Preached in Markham Baptist Church, June 18, 2006

THE GIFT OF A FATHER'S FAITH

As I read through the Scriptures I have been struck by the fact that one of the greatest gifts we can give to our children is our faith in God. To be sure there are many wonderful gifts that we can give to our children. We can give them our encouragement, a healthy sense of self-worth, the ability to discern right from wrong, a good education, a healthy environment in which to live, the ability to differentiate a geranium from a marigold, and even the ability to tell the difference between a John Deere from a Kubota tractor!

All of these are good gifts but Scripture makes it clear that one of the greatest gifts I can give to my children is my faith in God.

Now of course we evangelicals like to say that there are no grandchildren in the Kingdom of God – meaning that everyone must make their own decision for or against Christ. And that is true. Just because your parents are Christian does not make you a Christian. It is one of those myths that is widely accepted by our culture today. But it is a lie. I know, I have believing parents but that did not make me a Christian, any more than hanging around Ed makes me South African.

You may inherit your father’s nose, your mother’s ears and your grandfather’s double chin but you cannot inherit your parents faith. You may be influenced by your parent’s faith so that you have good morals and can answer all the questions in Sunday School, but faith is something which you must make your own. You cannot inherit faith from your parents.

I’m not suggesting that we can give faith to our children.

What I am saying is that one of the greatest gifts we can give to our children is our faith in God. I don’t give them a faith in God, but it seems to me that as I have a living faith in God there is spillage. The Psalmist said, “The Lord is my Shepherd, … You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies, you anoint my head with oil, my cup overflows.” Spillage. It appears that as I place my faith in God and live for Him, not only am I blessed but also my children are blessed and everyone else around me for that matter, but especially my children.

This idea is supported in such passages as Psalm 25:12 and 13: “Who, then, is the man that fears the Lord? He will instruct him in the way chosen for him. He will spend his days in prosperity, and his descendants will inherit the land.”

Or consider Psalm 112:1,2: “Praise the Lord. Blessed is the man who fears the Lord, who finds great delight in his commands. His children will be mighty in the land; the generation of the upright will be blessed.”

Proverbs 20:7 - “The righteous man leads a blameless life; blessed are his children after him.”

Or think of those last verses in our text, Abraham displays a great faith and what is the promise he receives from God? Is it for himself alone? No it is for his children and their children and so on – we read in verse 16: “I swear by myself, declares the Lord, that because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore. Your descendants will take possession of the cities of their enemies, and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me.”

To be sure we cannot press the principle too far. Each generation has to renew the covenant promises with God – Isaac and Jacob – each of them had to make those covenant promises their own. But the fact still remains that one of the greatest gifts we can give to our children is our faith in God for as God blesses us – our children are blessed - there is spillage.

Have you ever thought that part of the reason we are experiencing blessing in this life is a result of our relationship with God? Yes, but it also is a result of the faithfulness of those who have gone on before us. We know it to be true - we live in Canada and the freedoms we enjoy and the privileges and social service institutions that are ours are directly connected to the Christian beliefs of the founders of this land. Because of their faith we are blessed.

Then, have you ever thought that the blessings that your children enjoy and will enjoy tomorrow is directly connected to your faith in God today?

We live in a day when children are again seen as blessings to celebrate rather than burdens to endure. Gone are the days when children are supposed to be seen but not heard. We live in a culture where children are cherished and parents seek the best for them, so we are out every night making sure they get to their soccer games, and hockey games, and band concerts and ballet recitals and gymnastic lessons, and judo competitions and music lessons – our motto is nothing is too good for our children. That’s a good sentiment. But we must understand that the greatest gift we can give to our children is a living faith in God.

Verse 17 and 18: “God said to Abraham your descendants will take possession of the cities of their enemies and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed – why? Because you have obeyed me.”

The greatest gift we can give to our children is our faith in God.

Let’s think of this story that is before us. We are told at verse one that God is out to test Abraham. We read negative thoughts into that word test. We may think of trickery or temptation. But that isn’t the nature of God and that isn’t the meaning here. Tests have another purpose and that is to strengthen us. A number of you in high school are going through exams, and do you know that exams are good for you? Exams are a good thing! No. really! They are meant to strengthen your learning, they are meant to solidify all the good stuff that you have learned this past year. A test is a means of strengthening. And so here, God is seeking to strengthen Abraham’s faith. And so as a test God asks Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac.

Now just a bit of history here. You need to know that God called Abraham out of his homeland, of Ur of the Chaldees and from that time God promised to make Abraham into a great nation. God repeated the promise and enlarged the promise many times but in all these years, from Abraham’s early seventies to when he was ninety-nine years old Abraham has had only one son – Ishmael through one of his Egyptian servant’s Hagar. So Ishmael would not be part of the covenant promise. So here is Abraham he possesses the promise of God but he does not yet see the reality.

