The Steps Of A Father

June 21, 2026

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

And let's do our meditation text. They look like they in Cancun somewhere, huh? I need to check y'all's passport when y'all get back. Make sure y'all went to Ghana. No, I'm just like y'all pray for me. I know, I know. Proverbs 27. Let's read. Here we go. A righteous man who walks in his integrity. How blessed are his sons after him. And I would add his daughters too. Amen. Alrighty. And our main text comes from Proverbs chapter 3. I want to encourage you to read all of chapter 3, really. It's chapters 1 through 9, which really forms the context of today's word for our fathers today. But we'll kick off with Proverbs 3. And I'm going to look at a number of different passages to help us be better fathers. And I think we should all want that. Amen? Here we go. Proverbs chapter 3, verse 1 through 2. Here's what it says My son, do not forget my teaching, but keep my commands in your heart, for they will prolong your life many years and bring you peace and prosperity. Amen. Amen. I want to talk about the steps of a good father. Steps of a good father. I don't think as fathers we ever outgrow the need for additional fathering advice. We surely needed it when we need it when our kids are small. Made a lot of mistakes when they were small. I wish I knew then what I know now. Amen. But personally, I thought my fathering duties were over once they got out the house. Any dads know that ain't true. But fathers, we we need additional advice because of the challenges that come with raising our children. I recently read a story that illustrates the importance of this idea. A father was working in his garden in his backyard, and his daughter decided to come along to help. And it had rained pretty heavily, and so the father, as he worked, carefully stepped through the garden in such a way to keep from muddying up his shoes. And as he was stepping through the garden, he turned around and looked back and noticed that his daughter also was carefully stepping through the same garden so as not to muddy her shoes. Except his daughter stepped exactly where her father had stepped. And while they were stepping, she blurted out these words, and I've been messed up every time I read this. Daddy, if you don't get mud on your shoes, I won't get mud on mine. You missed that. Let me try that again. Daddy, if you walk in a way that you don't get mud on your shoes, I can walk in a way that I won't get mud on my shoes. That's why, as fathers, we can't ever outgrow the need for fathering advice. Because our children watch where we step, amen. And if we're not careful, not only can we get mud on our shoes, but our children will also get mud on theirs. We need to know the steps of a good father. Matter of fact, here's my thesis statement very quickly. Fathers, we must watch our steps. Tell some dad, watch your steps. Watch your step. Because our children are coming behind us. No matter how old or how young they are. They're always watching us. And listen to me this morning. I'm not suggesting that many of you have not been good fathers. Most of you have been outstanding fathers. I know some of you, a lot of you. The fact that you hear that says something about your faith, that says something about your family, you've been an outstanding father. Fathering is not for the faint of heart. And many of you have done it well. Many of you have done it with a wife. And the Lord has blessed you. Many of you have done it in a blended situation. And it takes real manhood to blend two families, two values, two visions, two ways of life. And raise kids in a way that they know they all feel love. And then many of you, unfortunately, you've had to do it under adversarial conditions. Felt like every time you had a conversation, it was like an Iranian crisis. Just when you thought it was resolved, preach, Altery. You discovered it ain't over. I'm just trying to tell the truth this morning. Fathering is not for the faint of heart. And then there's some, I'm not, again, here trying to throw shade. For whatever reason, you've checked out. For whatever reason, you're out of it. And hear me well. Whatever the reasons are, our children still follow in our steps. Even if there's no steps that they can follow, they're gonna try to make some steps based on what they know or don't know of their father. And so we must begin to order our steps and do the steps of a good father. Frederick Douglass may have said it best. He said it like this it's easier to build strong children than to repair broken men. Douglass here was emphasizing the importance of dads being involved in the lives of their children. And then somebody else said it like this every father should remember one day that his son or daughter will follow his example and not his advice. We need to watch our steps. We need to have the steps of a good father. And I believe that's what this text helps us with today, this morning. The first nine chapters of the book of Proverbs is really ten speeches by this father to his son. He's trying to teach him what it means to be a man. Wants him to grow up to be a godly man, a good man, a man of integrity, a responsible man. And I don't have time to go through all