2. Loving fathers

In a family that is built on the pattern of a loving Heavenly Father — with loving communication as a priority principle — the role of the husband is incredibly lofty and an exceptionally high calling.

Mothers are typically understood to have a loving disposition, but Paul in Ephesians 5 explains a great secret — that the husband is to lead his wife in love in the same way that Christ loved the ecclesia (Eph 5:25). He is, as it were, Christ to his wife. Think about the ramifications of this for a moment. Just as the ecclesia reflects the light of the knowledge of the glory of God (2 Cor 4:6) as a reflection of Christ, it should also be a living example of walking in love in response to Christ’s love (Eph 5:2). In the same way, the wife is to reflect the godly qualities of the Truth that are found in her husband and so respond to his love. This means that the husband needs to not only express love but also become the motivation of love within his family.

Are we living up to that ideal? Are we, as fathers, providing the love and light of God in our homes? Or do the children see their mother as their primary source of love, with Dad hanging around the periphery?

This is the challenging role for husbands: that in the same way as Christ loved his bride and gave himself for her, so must we first sacrifice ourselves for our wives, and elicit their willing responses in return. In this way, each is looked after by the other.

There is a saying that “two halves don’t make a marriage — two wholes do”, and it is instructive that the role of the wife is not to sacrifice herself for her husband, but to respond to her husband’s sacrifice for her.

This may take some thinking and need some readjustments of our relationships, but such is the high calling of the Scriptures. God is “willing to do more than we ask or think” (Eph 3:20), and one of the ways He enables us to demonstrate our potential is through stretching our capabilities if we willingly follow our Lord’s example.

But the challenge for fathers does not end there. As a reflection of the Lord Jesus Christ to our family, and as the source of love and as the example of our Heavenly Father, how well do fathers follow the Lord’s example? My impression is that most fathers would willingly offer their own lives to save their wife in a one-off sacrifice, such as in a “women and children first” situation. I hope and pray we are never put in such an extreme situation, but the issue as godly fathers is not about how we would perform if we needed to die for our family. That’s not what following Christ’s example is really about. Being like Christ is not a one-off supreme sacrifice for our family; it’s sacrificing ourselves each day and being like the Lord Jesus Christ consistently.

As the type of Christ in the relationship, how are we at washing the feet of our family? Do we nurture and encourage our family as Christ did? Do we calm their storms of emotional turmoil — or are we sometimes the source of waves or clouds of anger? Do we pray “all night” for our families (Luke 6:12)? Do we spiritually feed our family, teach our family, and point out lessons from nature to our family (as in the parable of the sower), and encourage the growth and development of our family as we see that Christ did? And we need to be a forgiving spirit in our family as its source of light and love.

Fathers are also singled out specifically a couple of times in Scripture with the charge not to frustrate their children (Eph 6:4, Col 3:21). I think that fathers are singled out because we can potentially discourage our children by being too unyielding — or even, at times, too hypocritical — having higher expectations of others than we do of ourselves. I also take from the fact that Paul warns fathers twice that fatherhood is likely to be a challenge.

From these passages, there were two potential failings that I was most conscious of as a loving father.

The first was always having to be seen as “right” and, therefore, lacking the humility to apologise. Our Heavenly Father is unique as a father in that He is perfect and does not make mistakes. But, as loving fathers, when we obviously fail, perhaps by losing our temper while driving, or by misjudging a situation and rebuking a child too harshly we will gain more respect from our children if we apologise. Being fathers who are genuine and who admit mistakes makes us open and vulnerable to our children in a positive way and will create a genuine loving relationship, with no danger of being the kind of father warned of by Paul.

The second potential failing that I was conscious of as a father from Paul’s warnings was neglecting to empathise with my children and enter into their excitement. In my experience, mothers seem to resonate more with the children; dads can easily “razz” them up, but we can also be easily annoyed by them and fail to match them emotionally, which can lead to repeated failures from their perspective when they try to share something with us. This potentially gives rise to frustrations in our children, who then, in the end, might angrily write us off, and not try to share anything with us in future.

As an illustration of what I mean, maybe the children have found a bird’s nest that fell out of a tree in autumn. They come running inside to share it with us — but we fail to see the excitement on their faces or hear it in their voices, and what we see is sticks and twigs falling onto the carpet and perhaps mites jumping off it too! And so we raise our voice and tell them to “get it back outside this instant” — and immediately we have completely ruined the chance to resonate with our children emotionally and share in their obvious excitement at finding something so special that they wanted to share it with Dad.

Instead of creating frustration through missed opportunities to relate on their level, we have to learn to see events through their eyes and learn to hear and engage in a positive way with their excitement.

In this example about the nest, a better response might be to say, “Let’s find a box or container for it first”; and then, when you have contained the mess, you can examine it together in a positive way, perhaps talking about how the birds made this nest so neatly and wove all the grass and twigs together to make a nice home for starting a family. Together, you can marvel at God’s handiwork in creating these creatures, and so share and resonate with your children’s joy and enthusiasm.

Another important part of being resonant and understanding is to recognise when your children are not excited, but are upset. Just being held by your father can be comforting, so, as fathers, we need to recognise and respond appropriately to these moments, too.

Being open and vulnerable — by apologising when we fail to be a good example to our children, and resonating with them emotionally when they are younger — develops trust within your family, which as your children grow older can form the basis for a positive and supportive family environment. The angry and frustrated teenagers that Paul potentially warns fathers about in Ephesians and Colossians doesn’t have to be the end result in our families. Anger and frustration are how society understands teenagers to behave, but Paul tells us that these are the default responses of children who have been failed by their fathers — and we can potentially prevent this.

As fathers, we are leaders; and as much as Paul warns us of the potential for harm in our relationships with our children, there is obviously also just as much potential for good.

The final thing I will point out is our tendency, as males, to single-mindedly focus on any one particular thing that needs to be done. It is a God-given attribute that allows us to tackle, process, and find solutions for large problems. However, when we wake up on Saturday morning, we need to be conscious that no matter what we think is the priority that must get done, loving our wife comes first at all times, and training our children comes second. Whatever we see as a priority at that moment comes a distant third. So, we must refrain from yelling at the kids for ‘being in the way’; instead, we need to find ways to involve and encourage them — perhaps they can pass the tools, or hold the spring clamps for us. Yes, the job takes longer, but you are actually doing multiple jobs at once — including the greater job of being a godly father and not frustrating or upsetting your children by yelling at them for simply being there. Yes, there are occasions when the best “help” the children can be is to play quietly somewhere else, but this should be the exception rather than the rule.

Let us, as loving fathers, strive to use our leadership role and responsibility as a positive motivator for love in our families — first, by loving the wife our God has blessed us with, by following our Lord’s example of sacrifice, and second, by extending ourselves to encourage, resonate with, and develop trust within our children.

 

The first article in this series on Family Life: Family foundations

This article was previously published in The Lampstand magazine.