"A Father's Rejoicing"

Treasure that, that we would meditate on that, that we would truly honor you today.

Even as our thoughts turn to our own earthly fathers and whatever relationship

that may have been, we can turn to you in Christ and know that you are our perfect

Heavenly Father, powerful and righteous and holy, everlasting.

We ask that you would help us today to go through this Father's Day, a day that could be filled with

joy and sorrow, a day that could be filled with,.

With.

Feelings of, of strain or feelings of happiness.

As we think about our own sinful responses and.

Imperfect.

Reactions to our failing fathers and as our, as fathers, as we think about whether or not we

really truly deserve to be honored by our children, all these things can come into mind.

All these things can cause us to, to question the day

and wonder how we're supposed to respond and maybe we're just looking forward to a nice day of relaxation,

a nice day to kick back and, and enjoy what's to come.

But Lord, we ask for more than these.

We ask for more than the common thoughts and activities.

We ask that you would give us a clear view of your Son, Jesus Christ, in whom and by whom we may call you

Heavenly Father.

And I pray that you would grant us great joy today as we consider the truths of this, of this

proverb that we will look at together.

Thank you for being our Heavenly Father and providing us these graces for which we ask.

We ask in the name for the glory of your Son, Christ.

Amen.

Well, it's Father's Day.

I hope you have a happy Father's Day.

I've been saying that to everybody I can get to.

But I wonder if you have given much thought about what makes a

Father's Day happy, right?

That may be a different definition for fathers and for children, but sometimes it comes down to

what present to buy.

And if you're anything like me, then you have a real hard time figuring out what that's going to be.

I was talking to my brother about that this last week and just, you know, my dad

is someone who's just really, really hard to find any present, any thing, a token of our honor and affection

that even will last and not be put on the shelf somewhere.

So we hope we've made the right decision this year and it remains to be seen.

But when you're thinking about a small thing like that, about, you know, what kind of present to buy for

your father, it's kind of a smaller question of a larger one of

a question that children often will ask themselves.

How can I make my dad happy?

Maybe that's something that you reflect on in your relationship with your father about how did I make my

father most happy?

One of the times that I really knew that I pleased him and you can think about that and also fathers

will think.

About.

Their children and think about what is it about my children that make me that makes me rejoice in them to be

happy in them to feel like I have a good child, a good

daughter, a good son that I rejoice in and like talking about with

others.

And in general parents will get together and sometimes will swap stories about

children and most of the time they want to say something nice and something good, something enjoyable.

I want to try to understand that dynamic a little more on this

Father's Day to think a little bit more about that.

And I think Proverbs chapter 23 has a passage that will be

helpful to us particularly a sentence a proverb

verse 24 out of Proverbs 23.

So let's look at that together this morning.

Proverbs 23 beginning in verse 15.

My son if your heart is wise my own

heart also will be.

Glad.

And my inmost being will rejoice when your lips speak what is

right.

Do not let your heart envy sinners but live in the fear

of the Lord always.

Surely there is a future and your hope will not be cut off.

Listen, my son and be wise and direct your heart in the way.

Do not be with heavy drinkers of wine or with gluttonous eaters of meat for the heavy drinker and the glutton will come

to poverty and drowsiness will clothe one with rags.

Listen to your father who begot you and do not despise your mother when she is old.

Buy truth and do not sell it.

Get wisdom and instruction and understanding.

The father of the righteous will greatly rejoice and he who sires a wise son

will be glad in him.

Let your father and your mother be glad and let her rejoice who gave birth to you.

Give me your heart my son and let your eyes delight in my ways for a

harlot is a deep.

Pit.

And an adulterous woman is a narrow well.

Surely she lurks as a robber and increases the faithless among men.

You can hear the father's heart as he admonishes his son as he speaks to him about

what is most vital what is most important.

But I want us to look particularly at verse 24 this morning.

There's an image here.

It's a happy image.

The image of a father and how he feels about his son.

If his son is righteous, if his son.

Is wise.