of it. I got five values I gotta share. I know an normally I have three, but it was so juicy. I want to encourage you to get all of chapter nine. I'm just gonna run through these five very quickly. So I ain't got time to smell the roses. Somebody say amen. So I'm gonna jump right on into this. So number one, and again, my thesis statement, we gotta watch our step. Now, how do we do that? Number one, we gotta make sure that we provide wisdom to live life. The good steps of a father provide wisdom to live life. And here I give you Proverbs 2, 6 through 8, for the Lord gives wisdom. From his mouth come knowledge and understanding. He holds success in the store for the upright. He's a shield to those whose walk is blameless, for he guards the course of the just and protects the way of the faithful ones. We gotta give our kids wisdom for life. We gotta help pass on the wisdom. And this weekend we celebrated Juneteenth. And I think that's a wonderful thing because we we gotta first and foremost, I think as dad's, we gotta make sure our children know who they are and where they come from. We gotta be the first one to say that God is the maker of all humanity. And he's the one that made you and crafted you. And if he's the one that made you and crafted you, he's the one that can point out and chart out your destiny. But then also, too, our kids need to know who they are culturally. God didn't make a mistake because he made you a little bit darker than everybody else. That you are also a part of the fabric of humanity. So much so that even in God, that we were made in his image, there's some blackness in God. We gotta teach our kids and make sure they know who they are. And then also, too, when we pass it on, we gotta keep that thing simple. We gotta keep it simple because a lot of times, and I'm guilty of this, when we pass on wisdom, a lot of us as men, we got a lot of wisdom to pass on. The problem is we passing on a lecture, not wisdom. But notice the title of this book is Proverbs. Proverb. A proverb is a short, clever saying. I'm gonna say that one more time. A proverb is not a long lecture. It's a short, let me say it again. It's a short, clever saying that offers a wealth of wisdom. We know what that is. We've heard proverbs, we've heard certain idioms, what goes around. Come on. You reap what you come on, somebody. You lie down with dogs, you get up with it. You heard it, you heard it. Let me give a shout out to my own dad. The only place that success comes before work is in the dictionary. Just keep it short. We we ain't gotta give them a lecture, y'all. And a lot of times we, if we're not careful, we can run off our kids with the intent of giving them wisdom when we gotta keep it short and simple. Wisdom, what I mean by wisdom is it's it's that skill to live life. We're not talking about knowledge. We got too much knowledge as it is. All that's online, all what's through AI, we got plenty of knowledge, and we still got all kinds of foolishness going on in our culture. Amen. No, we need to have wisdom. That that word wisdom, really, the root of it has to do with skill. Uh, it's a word that describes different crafts, uh, carving and construction. Uh, when they constructed the tabernacle, they use the same word. They use skill to construct that tabernacle. And that's what our kids need. They need wisdom to live. Shea tried to tell us about how her daddy could make a dollar holler. See, the Jews, the Jews, when they're kids, before they even reach the age of 18, they teach them all that they need to know before they reach 18 in terms of what they need to know about money from age 18 to 65. What do you do when you get this amount of money when you get 20? What do you do when you get this amount of money at 25? You don't go out and buy the biggest luxury car. Preach authority. One of the greatest things my dad told me when I got out of high school. He said, son, don't do like me. Don't buy a car every two years. Save that money so you have something when you come to the end of your life. We gotta pass on some wisdom, y'all. Wisdom, wisdom. And so we gotta, number one, give them wisdom to live life. What are some other things? Wisdom to choose a mate. Preach, Pastor. Here's a father that wasn't gonna wait till his son bring somebody home. He laid the groundwork for what kind of mate he should bring home. And we gotta have wisdom that teaches our kids how to choose a mate. Proverbs 2, 16 through 17 says this wisdom will save you also from the adulterous woman and man, from the wayward woman and man, with his or her seductive words, who has left the partner of their youth and ignored the covenant that they made before God. We gotta teach our kids that you can't bring home certain mess. Now, now we can't ask our kids not to bring home mess and we still running after, oh, y'all not gonna get this. Can't take, don't bring home the loose person and we still running after loose people. Preach all to you. I am. No, we we gotta lay the foundations about relationships. We gotta teach about relationships. Here's a father in Proverbs chapter 5, 6 and 7. Teaches his son about sex. Matter of fact, he says, don't be spilling all your streams out in the street. It's in the Bible. Don't look at me crazy. Y'all