Original
Entry: August 21, 2011
McMinnville, OR
Know then in your heart that as a man disciplines his
son, so the Lord your God disciplines you.
Deuteronomy 8:5
I was having coffee with
a man who wanted to talk about getting his son more involved in our ministry.
Knowing his young man I shared that he was a great kid who lacked the giftedness
to needed to fulfill his ministry standards.
His dad, knowing this was the case, refused to offer his son
constructive criticism.
I called him out and
his passivity and his emotional response was, “Would you be that harsh with
your boys on the football field?”
If he only knew! My boys get the worst of it from me on the
field and they are better for it. I guarantee that when they play nobody whispers
dissension among the ranks because they have earned it! Stu Weber once wrote, “This
is the era of the soft male.”
Not in our house.
We all know men who
refuse to discipline their children. Their lack of discipline is making their
sons into a piece of over ripe fruit: soft and rotten. As scripture speaks, “He
who spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him is careful to discipline
him” Proverbs13:24. Biblical discipline is synonymous with
love.
Whatever happened to
the trepidation found in the words, “Wait until your father gets home?”
The absenteeism of
dad’s in America is robbing young men of their identity. Young men are lost with no model of
discipline to follow. Full of tears in his eyes I spoke to a young man who confessed,
“I have learned how to be a man by doing the exact opposite of all the men in
my life.”
Whether literally or
figuratively absent, the apathetic dad hates his children. A man accepts the responsibility for his
children, especially if distanced through divorce, or separation.