In fact, instead of Abraham’s family growing it is shrinking. His father dies, his nephew Lot abandons him, and he and his wife Sarah are well past child bearing years – being 99 years old and all. But Abraham believed God and he and Sarah give birth to Isaac. Abraham loves Isaac but even more all his spiritual hopes were centred on this one child. Here was the one who would fulfill the covenant (Genesis 17:19). And now God was asking him to sacrifice him!

So what is the quality of Abraham’s faith? What is the quality of faith that he has that blesses his children? What is the quality of faith that you and I are to have that our children may be blessed?

First, it is a faith that does not avoid stressful testing. I hate stressful testing. Anyone here like stressful testing? Anyone here like adversity? Don’t we all pray, “Lord may I be successful at work, my physical health strong, and may all my relationships be in agreement with my ideas and my point of view. Amen. And P.S. - could you please remove the speed bumps from Larkin Avenue?” And so we seek to avoid stressful testing. We go out of our way to avoid difficult people, hard situations, and speed bumps on Larkin Avenue.

But maybe we’ve got the wrong idea about adversity. Maybe we need to start looking at adversity as a test – a means through which our faith in God is strengthened and we are able to move forward in spiritual maturity.

Charles Stanley says that he is an achievement-oriented person. He likes to see projects started and completed. He enjoys setting goals and accomplishing them. Nothing is more frustrating to him than getting sick. What a waste of time he says. First, I become angry. “Lord, do you know all that is going on? Do you know all the work that needs to be done.” Then he gets spiritual, “If I don’t get well quick what is going to happen to the ministry?”

And then Stanley says that he finally realized that God cannot be bribed or manipulated. And so when he gets sick he asks a different set of questions - “Lord what are you saying to me? What do you want me to learn? What about my lifestyle needs to be changed or eliminated?”

And he says that it is those questions that he should be asking all the time, but never does until he is flat on his back sick. And during those times of sickness, Stanley says, God has taught me some amazing things so that when I return to the pulpit I am is full of insight and enthusiasm.

He concludes, “This has happened so many times now that my congregation gets excited when I get sick!”¹

Now, the adversity you face is probably far more serious than a head cold or a bout of flu. But the truth is God wants to use the adversity that you are facing or have faced to enable you to grow spiritually. So God’s Word says to us in the book of James, (1:2,3) “Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.”

Consider it pure joy when you face trials of many kinds?? Why?? Because it is a means of spiritual growth, in which your relationship with God is deepened, and your faith is strengthened.

Think what a great gift that would be to your children if when you go through difficulties they see you as one who has your eyes firmly fixed on God who is able to work all things for the good of those who love Him(Romans 8:28). Imagine what a great gift of peace you would give to your home if you came home from the stresses of work and were able to say, “God is at work here. I know the time is stressful, I know the time is difficult, but God is at work.” That’s not painting over life with rose-coloured glasses - that’s looking at the stresses and strains of life and acknowledging that they are difficult and hard and heartbreaking but it is also recognizing that we worship a God who is bigger than our problems, stronger than our stresses and who has overcome this world.

That’s a faith that blesses others with peace, with confidence and yes, even joy in the midst of pain and difficulty. That’s a faith that enables kids to see God with skin on – when mom and dad pray about financial difficulties instead of panicking. When Mom and Dad trust God in the midst of sorrow and heartbreak to bring healing and MEANING to light instead of being crushed.

That’s what the verse in 2 Corinthians means: “We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed.”

Second, a faith that blesses our children is an active faith. Notice what Abraham does after he hears God’s request in verse 3. “Early next morning Abraham got up and saddled his donkey. He took with him two of his servants and his son Isaac. When he had cut enough wood for the burnt offering, he set out for the place God had told him about.”

Notice the verbs in this verse, Abraham got up, saddled, took, cut, and set out. All of that happened early the next morning. There is no dithering, no hesitation. There is no quibbling, no bargaining, no deliberation. No committee meeting, no motion, no seconder, no majority vote. No discussion as to whether it was reasonable or if it had been done that way before - just action. The Spirit of God told him to do something and he went and did it. He went and did what he was asked to do.

Your kids probably hear the words compassion and love around your house. But I can tell you that they will never learn what those words really mean until they see you scour the house for toys and clothes that you can give to a family who is in the midst of a crisis. They will never learn what that word worship means until they see you rise early on Sunday and Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday or any other day of the week with an attitude of wanting to praise God and put His priorities first in your life. They will never see what true faith is until they see you display it in action.

And think of the blessing that is to your children when they see your faith in action. They see that God is real, that He really is worth something to you and that His direction and His word really do matter.

The third kind of faith that blesses is a faith that believes that God is faithful. When you think of what Abraham has been asked to do, it really does sound crazy. Think of how it sounded to Abraham! We aren’t told of the agony he went through as he saddled his donkey, split the wood and then set out for the place that God had told him about – but you can be sure he was going through agony. Not only was there concern for his son Isaac, but there was his relationship with God.