looking at me crazy like I made that up. It's in your Bible. It's in your Bible. I didn't say anything that was not in the Bible. Don't be, okay, don't be spilling your seed all over the place. He said, matter of fact, devote yourself to your own sister. He says, No, teach your kids that marriage is a good thing. That being committed and devoted to one person is a good thing. I'm gonna preach all this today, y'all. Don't worry. And I know marriage ain't for everybody. I got it. That's okay. But now, if you say marriage ain't for you, that don't mean God's gonna bless creeping either. Because what we say, I'm gonna preach all this. What we say, well, I'm just not into marriage. And then we start creeping, and then we want to bring that to God. God, can you help me with the no that's not the relationship he blesses? And and here's a father that's not ashamed to teach his sons about marriage. Now let's be clear on who it is: Solomon. Y'all don't know who Solomon is, huh? Let me help you. Solomon didn't have seven wives. Come on, somebody read the Bible in here. 700 wives. And tell your neighbor, he didn't stop there either. And he had 300 concubines. Now, now, scholars love to kind of clean it up a little bit and say, you know what, those were political marriages. Yeah. I'm sure they were a thousand. But but here's somebody which says this no matter what your relationship history is, we still have a responsibility to teach our kids what the path that God blesses. I'm not saying it's easy. Marriage will wear you out. Say amen, Lisa. Yes, it will. Say amen. It'll wear us out, won't it, Lisa? It's hard work. But if we want God to be in our kids' relationships, we got to teach them the right way. I'm gonna preach all this. That's okay. And this doesn't just go for sons either. We need to teach our daughters the same thing. And I used to tell when I was a youth pastor, I used to tell the girls all the time anybody can ride a bus, baby. But everybody can't ride in the bagata. You are not a bus. No, you are somebody special. And until you carry yourself as somebody special, nobody special will ever come your way. All you're gonna get is bus riders. Preach, Pastor. Ah. We gotta teach our kids, teach our kids how to choose a maiden. We gotta teach our kids wisdom to choose friends. Good steps of the Father helps children make the right kind of friend choices. Proverbs 17, 17. A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for a time of adversity. Teach them how to choose friends. Proverbs 27 and 6. Wounds from a friend can be trusted, but an enemy multiplies kisses. Sometimes my good friends will hurt me if that's what it takes to heal me. But then here's the one I got a man of too many friends comes to ruin. But there is a friend that sticks closer than a brother. See, we we live in a culture where folk brag about how many friends they have, how many clicks they get. That's not your friend, amen? And that's kind of what the Proverb writer is saying here. The words he used here, even in this verse, in verse 24, there are two different words for friends. The first friend is acquaintances. And basically the point is sometimes we mistake acquaintances for deep friendships. Just because you got an acquaintance, that don't mean you have a friend. You just know somebody. That don't mean it's time to reveal everything. We gotta tell our kids. No, no, it takes time to develop a friendship. You you gotta go through something to know whether you got a friend or not. You don't mean a friend on Friday, and then y'all just hanging in buddies for the rest of your life on Sunday. No, you gotta go through some stuff together. He said, No, that's not the kind of friend you want. But the second one is literally the word love, ahead, which means someone who is loyal, someone who's been through the thick and the thin, someone who is right there with you, someone who's gonna keep your confidence, someone who will be a friend through all your ups and downs, someone who will fight you and forgive you and know how to reconcile with you. That's what you want in a friend. And we gotta teach our kids, listen, you're gonna have some challenges with your best friends. But friends learn how to work through those things. Friends learn how to work through those dignity. Let me keep running because I got two more. Four, wisdom to guard the heart. Verse 20 of chapter 4, 23 through 24. Above all less, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it. Keep your mouth free of perversity, keep corrupt talk from your lips. The heart always shows us who we really are. And it comes out in our words. We got to teach our kids to guard their hearts. And usually when we read this verse, that's kind of how we see it, but really, that's not what the Proverb writer is after here. What he's after, or the idea here, is not just protecting your heart, but it has to do with how do you handle your heart after someone has hurt you? How do you handle your heart after somebody you trusted and they betrayed you? Do you let all that spill out? Or do you trust God and allow God to heal you and to go on become a better person? That's the point. Years ago, my wife and I and the family, we were we were in Mexico on a vacation. True story. And