How much will this father greatly rejoice?

How much will this father's heart.

Truly.

Be glad?

And I think as we think about that image as we consider this this ideal

relationship between father and child that it will help us to

reflect further.

On.

Why that matters such a great deal to our lives.

And I believe that if we're going to honor our heavenly father if we're going to honor our

heavenly father then we will honor our earthly father.

To honor our earthly fathers we ought to live in the joy of our heavenly

fathers.

So we consider their memories as we consider how to interact with them today as we as we consider

what it means to be a father.

I think it all depends on living in the joy of our heavenly father.

So let's begin in verse 24 of Proverbs 23 and think about this

ideal father -son relationship.

We have a father rejoicing in an admirable son.

An admirable son and you can see how admirable he is.

The father of the righteous will greatly rejoice and he who sires

a wise son will be glad in him.

So what we have here is classic Hebrew poetry and the first statement.

Corresponds.

With another statement and the second statement with another statement.

So the idea is this greatly rejoice and to be very glad.

The father rejoices to rejoice actually in the Hebrew it's rejoice twice.

So it's rejoice bold and underlined to greatly rejoice.

He rejoices what kind of a father rejoices with such joy?

The one who has a righteous son and he who sires a wise

son.

Oh his heart will be glad in him.

So you can hear that the happy father the happy father is the one who has a righteous

and wise child and that these two traits of righteousness and wisdom go together.

That a righteous son is a wise son and a wise son is a righteous son.

Here is a child who has an impeccable testimony.

Here is a child who is impressive in their insight in their decision making

and oh what a child to have for a father one that does what is right in a wise way.

Wow, that's going to make any parent happy.

That's going to make any parent walk around and want to talk about their son want to talk about their daughter

their child who is right and their child who is.

Wise.

We're given a poetic.

Ideal.

The happy father and the good child.

Let's think more about it because this ideal is not restricted of course to this one verse.

It's something we find in the context that I just read for you and in all of Proverbs.

In all of Proverbs over 80 times we have the term either father or son and we have

a series of of encounters or instructions that craft for

us what it's supposed to look like this father child relationship.

Obviously when the child is foolish and and does iniquity then the father is shamed and the

father has a broken heart.

But when the child does what is right when the child does what is wise then the father rejoices and the mother

along with him and we hear that in so many different ways throughout the book of Proverbs but even in the particular

context you can hear in verses 15 and 16 very much the same idea that you hear in

verse 24.

So in verse 15 and 16 you hear this.

My son if your heart is.

Wise.

My own heart also will be glad and my own my inmost being will rejoice when your lips speak what

is right.

So you hear wisdom and righteousness as well in verses 15 and 16 and you hear that the father's

heart is glad that that his inmost being rejoices.

We can also hear that the father knows that his child his son

needs direction in these ways his son needs to be wise.

He needs to grow in wisdom.

His son needs to say what is right and develop in righteousness.

And so the father again and again calls for his

child's attention.

He says listen to me.

He he says he says direct your heart in my way.

Listen to your father who begot you.

Give me your heart.

Let your eyes delight in my ways.

How often does a parent say to their child pay attention listen

watch look where look where I'm pointing.

Over and over the child's attention must be grasped because the parent wants the

child to learn wisdom and to learn righteousness and so you can see this father has a

heart for his child.

This passage shows us that no father wants a drunk or a glutton or a bum or a

sexual degenerate for a son.

So he compels him out of love to to turn to pursue truth wisdom

instruction and understanding.

And we can hear the motivation.

The motivation is there in verse 24.

My son if you'll be wise if you will work righteousness.

I will rejoice.

And that's a great motivation for a child.

A child wants to know that his or her father looks upon them with favor

and approval and acceptance and likes to say

wonderful things about them when they're not around.

Every child wants that.

They want their father they want their father to favor them

and to and to and to rejoice in them.

And that's what the father's saying to his son.

Think about if you live this way how happy this will make make me and and make your mother as well.

And when the mother's at peace about the child that really helps the father to be at peace as well.