God had told him, promised him, that Isaac was the son through whom the covenant would be carried on and yet now God was commanding him to offer Isaac as a sacrifice. So Abraham is thinking – God is so erratic. Crazy even. He shouldn’t be in heaven, He should be in the looney bin. “I mean he wavers from one plan to another, at one point telling me that Isaac is the one and then the next moment he tells me to kill him.”

But then Abraham thinks some more of his experience of God and says to himself, “No, God isn’t erratic. I know that his plans are consistent and true. If that’s the case then God must know what he’s doing. And I will trust that even in this God knows what he is doing.”

We are not told the process of Abraham’s thinking, but we are told of where Abraham arrives in his thinking. Look at verse 5. Having arrived at the place where God told him to go – Abraham tells his two servants, “Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there. We will worship and then we will come back to you.”

Do you see that? It’s not, We will worship and then I will come back to you. But WE will come back to you.

That tells you a lot about Abraham’s faith. It is a faith that believes God is faithful. He didn’t know how it was going to be done, but he believed that if he followed the commands of God the promises of God would he fulfilled. There was a deep faith in the faithfulness of God.

We are told in another part of God’s Word what Abraham was indeed thinking. Look at Hebrews 11:17 – “By faith Abraham, when God tested him, offered Isaac as a sacrifice. He who had received the promises was about to sacrifice his one and only son, even though God had said to him, ‘It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.’ Abraham reasoned that God could raise the dead, and figuratively speaking, he did receive Isaac back from death.”

The Word of God tells us what Abraham is thinking – he is thinking that even if he does kill Isaac, God will perform a miracle and raise him from the dead because God is faithful to His promises.

I talked about this a bit last week, but friends, as people of the faith let us not doubt God’s promises. God is faithful to His promises. That’s why the church can dare. It has nothing to do with personalities, or good preaching or a wonderful youth program, or a healthy financial picture or a great music program, or anything else. The church can dare, not because of who we are, but because of who God is. He is faithful to His promises. Read the book of Joshua. “Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.” (Joshua 1:9).

And what a great blessing that kind of faith is to your children. As they see you as a parent put your trust in God instead of your finances, or your skills or anything else to meet life’s demands they see that God is trustworthy, that they can trust in Him – that they need not lean on their own understanding, instead acknowledge Him in all their ways, and they will see that God will lead them in all their ways.

Well, I must finish. There is one more quality of Abraham’s faith that I want to mention and that is – that it is an obedient faith. Abraham did what he was asked to do. He did it right away and he did it obediently. He cut the wood, he bound the boy and he took the knife – he obeyed.

This is the heart of all true faith. This is why God demands obedience. It’s not because he’s a God who wags his finger and says you have to live this way, it is because obedience is a sign of our faith. Of course going to worship every Sunday morning doesn’t make you a Christian but it’s a pretty good indication of where your heart is. Giving to financially to God’s church will not win your way into heaven but it’s pretty good indication of where your priorities lay – it’s a sign of your faith.

So Abraham’s faith is so beautiful, so filled with blessing for his children, because it was a faith that was demonstrated through obedience.

We evangelicals sometimes are guilty of oversimplifying the gospel. We tell people say this little prayer, say the right words and you will become a Christian. Listen very carefully – you do not become a Christian because your parents were Christian nor do you become a Christian by saying the right words. Jesus does not become our Lord and Saviour simply because you refer to Him in those terms. The faith that Jesus revealed to the world had less to do with stating one’s beliefs and more to do with love, trust, and obedience.

We just came through a series of sermons that were focused on doctrine - the truth of the Word of God, the Divinity of Jesus Christ – but we must be careful not to get sucked into thinking that doctrinal purity is what really matters to God. Jesus said, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my father who is in heaven.’ ” (Matthew 7:21)

An obedient faith. Is there something that God is calling you to but you have not listened? Is there something God is asking of you but you are refusing? Perhaps it is an area of your personality that He wants to change, perhaps it’s a ministry that He wants you take up, perhaps there is something near and dear to you that He is calling you give up. An obedient faith.

And we think we cannot do it. My friends, I am trying to show you that you can do it – because God can be trusted, but also because your kids will be blessed by your active, trusting, obedient faith.

Ron Hutchcraft tells the story of a four-year-old boy who was dying of leukemia. His father visited him faithfully every night in the hospital. One night, as Dad was preparing to leave, the boy stopped him with a short, staggering question, “Daddy, what’s God like?” His father was not ready for that one. He cleared his throat, licked his lips, and looked at the ceiling. Sensing Dad’s uneasiness, the dying boy withdrew the question, “That’s okay, Daddy.” Then he added these simple, unforgettable words: “If he’s like you … then I’m not afraid.” ²

That’s a deeply emotional story, but it contains a grain of truth – a dad. A mom. A child’s bottom line on God.

May our children be blessed by our unwavering faith in almighty God.

ENDNOTES:

Charles Stanley, How To Handle Adversity, (Nashville: Oliver-Nelson Books, 1989), 74-75.
Ron Hutchcraft, 5 Needs Your Child Must Have Met at Home, (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House, 1994), 173.