Missio Dei Communities

The following post is by Dennis Kelley.  We asked Dennis to write a short post reflecting on Fatherhood and the gospel.  He and Summer recently had their first child, Logan.

Logan looks so sweet, so innocent, so fun.  He is my pride and joy.

However, even sweet little Logan was born into a fallen world.   His shots and vaccines, monthly doctor visits are all because when sin entered the world, so did sickness, disease and death. Looking into the future I fear his teen years, where he is likely to rebel if he is anything like his dad.  I cringe thinking about the times when our relationship will be broken.  

I am painfully aware of another evidence of the Rebellion.  As his Dad it is my job to protect him, to guard his heart, to raise him up with a clear and functional view of the gospel, to provide for him, to enjoy him.   

Where the gospel is so hard is that even in all the things I can do to bring Logan up in a safe, happy, gospel-centered home, I am an awful and inadequate savior! The hard truth is that I am utterly incapable of saving him.  If I fail to show Logan how short I fall of deserving and being a savior, and both of our extreme needs for Christ to be our savior, then I will have missed the boat completely.  

I continue to see where I erect idols in my own life as my sinful attempts at saving myself.  (i.e. moralism or allowing my ultimate satisfaction to be my comfort instead of my relationship with Jesus.) If I pass on to him the idea that he can save himself through moralism or by earning comfort or control, I will not have passed on a gospel legacy.  I will have passed on a crushing idol.

As a father, my most important job is to pass along to him a life centered on that pivotal moment where our transcendent God broke into human history through the person of Jesus Christ and defeated death and sin through his crucifixion and resurrection to redeem his people and guarantee his promise that he will restore this fallen world to the state he meant it to be in.  In that day, my son won't rebel and our relationship will be right.  I won't have to worry about disease, vaccines, pain or suffering in his little life or mine.

Father help me father my son!