But as we think about the ideal that we have here a son that listens to truth and

follows wisdom.

A father who constantly and in a very dedicated way instructs the

child and all the ways that the child is to go.

As we think about the ideal father son relationship displayed for us here.

How are we supposed to relate to that?

How are we supposed to apply that?

Of course, we are being given in this wisdom text something of a moral absolute.

That fathers or parents in general ought to instruct their children in righteous ways and in

wise ways and those are defined for us.

Unrighteous ways are listed for us.

Foolish ways are listed for us and righteous ways and and wise ways are listed for us.

We're being given a moral absolute of how parents should instruct their children.

How children ought to how to how to respond to their parents.

And if all goes well and the parental instruction is perfect and the children respond

perfectly we have an ideal parent child father son

relationship, don't we?

But we know none of us live up to that ideal.

We know that right?

I hope you know that.

If you don't know that we'll talk about that out of church.

But we all can sense that somehow some way as as parents our instructions have

been somewhat defective.

We've not always instructed well and in wisdom and in patience and in specificity and

in great wisdom and so we can feel that we have not measured up.

Children as well often feel like they don't measure up to the desires of their parents and

and haven't done enough to gain their mother's favor or their father's favor.

We can sense that we don't live up to this ideal.

So how do we treat it?

How do we use it?

In some ways, I guess we could just leave it as the ideal.

It could be like north on the compass.

So you always know where north is and you can and you can gauge standards by which direction

is north even though you know you're never ever going to make it to north.

To magnetic north you're never going there, but at least you know where it is and so you have some direction.

That's a moral absolute and I suppose if we keep it there we can pat ourselves on the back and say we're doing

much better than many people in our generation who simply takes the compass of morality and

tosses it into the gutter of moral relativism and says there are no

absolute rights and wrongs.

There are no absolute.

Truths.

Or falsities.

But we need more than that.

We should desire.

More.

Than just a moral absolute as effective and as essential as that is.

This is not just a poetic ideal or a proverbial ideal.

This is a profound ideal and the word profound I think gets overused but it has the idea of that which is

before and established.

That which is pro before found or founded foundation established.

There's something that lies in the in the deep and distant

past.

Behind.

This ideal father and son relationship and we should get that some thought this morning.

A father's joy and gladness in righteous and wise children is a universal idea that we find

throughout the Old Testament.

There are many stories if you think about it for a little bit.

There's many stories in the Old Testament of fathers and their children.

And there are some stories that that are about disaster and there are some stories that

are about joy and happiness.

You think about the sorrowful stories stories such as Lot and his daughters David

and his older sons.

Some of them are examples of joy and gladness.

Think of the son named Shem, son named Isaac.

Think about Caleb's bold daughter and think about Rechab's children.

But this whole father child relationship this whole ideal becomes a central

focus in the Old Testament primarily because of the fall.

When Adam and Eve sinned death enters into the human

race.

No longer is life the primary characteristic of the human race, but death.

Is.

And now there's a very great need to fight against death with life.

In fact God promised the serpent in the hearing of Adam and Eve in

Genesis 3 .15 I will put enmity between you and the woman, between your

seed and her seed.

He will bruise you on the head and you shall bruise him on the heel.

Even as bearing children now becomes essential for the survival of the human race

because death has entered.

So also even in a greater way there is the need

for a descendant, a seed, a son who will defeat

the evil that has raised up against humanity as Satan led

humanity into death.

So the seed of the woman would crush Satan and thus lead humanity back into life.

And humans began to bear children and two lineages appear.

There's the.

The.

Foolishly wicked shameful line of God haters from the line of Cain.

And then there are the righteous and wise descendants of and the God

fearers from Seth.

And soon the God fearers were reduced to a single family, Noah and his sons.

And then God destroyed all of the God haters in the universal flood, the worldwide flood.

And saving Noah and his family alone.

So the fall.

Teaches.

That we need to have children to fight against death.

