Daddy

God is our Heavenly Father. He provides for us (Matthew 6:25-34), forgives us (Matthew 6:14), disciplines us (Hebrews 12:6), Loves us (1 John 3:1), and so much more.

A recent article from Focus on the Family reminded me of an important truth. A person's earthly father colors their perception of the Heavenly Father. This gives me two important things to consider, both as a father and as a son.

As a son, I need to see how my opinion of my earthly father affects my thoughts about my Heavenly Father. It is so difficult to break free from human perceptions. God is spirit, so we cannot see Him with our human eyes. We can feel Him, we can see His work, but we cannot actually see Him. At least not on this side of Heaven.

The clues about who God is are written into the fabric of the Universe. But these are only clues. They do not (and cannot) tell us everything about God. These are hints, provided on the level that we can understand.

God was gracious to provide the perfect man to be my father. Obviously, he is not perfect in every way. But he is perfect for me. While I cannot find a single thing about my Dad to complain about, I have to realize that God is way more than simply a magnification of my father. If I see God simply through the view of what my earthly father is, then I will miss out on important aspects of His character. Even worse, I might take my Dad's flaws and ascribe them to God.

I have to be diligent to take the clues about God's character that I see in my Dad, and stack them up against Scripture. Hold them in the light of my own experience, and the relationship that I am building with God.

And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, "Abba! Father!" So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God.
-- Galatians 4:6-7

As a father, I need to be keenly aware that I am perhaps the biggest clue my kids will have to God's nature. I have to be diligent to be the best example of God that I can be. This is a responsibility that is way more than I could handle on my own. Thankfully, God's power is made perfect in our weakness.

I would love to go on about this, but this post is already getting too long. The insanely important depths of fatherhood will have to wait for another post.

Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.
-- Ephesians 6:4

Waiting

A dear friend of mine, Rodney, recently wrote a note of encouragement to me.

I heard someone the other day speaking on Isaiah 40:31.

But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.

They spoke about what WAIT means in this verse. Does it mean to just sit back and wait like you are in big waiting room? Does it means to be anxious like waiting for a Baby? The NIV uses the word HOPE. The speaker put emphasis UPON in the King James. He got the image of a servant.

That gave me an idea. We don't use the term waiter any more do we? They are servers. Perhaps this gives a clue to what it means to wait. Waiting is not passive. Waiting is active. Waiting does something FOR God during the course of the wait. We serve God. We go about his business while we wait. We don't sit back until something happens. We don't become anxious about what is not happening. We keep doing one of the most important things that Christians do. We serve God.

Have a great evening!

In Christ,
Rodney

My evening will indeed by good. Thanks for the encouragement.

Life and death - Scripture says it best

For if we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord. So then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s.
-- Romans 14:8

Time Budget

Like it or not, I've been listening to a lot of Dave Ramsey lately. The motivator for this is the hospital bills that have been rolling in since the baby was born in April. My out of pocket is getting close to $2k - I wonder what people without insurance do? But I digress.

The Ramsey plan is straightforward: change your behavior. Pay off your debts, build up an emergency fund, pay off the mortgage, start storing up money for... Well, he doesn't spend a lot of time talking about what you want all of that money for. I guess for most people it's obvious.

He has a tremendous focus on getting out of debt. The Truth is, the borrower is the slave of the lender.

I realized over the past few weeks that my debts are not strictly financial. My biggest debts are temporal. Whenever I promise to do something, I'm spending time that I have not yet received. A time debt. What a thought.

In the same way that you cannot live off more than you make, you only get so many seconds in a day. By promising them out, even promising them to good and noble efforts, I am squeezing what precious little time I have with my Savior. And with my family. And that's the time that truly matters.

God, help me to spend my time wisely. Especially the time I have yet to receive.

This isn't the first time I've written about time management. It surely won't be the last. Spending my time wisely is one of the biggest struggles that I face.