A Father's Role - Planting The Seed

"And Judah said unto Onan, Go in unto thy brother's wife, and marry her, and raise up seed to thy brother. And Onan knew that the seed should not be his; and it came to pass, when he went in unto his brother's wife, that he spilled it on the ground, lest that he should give seed to his brother. And the thing which he did displeased the LORD: wherefore he slew him also." - Gen 38:8-10


The father's primary role in these New Testament days has not changed from the days of the Old Testament. We have been and always will be called to proclaim Christ and God's salvation in Jesus as the Messiah (the Anointed One) for we know that there is "no other name under heaven by which a man may be saved".

In the days of the prophets before Jesus, they were called to preach the promises of the covenant of God to His people. However, that was not their only duty. They also, in faith looking forward to the Messiah, were partakers in the procreation and proliferation of the seed knowing that one day the seed would bruise the head of the serpent and defeat death which had entered through Adam's sin. [Gen 3:15]

Today, the seed is no longer the way in which the Messiah would come in the person of the Lord Jesus. However, our role fathers has not changed in principle. We are still to plant the seed, but that seed is now the planting of the Gospel into the hearts of our families. Let us do it in faith by the power of the Spirit rather than defiance and shame as Onan had done.

Happy Father's Day to my fellow brothers out there. Praise God for revealing to us our sin and His righteousness.

My Daughter, The Apologist

Sitting with me as I was listening and critiquing a Mark Driscoll sermon, little Izabella (my 7-yr-old daughter) blessed me by displaying the fruit of our labors to teach her not merely to memorize scripture but rather to understand and apply them.

BELLA: Is he a false preacher or a good one?

PAPA: He's not preaching Christ in the message.

BELLA: Really? But isn't everything in the bible about Jesus because "in the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God"? That's John 1:1, right?

PAPA: Amen!

What a joy to see God answering our prayers in her bearing such fruit and producing the very thing we strive for in teaching her - an understanding of Christ through the scriptures.

Here is another dialog that Bella had with Leilani that I just found out about...

BELLA: Hey Mommy, you know what? Taylor really wanted to win this notebook today in class and so she kept saying, "Please God, if you let me get this, I'll do anything for you."

MOMMY: Oh did you think that was weird?

BELLA: Yeah, God doesn't need her to do anything for Him! Because the bible says, "I am the vine you are the branches, you can't do anything apart from Me."

Christian, if you have been blessed with children, let us not raise them to be intellectual, religious zealots but rather to grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus. May we raise up a new generation of evangelists in this dark world in need of the "light of the world" - our Lord Jesus.