But the flood says you need wise and righteous children because if your children are

sinfully wicked, if they are foolish, then God will destroy them in judgment.

So the fall and the flood emphasized to us in a very basic and

undeniable, unforgettable way.

That we.

Should value children, we should love children, and we should raise them in God

fearing ways in a righteous and wise way.

And this is the basis for that ideal relationship.

So when parents rejoice in the children, when a father rejoices in his

son, what you experience is.

Is.

Deeper than simple parental pride, which is obviously something that's there,

but it's more than that.

There's this primal ancient joy connected to the hope of the seed, the

child who would be the perfect answer to the ultimate problem.

And every parental struggle and success in the scripture has to be understood against that background.

The hope of the seed in the face of death is carved into every genealogy that

you read in the Bible.

In fact, it is the artesian well from which the hope of a perfect son

springs.

Well, let's think about this again.

It's not just that a father rejoices.

In.

An admirable son, but as we think about it in its full New Testament

context, we should think about how a father rejoices.

In.

Anointed son.

We think a great deal about parent -child relationships.

There's.

Radio shows dedicated to good parenting.

There are books everywhere about good parenting on days like Mother's Day and Father's Day.

We think about parent and child relationships.

We give a lot of thought to it.

How much thought do we give to the heavenly father -son relationship?

We should give some thought today.

Verse 24 says, The father of the righteous will greatly rejoice, and he who sires a wise son will be glad in

him.

Now the truth of that scriptural ideal is rooted in the author of scripture

himself.

God eternally exists as one essence and three persons.

And in this triune bliss, God the father and God the son forever delight in one another

through God the Holy Spirit.

And the heavenly father's relationship to the heavenly son is.

Heavenly.

It's perfect.

It is the ideal relationship between father and

son.

All of God's commandments and instructions and examples and encouragements and proverbs about fathers and

children in his word, all of that finds its truthfulness, its reality

in God the father and God the son.

Proverbs 23 verse 24 is true because God is the father of a righteous

son in whom he greatly rejoices.

He has begotten an infinitely wise son and has supreme gladness in

him.

Let's think about this for a little bit.

Think about the eternal origins of this ideal father -son relationship.

When we hear Jesus pray in John chapter 17 and verse 5, he says, Now father,

glorify me with the glory I had with you before the world

was.

This father -son relationship goes back before the beginning of time into all of

eternity past.

It had no beginning.

The divine father -son relationship did not begin with the birth of Jesus of Nazareth.

It had no beginning.

John chapter 1 verses 1 and 2 speaks of the father and son in terms of God and the word.

And the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God.

He was in the beginning with God.

We are taught from the scriptures that before the beginning God the father and God the son commune

perfectly and God the spirit and that the son is eternally begotten of the

father.

He has no beginning yet eternally proceeds from the father as the

infinitely echoing second person of the trinity.

And this is not a mystery that is forever hidden from us, but revealed to us in the incarnation.

For the word became flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld his glory.

Glory as of the only begotten from the father full of

grace and truth.

And the glories of of the father -son relationship, the glory of God is revealed to

us in Christ.

And God the father and God the son alone possess that perfect.

Ideal.

Father -son relationship.

John 1 18 says no one has seen God at any time.

The only begotten God who was in the bosom of the father he has explained him.

And I think that these passages therefore lead us to consider the historical expression for what was

eternal.

It's also historical in that Jesus of Nazareth is the

Christ, the son of the living God.

That God the son, the second person of the trinity took upon human flesh and in space and

time intervened for our behalf.

And we know that he is the beloved son of the father for many reasons.

We could think of his baptism where Jesus comes to John the Baptist and as John the Baptist is

baptizing him the heaven's part and the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove alights upon

Jesus the Christ, anointing him before all of Israel.

And God the father speaks and says this is my beloved son in

whom I am well pleased.

He says the same at the mount of transfiguration, something that Peter talks about in his letter that that Jesus

Christ was transfigured in glory before his three of his disciples and that again

the Shekinah glory cloud of God comes upon him and we hear the voice again.