my wife and my sons, they were out at the beach or what have you. I was sitting by the pool, pastor was chilling and cooling, all that kind of stuff. And there was this brother, this young man here, and he had two friends, and they were definitely celebrating, but I kind of felt like something was off. And so we got to talking, they were very cordial, very kind. I asked them what they did, and they told me what they did for a living. They asked what I did. I said, I'm a pastor here, I'm with my family, getting some relaxation. I said, Well, sound like y'all throwing a celebration. What's y'all celebration? Celebrating. And the guy raised a my tie. He said, I'm celebrating my divorce. And they and the two friends said, Woo! I said, She must have been something, huh? And so after they celebrated high for a minute, I just looked at the brother and I said, That can't be a lot of fun. Because I could see some hurt on his face. And in that moment, he began to break down right there by the pool. He said, Pastor, you are right. It hurts, and I don't know how to stop it hurt. And here's what I told him: I said, Life will break you. But you need somebody bigger than you to put you back together. We start talking about God and talking about faith and those kinds of things, and I'm not saying some major conversion happened, but he began to recognize he needed the one who made him. And that's what we got to teach kids in life. We live in a day, y'all, where this culture thinks nothing should ever happen to me. I should go through life pristine and clean. But even Jesus said, in this world, you shall have somebody reads the Bible in this church. And the issue is not, listen to me, parents, and I get it. You love your kids, you don't want them to go through anything you want, you don't, you done been through. I get it. But it's more than just preventing them from going through the stuff you've been through. Listen to me, dads. It's helping them work through once they've been through it. That's how you help them live life. So, how do I help this young man to get through this? How do we help our kids get through brokenness? Here's the first one. Number one, confession. Confess what has been done to me. Confess how it hurt me. Confess how I feel that it's wrong to the Lord. And then confess. Invest my part in it too. Is this mic working today, Chris? Is it working? See, deliverance is not coming unless I'm honest about myself before God. Because I'm the one that's seeking deliverance. So if God's gonna deliver me, I got to be honest with the whole truth and nothing but the truth, which includes me. So yes, confess what was done to you, confess the betrayal, confess the pain. But wait a minute, you got to confess what you did. Because sometimes daddy did try to tell us and we didn't listen. Or somebody did try to pull our coattail. Or sometimes we stirred the pot and it came back on us. And that that little that little accent we just talked about, what goes around, it came right back around on us. So number one, first of all, is confession. Now we put ourselves in a place where God can deliver us. And then number two, here's a tough one: forgiveness. And forgiveness means I gotta teach, we gotta teach our kids, dad, to let it go. But watch this, Dad. I can't expect my child to let it go if I'm still holding on. So I got to demonstrate that I'm letting it go if I want my kids to let it go. And let it go does not mean that somehow they're getting away on you. It doesn't mean that that somehow you're becoming a doormat. What it means is I don't wish on you what you did to me, even though I have every right to wish that on you. Like some of my members in here. I got some gangster Christians in here. Say, amen. I'm saved, but don't push me, don't push me. You know I know what that means. Come on now. Forgiveness says, I'm not gonna let my gangster out. Even though he ought to come out and just go off strong. Tell your neighbor that's forgiveness, baby. And then the last one is learn. We use the technical term repentance. Repentance means to turn around, which really is a fancy theological way of saying learn the lesson. How do you get through it? Teach your kids what did you learn? Not what I'm trying to, I'm not trying to lecture you. Have you learned from what happened to you? You want to know why people keep going back into the same situation over and over? It's that third one. They don't want to learn the lesson. Or as my wife used to say, loves to say, it doesn't hurt bad enough yet. But when it hurt bad enough, they'll learn the lesson in. Never saw that coming. Put some other eyes on it. Here we give you the last one. Here it is. Number five, wisdom to trust the Lord. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction. Proverbs 1 and 7. And then Proverbs 3, 5 through 3, 5, and 6. Trust in the Lord with all thy heart. Lean not on your own understanding, but in all your ways acknowledge Him. He will direct your path. Wisdom to trust the Lord. What does that mean? Here it is. You can't say the moment you met God and where you are now is the same level of trust. Hear me well. The moment you met God and where you are now, it's not the same level of trust. Maybe when you met him, you were at 30%.

