The idea of a father is less then a noble role in America today.  In fact, it is a name met with contention in many peoples lives.  When Mothers day is celebrated Churches attendance increases, dinner at Mom’s and gifts exchanged.  Probably the easiest day for our local crime fighters.

Fathers day takes on a little different outlook, low church attendance, DWI enforcement increased (Minnesota Highway Patrol warnings) and regarding gifts, not a major budget breaker. Hollywood comedy has also added to the reluctance of being a father:

All in the Family
Married with Children
The Simpsons
American Dad
Everybody Loves Raymond

Basically fathers are the center of mockery in our nation and in the defense of the writers rightly so in many circumstances.  The reality is that we as men have let this humor become the image of fathering, or the image of fathering has become our humor. Either way we are facing a pandemic.  In the United States, we are approaching the reality that 50% of the nations children will be fatherless.

I cannot think of any need in childhood as strong as the need for a father’s protection – Sigmund Freud

Hollywood may have mocked fathers, they are also leading the way with a subtle cry for real fathers to arise. This can be seen in the underlying problem within the storyline of movies for decades, the need for a father:

Batman Begins
Gladiator
Field of Dreams
Good Will Hunting
Million Dollar Baby
Slum Dog Millionaire
Kingdom of Heaven
Cinderella
Recentley Robin Hood and Thor

The results of this fatherless generation are staggering. Children from fatherless homes account for:

• 63% of youth suicides.
• 90% of all homeless and runaway children
• 85% of all youths in prison
• 71% of pregnant teens
• 70% of all juvenile in institutions
• 85% of rapists
• 85% of behavior disorders
• 75% of chemical abusers

“A community that allows large numbers of young men to grow up in broken families dominated by women, never acquiring any stable relationship ship with male authority, never acquiring any expectations about the future- that community asks for and gets chaos.” 1965 Senator Patrick Moynihan

Since that day the number of fatherless children has more than doubled. In the last decade, Conservative estimates have American taxpayers spending 112 billion dollars annually on fatherlessness and single parent homes. More legislation, more demands for justice, more pressure will not change these statistics.  There is only one thing that will change this problem.  It was written over 2000 years ago by the prophet Malachi foreseeing this epidemic:

Malachi 4:5-6 – Behold, I will send you Elijah the Prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. And He will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the earth with a curse.

We can see God’s heart in this matter.  Many will become angry here since we ultimately blame Him (God) for this mess, yet He was trying to offer the solution. How we view our natural father relationship is how we view God.  It is time to allow HIS real identity to be revealed.  It is our relationship with Him as our Father in honor and trust that we change this cycle.  Ultimately we take on the identity and role of our father.

A father of the fatherless, a defender of widows, is God in His holy habitation.  God sets the solitary in families; He brings out those who are bound into prosperity;” Psalm 68:5-6a (This is God’s desire)

How do we swing this pendulum?  We begin by engaging God into this father/child relationship.  When we begin to experience Him standing behind us when we venture into the unknown, encouraging us to move forward unashamed when failure has shattered our dreams and listening to His words, “you are my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased,” in spite of your performance.  We will begin looking at our children and others around us from a new light.

Jesus closed His walk on earth with this prayer from John 17: 22-23, “And the glory which You gave me I have given them, that they may be one just as We are one; I in them, and You in Me; that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved me.” vs. 25-26 “O Righteous Father! The world has not known You, but I have known You; and these have known that you sent me.  And I have declared it, that the love with which You loved Me may be in them, and I in them.”  This is our hope, now let’s engage.

It is time to make fathering famous!