This is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased.

He was so pleased in his beloved son that Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ alone

was the perfect sacrifice for our sins.

No other sacrifice would do, no other lamb could do what Jesus Christ could do in that he

died upon the cross an acceptable sacrifice to God.

Him dying, taking the penalty for our sins but he was perfect and he was

righteous and he was fully beloved by the father.

So it was that because the father so loved the son because he was such a

righteous and wise son that the son died in our place

satisfying all of the righteous requirements of God, dying for our sins, dying

for our folly.

But that doesn't end the story for God because he delighted in his son, because he rejoices in his son.

He rose him from the dead the third day showing everyone, vindicating his son before

everyone that he indeed is the infinitely wise and righteous son who satisfies

God's justice upon the cross and he welcomes him to heaven.

He ascends to the right hand of the father and sits there and and reigns forever with a name

which is above every name.

We see the eternal everlasting beauty of this ideal father -son relationship for God

gives to him a dominion glory and a kingdom that will not pass away, a kingdom that will

never be destroyed.

We can spend a lot of time thinking about how the ideal father -son relationship.

Really.

Comes forth from the perfect father -son relationship in God the father and in God the son.

But I want us to apply this to our own lives by recognizing this

that a father rejoices.

In.

An adopted son or we can even say the heavenly father rejoices in his

adopted sons and daughters.

The ultimate son pleased the ultimate father and answered the ultimate problem

of sin.

What is the result of this?

Galatians 4 verse 4, but when the fullness of the time came God sent forth his son

born of a woman born under the law so that he might redeem those who were under the law

that we might receive the adoption as sons.

Adoption.

God sent his only begotten fully beloved son

to die upon the cross and redeem us that we might become adopted children adopted

sons and daughters of this same heavenly father.

And because we are sons God has sent forth the spirit of his son into our hearts crying Abba.

Father therefore.

You are no longer a slave but a son of a son and an heir through God.

In Christ made right with God I am adopted as one of his many children.

I'm given fellowship with him through his spirit all because of his son all because of the way that God the

father loves God the son I may have fellowship with

God the father because of my faith in God the son.

First Corinthians chapter 1 verse 30 tells us something I think

it's important for us to pay attention to when we think about Proverbs 23 24 that a father greatly

rejoices in a righteous son and that in in a wise son

his heart is very glad and a righteous and wise son.

Think about what Christ is to us.

Think about what Christ is to us.

First Corinthians 1 30.

By the father's doing we are in Christ Jesus who became to us wisdom

from God and righteousness and sanctification and redemption

many times many times just as earthly

children we struggle with whether or not our fathers rejoiced

over us or loved us or accepted us or favored us we also

struggle with whether or not God loves us and accepts us

and truly rejoices in us or is he just someone bending his arm and he's tolerating us

but as a father rejoices in a righteous son and his heart is

glad in a wise son if Christ is your righteousness and

if Christ is your wisdom then how do you think God looks at you?

If Christ is all your righteousness before the father if Christ is all your wisdom before the father,

how do you think the heavenly father sees you?

If you have Christ you have the father's favor.

If you have Christ you have the heavenly father's joy, if you have Christ you

have the heavenly father's acceptance you have his delight

you know it's on a father's day that we should remember

this essential truth that God does not want us to live up

to an ideal father -son relationship but God wants us to live in the

ideal father -son relationship we can

easily fall into that trap.

I gotta live up to the ideal I've been given the compass with north on the

dial unless I unless I get there and achieve it and somehow live up

to the ideal that I'm not doing enough but the moral absolute as true as it

is is there and north is pointing not because we have to

make it all the way to north but because that is where we look and find God

the father and God the son.

And we can by faith united with Christ rejoice in that perfect that ideal perfection

and claim a righteousness not our own the

righteousness of Christ that covers us like a white garment that God

looks on And sees no stain and accepts us and loves us.

It's so easy to fall into the trap of trying to live up to an ideal.

