Dads MIA

By: American Decency Staff

June is often dedicated to graduations, marriages, open houses, and some early vacations; however, there’s another special day in June. Father’s Day: a day to honor our dads by giving thanks to God for them and by showing them how much we appreciate them.

As we look around us we may well notice that there are many dads who are missing in action.  I certainly am not making light of those valiant men who have gone off to war and have died; there’s a spiritual war that has claimed the lives of countless males and Satan has either made them prisoners of war or has gotten them to buy the lie and they are just missing in action.  It’s a painful reality.  Look around you.  If men were busy being real dads and fighting the fight for their families, if they were standing strong having done all to stand, we wouldn’t see places like Baltimore go up in flames and fury.  Racism and race-baiting wouldn’t be tolerated and those who promote it wouldn’t have the grasp on our sons and daughters that it has.  Homosexuality wouldn’t be in the hands of the Supreme Court and it wouldn’t be invading “the church,” our culture, or our communities.  Teenagers would be respectful instead of promiscuous, helping at home instead of running the streets, and brought up in the fear and admonition of God instead of buying the lie that there is no God.  By this we can see that even in the church we have dads who are MIA and POWs.

Even if a dad is home but not spending time with his children he is MIA.  If he’s not training them as he ought, he’s MIA. If he’s so caught up in work, pornography, alcohol, or some other vice, if he’s so self-absorbed that his family comes second only to him, he’s a POW in his own self-made prison. Vice by vice he’s laid down brick by brick a cell of his own choosing.  Choice by choice he’s forged the chains of his own bondage.  If he’s taken his keys of freedom and given them to the government or some peddler of filth and corruption, he’s chosen his own jailer but it’s a jail, a cell, and a chain, just the same.

Because we have spiritually POW and MIA dads we find daughters “looking for love in all the wrong places” and sons looking for someone else to fill that leadership role.  They turn to gangs, Islam, or just prowl the streets looking for something to do.  Evil is often allowed to fill the vacuum that is left by a father who does not lead in holiness.  We need dads who will raise up their children and encourage their grandchildren to stand strong!

Don’t get discouraged; please keep reading on.  I’m not looking for Mayberry but I’m tired of this Mayhem!  I’m not looking for the “good-ole-days” because I hear they weren’t so good.  What I am looking for are men who truly desire to train up their children in godliness, men who are willing to pass the torch of true freedom and liberty on to their children by raising them up in the nurture of Jesus.  We need dads who will—in this dark day—shine the Light of the world (Jesus, the Christ) into their homes and into the lives of their children that God has blessed them with. 

Voddie Baucham states it best when addressing parents: “If parents have raised their children to be great doctors, lawyers, athletes, or musicians, but have not trained their children to honor them and obey God, they have failed!” Dads, your God-given responsibility is to train your children in godliness, to teach them about the Holy God Who created them, and created them for His own good pleasure.  Your real job is to train them in holiness and righteousness, to raise them to love the one true God with all their heart, all of their mind, all their soul, and all their strength.  If you won’t do this then you are MIA or a POW; the world will take them, train them to hate their Creator, and lead them to an eternal hell.  They may grow up to be “respectable” but God is no respecter of persons; without the love of Jesus shining in their lives, hell will still be their eternal home.

Paul had one goal in mind, to win Christ.  After he listed off all his earthly blessings and “church” standings, his civility and greatness, he said it was worth less than a pile of manure to him in the light of Jesus.  Give me Jesus or give me nothing!  “Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ,” (Philippians 3:8)

We will never be perfect dads but we have a heavenly Father who IS perfect and holy.  He gives power and strength for us to raise our children as soldiers of and for Christ. He is a gracious and loving God.  I thank Him for giving me a Dad who loved me and did what he could to train me in holy living.  I thank God for my Dad.

Press on in living faithful and training your children in the fear and admonition of the Lord!

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