Fathers and Kids

Mother's Day sermon next week. This week's sermon theme was determined by the kid's drama group.

Scripture: Matthew 7:7-11

Links to the videos about Dick Hoyt and his son, Rick Hoyt.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDnrLv6z-mM&feature=related. In this video the emphasis is on the son being carried by Dad. Moral of story: God carries us. The magnificence of God for us.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zFVGdZOhlL0. In this video we see more of the pleasure and satisfaction the father receives from participating with his son. Moral of the story. We give great pleasure to God by being his children and participating in his life.

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“What were you thinking?” the prime minister asked. “Surely you realized someone in my position would have access to magical powers. No one could steal my ceremonial cup and get away with it. What were you thinking?”

What could the prisoners say? They had traveled from Palestine to Egypt to buy grain because there was a severe drought in Palestine and food was scarce. After purchasing bags of grain, they had loaded their donkeys and were an hour or two out of the city on their way home when the royal police overtook them and accused them of stealing the prime minister's gold cup. The brothers—there were eleven of them—knew the accusation was false. They also dreaded what was coming next. Something fishy was going on. And they were in the middle of it.

When the royal officer accused them of stealing the prime minister's cup, they protested. “Last time we came,” they said, “the money we paid for our grain ended up back in our bags. We brought that money back with us and gave it to the treasurer and we brought more money to pay for this grain. We have been honorable men. How could you think we would steal your master's cup. Listen, if one of us has taken your cup, you can execute him and sell the rest of us on the slave market.”

“Oh, no, no, no.” The official said. “We'll keep only the one who stole the cup. The rest of you may go on home and take care of your families and your father.” Then the officer searched their bags. Their money was in the top of each bag. And in Benjamin's bag was the cup.

The brothers knew they hadn't taken it. They knew the evidence had been planted. But what was the point of arguing. Obviously the Egyptians were out to get them. The brothers loaded their bags back on their donkeys and headed back into town to face the music.

Now they were standing in the prime minister's palace being interrogated.

There wasn't any use trying to argue their innocence, so they didn't try. Finally, Judah, spoke up. “Sir, allow me to speak with you freely. Don't be angry with me. You are like the king himself.

“When we were here last time, you asked us, 'Do you a father? Do you have another brother?' We answered, 'Yes. We have an aged father and a younger brother who was born to our father in his old age. The boy's brother is dead, and he is the only one of his mother's children still alive. His father loves him very much.'

“Sir, when we were here last time, you told us to bring our younger brother with us the next time we came to buy grain, so you could see him. We told you the young man could not leave his father or his father would die. You said we would not be admitted to your presence unless we brought him.

“Back home we told our father what you said. When, some time later, he told us to come here to Egypt again to buy grain because we are starving in Palestine, we told him, “We cannot go unless our youngest brother goes with us. The man told us plainly that we would not be granted access without our brother.

“Our father responded, “My wife Rachel bore me only two sons. One has already left me. He must have been killed by wild animals. Now, if you take Benjamin from me and something happens to him, the sorrow will kill me. I cannot let him go.

“My father finally relinquished only when we were literally facing death from starvation. Now, if I go back to my father without my brother, as soon as he sees that Benjamin is not with me he will die. His life is bound up with the life of this young man. My father is so feeble that the sorrow would just kill him. In addition, I promised myself as surety for my brother. I told my father that if I did not bring the boy back to him, I would bear the blame all my life.

“So, please sir, allow me to stay here in prison or as your slave instead of my brother. How can I return home to my father if the boy is not with me? I cannot bear to see this disaster come upon my father.”

The prime minister's reaction was bewildering. Without warning he signaled to the court officers to leave the room. As they scurried out in a panic the prime minister hid his face in his robe and began sobbing. Then raising his head, he choked out the words, “I am your brother Joseph. Is my father still alive?”

