wife. None of the battling, none of the striving, can be done by the weak arm of flesh, but must instead be waged by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, remembering that His promises are to you and your offspring.

Please kneel as we confess our sin to our Heavenly Father, who disciplines the son whom He loves.
O GOD THE HOLY SPIRIT, That which I know not, teach thou me, Keep me a humble disciple in the school of Christ, learning daily there what I am in myself, a fallen sinful creature, justly deserving everlasting destruction; O let me never lose sight of my need of a Saviour, or forget that apart from him I am nothing, and can do nothing. Open my understanding to know the Holy Scriptures; Reveal to my soul the counsels and works of the blessed Trinity; Instill into my dark mind the saving knowledge of Jesus; Make me acquainted with his covenant undertakings and his perfect fulfillment of them, that by resting on his finished work I may find the Father’s love in the Son, his Father, my Father, and may be brought through thy influence to have fellowship with the Three in One.

O lead me into all truth, thou Spirit of wisdom and revelation, that I may know the things that belong unto my peace, and through thee be made anew. Make practical upon my heart the Father’s love as thou hast revealed it in the Scriptures; Apply to my soul the blood of Christ, effectually,  continually, and help me to believe, with conscience comforted, that it cleanseth from all sin;

Lead me from faith to faith, that I may at all times have freedom to come to a reconciled Father, and may be able to maintain peace with him against doubts, fears, corruptions, temptations. Thy office is to teach me to draw near to Christ with a pure heart, steadfastly persuaded of his love, in the full assurance of faith.  Let me never falter in this way.  Amen
 
Please stand and listen to the comforting assurance of the grace of God, promised in the gospel to all that believe:

Hebrews 4: 14 -16 Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

 To all those who thus repent and seek Jesus Christ for their salvation, your sins are forgiven in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Lift up your hearts!


(From the 02/03/2020 liturgy of Sovereign King Church written by Aaron Sabie.)