But we are to live in the ideal father -son relationship and I think when we do that

this this this is the this is the door through which we go if we're

going to follow through on the admonitions that we read about in proverbs 23, so

It's when we look to Christ.

It's when we trust in him.

To be the perfect son for the perfect father.

It's when when we're in Christ and we have the father's acceptance and love that this is when as fathers and as

children.

This is when we repent of our self -righteousness.

This is when we repent of of the drunkenness and gluttony and sloth and adultery and everything else that that that

drags us Down when we believe and trust in Jesus Christ the perfect son to find perfect peace with

the perfect father.

Because it's only when we live in the ideal father -son relationship of God the father and God the son

that we are given the not we're not we're not given the The task but we're given the

power to live out Righteousness, we're given the power to live out holiness.

We're given the strength to to pursue righteousness and holiness and and

experience the blessings of that.

Righteousness and wisdom are pleasing to an earthly father.

But we really have no claim to those things.

Have no real access to those things unless we come to Christ unless we come to Christ.

We really need to strive this father's day to live out our father -son relationships through the gospel.

Fathers can never be the perfect father for our children.

We're always going to fall short.

There's going to be failures.

We're going to lack we're not going to be able to do enough provide enough be there enough.

And the pressure is always there and every every

stumbling of our children.

Can feel like a stamp of failure on our jobs as fathers on our roles as fathers.

But we have to live out the gospel.

We have to apply the gospel to those relationships.

We need to know and entrust them to the heavenly father.

And ask that he who knows their needs before we even know to provide and to ask that he

will care for them and.

We cannot and must not provoke our children by demanding that they be perfect for us.

Of course, we want them to be wise.

Of course.

We want them to be righteous.

We want them to to do things about which we can rejoice, but we cannot provoke them to wrath.

By demanding that they be what only christ can be to the heavenly father.

How do we live out the gospel.

We direct them to the perfect child the perfect son.

Not as the ideal to live up to but as the one in whom they can live.

Children, we cannot be the perfect child for our fathers.

If you if you reflect upon your relationship with your father with with Some

regret with sorrow with some feeling of you know I never really seem to be able to

measure up to his His standards.

I want you to reflect On the gospel of jesus christ that we've just talked about.

It's not up to you to make it to the north pole.

It's not up to you to live up to moral absolutes and standards.

It's up to you.

To turn to christ and find in him the righteousness by which you are accepted before the heavenly

father.

And don't live in a sense of despondency or despair that you've never measured up.

Turn to christ.

And I think this is the way that we can be released from bitterness or from

anxiety or sorrow from frustrated expectations.

I think that this is key if we're going to honor our imperfect fathers honor their memories and truly.

Show them love and respect.

That we have got to dig deep into the ideal father -son relationship.

And if we're and if we're if we are Accepted in christ before the heavenly father Then

we can be released from any kind of bitterness or unforgiveness.

Towards our own earthly fathers where they have failed us or if if we have failed them.

We can be freed in the power of the perfect son to live humbly and graciously toward our own fathers.

This has been a fruitful meditation for myself.

Uh this father's day.

The father of a righteous Son will greatly rejoice he who sires a wise son will be glad In

him.

And I can't help but think.

About.

God the father and god the son and the joy that we each can have in that relationship Which will

and should overflow to our other Parent child relationships father child

relationships today.

Let's pray together.

Father I thank you for our time that we've had together in your word.

I pray that you would indeed Help us this day To make the most of the opportunity to

reflect on who you are as our heavenly father and why we can Call you that by the grace of your

son.

Jesus christ I thank you that he has lived perfectly

That he always did what you called him to do always said what you instructed him to say

That he was obedient Even to the point of death even death on a cross.

And because of his righteous ways And his wisdom You have given them a name

which is above every name That of the name of jesus christ every knee shall bow and every tongue

confess That he is lord to your glory.

And I pray that as we meditate on these things today that you would help us to Show show

grace and speak truth to one another and encourage each other in the gospel.

We pray these things for christ's sake.

Amen.