Fathers, protect your daughters and train your sons-in-law

This is an excerpt from my sermon of 3/21/10. You can read or listen to the entire sermon at

http://www.familylifebc.com/media/launch.php?mid=2E79W1PY4I4PS81Q59T3S13K

Ephesians 6:4:
4 And you, fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord.

And young men count on older men to be leaders. A father that lived in southern California had a daughter who was his pride and joy. She developed into a beautiful young woman that attracted the attention of a young man that seemed to be an upstanding fellow. After the young man graduated from high school, he got a job and began going to community college while courting the young lady. After a couple of years of working and going to school, the young man moved out of his parent’s home and rented an apartment. He invited his girlfriend to move in with him, and she came home to tell her Dad.

At first, Dad was uncertain as to what to do. He liked the young fellow, and he didn’t want to alienate his daughter, but he knew that that which the young man proposed was wrong. His problem was that that which the young people wanted to do was also common, and Dad was not sure as to how his daughter and the young man would receive his disapproval.

He consulted his pastor, who agreed that the young people were only proposing that which was common for the times, but admonished the father that if he wanted them to think differently, he would have to communicate his disapproval to them in the strongest possible terms.

So the father called the young man and invited him over for dinner. Dad instructed his daughter to send the young man out back to his shed when he arrived. When the young man came over, Dad was sitting in his shed overlooking the canyon behind his southern California home, cleaning his shotgun. As the young man approached, the father waved him over and invited him to sit down. “Young man”, the father began, “I used to have respect for you. You seemed like a nice, upstanding young man. But now, I understand that you want to make my daughter into an unpaid whore.”

The young man’s eyes got wide, and he was speechless for a moment. He began to stammer, but the father cut him off. “No, son”, the father said, “I’ll talk. You listen. If you had come to me with an honorable proposal of marriage for my daughter, I would probably have been favorably disposed to listen, but this shacking up business has lost you my respect. I just want you to know that I own this canyon back here, and, as you can see, I also own a gun. Now, I’m not generally a violent fellow, but there is no telling the amount of anger that I will feel if you treat my daughter disgracefully, and I’m not sure what I might do if I lose my temper. It will take them a long time to find someone back here.”

As the father glared at the young man, the young man regained his equilibrium enough to speak. “Sir”, he replied, “I meant no disrespect to you or your daughter. I like her a lot, and a lot of guys live with their girlfriends. I just thought…”

And the father cut him off. “I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt”, he said, “because maybe you didn’t know. But I’m telling you, there will be no shacking up with my daughter without consequences. Are we clear?”

“Yes, sir” said the young man.

“Now, we are going back in the house and have a nice dinner”, said Dad, “but I don’t want to hear any more of this shacking up talk ever again. When you reach the point that you are ready to propose marriage, come and see me, but just remember; whatever you do to my daughter, I’m going to do the same thing to you. Do you understand?”

“Yes, sir”, said the young man.

Needless to say, the two of them never shacked up, and are now engaged to be married.

Young men need older men to teach them the ways of the world and to keep them in check, which is why fathers ought not provoke their sons to wrath by treating them badly, but ought also to let them know when they have crossed the line in no uncertain terms. Sons reach a point in which they have to pull away from their mothers to become men, and they need an alpha male, meaning a male that is clearly and primarily in charge, to take over their training. Boys without fathers also need an alpha male, which is why it is good that so many of them are on athletic teams, or become Eagle scouts. Of course, in the worst case scenario, the young men find their alpha male in a gang and end up in prison, which is also staffed by alpha males who instruct young man as to what to do. And a lot of big boys turn into men after a stretch in the joint.

But all males need someone who is alpha to guide them. Even Jesus Christ needed an alpha male when He considered the Cross. In the garden of Gethsemane, Jesus appealed to the His Father for a pardon from the sacrifice, but God gave Jesus His marching orders. Jesus responded in Matthew 26:42:
42 Again, a second time, [Jesus] went away and prayed, saying, “O My Father, if this cup cannot pass away from Me unless I drink it, Your will be done.”

And Jesus did what His Father instructed Him to do and went to the Cross. He suffered, bled and died, on the instruction of His Father, that our sins might be forgiven and that we might have a right to the tree of eternal life that Adam rejected in the Garden of Eden. John 3:16-17 tells us:
16 For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
17 For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.

Just as the fellow in California laid out the path for the young man, and God laid out the path for Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ lays out the path for us. We can be saved by believing in the teaching of Jesus Christ and following His instructions, and there is a consequence for those that reject the word of the Son and the Father’s wisdom. So let us reject the wisdom of the world, listen to the wisdom of God, and follow the path laid out for us by the Lord Jesus Christ.

Alpha Male, Biblical instruction, Commonality, Love, Marriage, Out-of-Wedlock Sex, Parental Supervision, Sexual Sin