The brothers stared at each other in disbelief. Joseph? Their dead brother? This was unbelievable. Then it was terrifying. JOSEPH? The brother they had sold into slavery? The brother who had begged and pleaded for mercy before he was handed over to the traders back in Dothan, twenty years earlier?

Joseph saw the terror in their faces. He reassured them. “Don't blame yourselves. It was really God who sent me here to Egypt ahead of you to save people's lives. It was not really you. It was God. Now hurry back to my father and tell him that his son Joseph is ruler over all Egypt. Hurry home and tell my father my story. Then hurry and bring him here.”

When the brothers got back home and told Jacob their story, he nearly went into shock. It was not possible. But when he saw the wagons they had brought back from Egypt to handle the move and after hearing the story several times through, he said, “My son Joseph is alive! This is all I could ask for! I must go and see him before I die.”

Joseph and his brother Benjamin are so genuinely, deeply precious to their father, their death would render life itself worthless to their father. News that Joseph is alive breathes new life and vitality into the old man.

This is a picture of God. He loves us. His desire for life with us is so intense, he would rather die than live without us.

You are valuable. Your struggles are significant to God. He aches when life throws curves at you. He cheers when you struggle back to your feet after some miserable failure or defeat. God takes great pleasure in our achievements and successes. Like any good father would.

In the absence of achievements and success, God takes real pleasure in the fact that you are alive. There is another day. There is a future. There is hope. And God is a stubborn hoper. Like all good fathers. God believes we will triumph, even when we cannot feel it or see it ourselves.

The most frequent metaphor in the Bible for God is Father.

As a son bears his father's image, so we bear the image of our father in heaven. (Genesis 5:3, 1:26; Luke 3:38)

“The Lord is like a father to his children, tender and compassionate to those who fear him.” Ps. 103:13.

“Love your enemies and do good to them . . . then you will be sons of the Most High God. For he is good to the ungrateful and the wicked. Be merciful just as your Father is merciful.” Luke 6:35-36.

“Would any of you who are fathers give your son a stone when he asks for bread? Or would you give him a snake when he asks for a fish? As bad as you are, you know how to give good things to your children. How much more, then will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask him!” Matthew 7:9-11

For some of us the metaphor is natural and easy. Our father is or was gentle, compassionate, courteous, strong, resourceful. So it is easy to imagine God being like that. For others of us, our own fathers were not good men. For some, reclaiming the word “father” requires a major work of re-imagination. The Bible does not picture God as just any father, certainly necessarily as “my dad.” Rather, God is the best Father, the sum of all the very best attributes of the very best fathers in the world.

Use your imagination. Picture the very best father in the world. God is like that, only better.

Jacob's words: “My son Joseph is alive. This is all I could ask for.” tell us something about God. God looks at you and says, “You are alive. I am thrilled.”

There is more to this metaphor.

We are called to be Fathers. Like God. Just as every good father dreams of his sons and daughters becoming strong, capable partners, so God envisions us as strong, capable partners.

In the Adventist Church we have given considerable emphasis to education and healthy living. We strongly encourage our young people to pursue an education. Get all the education you can. Do well in school. Do not settle for “C's” if you can get “A's.” God values intellectual prowess and so do we. We join God in desiring that our young people become wise, knowledgeable, fit, good human beings. We unabashedly promote their development.

As a church we strongly encourage people to exercise, to eat wisely, to floss, to drink more water and less colored beverages. Why? Because God wants us to be strong. He has jobs for us to do, ministries to perform, ministries that call for physical strength and stamina. God has little people who need the strength of big people. And God wants us to be those Big People.

(I would say to you who are no longer “young people,” the most powerful way to promote the development of our young people is to tend to our own development. Take care of your health. Cultivate your mind. Feed your spirit.)

God is our Father. We are his children. That offers powerful reassurance that God is deeply involved with us. It also offers a powerful call to honor our Father by cultivating strength and wisdom and courage and goodness. Bask in God's love. Aim to make him proud.