Wednesday, June 11, 2014

June 12, 2014

"And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man." Luke 2:52

If a man agreed to take on the task of being the earthly father for the Son of God, and if he was successful in accomplishing that task, wouldn't you think you could learn some dad lessons from him?

Let me ask it this way, would you have taken that job?

If you answer "no" then you have something to learn from Joseph.

In the last post we learned that Joseph, like other godly dads in the Bible, knew his role and knew his resources and knew his responsibilities.

Joseph's role was to allow God to raise Jesus through him. How did he do that? He did it by praying to God for guidance and then obeying when he received the answer. 

Praying and obeying sounds like a sound parenting strategy to me. How are you doing on that one, dads?

But not only did Joseph know his role he also very aware of his resources.

In the limited references to Joseph that are found in Scripture it becomes obvious that he was committed to his responsibility to make sure Jesus grew up according to the Jewish religious customs.

On the eighth day Joseph made sure Jesus was circumcised and given the name "Jesus" as the angel had commanded.

We know that Joseph observed all the Jewish religious feasts and holy days.

We know that Jesus was raised in the local synagogue in Nazareth because when He went back there at the beginning of His earthly ministry they knew who He was.

Dads, like Joseph, you are blessed with numerous faith resources that can help you shape your child spiritually. You have good local churches, you have Christian schools, you have Christian radio and Christian TV and Christian books, videos and websites easily available to you.

If Jesus needed to be nurtured in a faith community, how much more do your children need spiritual training within a sympathetic and supportive Christian fellowship?

In 2014, dads have more spiritual resources available for spiritual training of their children than ever before. Why would you neglect your responsibility to train and nurture you child's faith by drawing from all those available resources?

That would be childish....