unknown 25:28

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:29

Okay? And then maybe it went to 40%. But then you had a catastrophic, difficult issue, and that 40% went back down to 20%. But God kept working in your life. God kept moving in your life. And it built it back up. And now you're back up to 60%. So trust is something that happens in the beginning, but it happens over the lifetime of the relationship. Catch me when I was 23, I was at a different level. But talk to me about the Lord right now. I've been through too much. I've had some hard days.

SPEAKER_00 26:03

Didn't think I can preach the name of Father's baby. But look at what gives my dig anybody women. God bring you through every time. That's why I trust him. I'm like David, some trust in Germany, some trust horses, but I shall trust in the name of the Lord.

SPEAKER_01 26:21

It's something that happens over time. So hear me, Dan. Don't be surprised if your kids don't trust you fully like they should. If with our walk with God is something that happens over time to be fully trusting of Him, what makes us think that our kids are gonna always 100% totally embrace us in trust? It happens over time. And if the Lord gives us patience when it comes to our trust in Him, why are we not doing the same with our children? Let me close with this. I saw a great story. I actually had a bunch of them, but I saw a really good one that I just had to say. It's a story about a stepfather shared by this stepson. He met him at seven years old, but his biological father was not involved in his life, and he just really had a hard time just trusting any kind of father figure at all. The stepfather married his mother, but he respected the boundary of this child. And slowly but surely he just simply did the things he was expected to do. Over the years, he taught him how to throw a football, taught him how to shoot a basketball, taught him how to hit and throw a baseball, taught him different things to navigate through life. Over the years, he was at his games, his track meets, celebrated his achievements. When he graduated from high school, along with the whole family, he cried too. But then later on in life, when he got in his 20s, he would have a mental health incident which required inpatient care. And who showed up? His stepfather was there. And the stepson told the stepfather, he said, I've never told you this. I've always struggled with loving a father figure. He said, But you've never given me any reason not to love you. I I want you to know I love you and I appreciate you like a dad. And I had to write it down. And here's what he said to his stepson. He says, You are my son, even if it's not by blood. Love is something that happens over the years. It's not something that's instant. It's trust. It's step by step every day. And sometimes that's hard for us as brothers, guys. Hear me well. I don't need you to say amen, sisters. It's hard for us. Because a lot of times that man side will rise up in us. Oh, he thinks he's gonna talk to me like I don't need y'all to say amen, ladies. Hush. Serious. And the first thing we want to do as men, you don't know who to blankety blank. You talk, I'm the man, I'm the man up in this mug. And I'm saying you need to put that brother down. And you need to step back. And you need to pray. And then you need to go at it again. And then if they act again, you need to step back again. You need to put that brother down. And you need to pray again. And then you need to go at it again, and you keep going at them, and you keep going at them, and you keep going at them. And then over the years, something will begin to break in them. Pastor, why should I do that? Because that's exactly what God does with us. Don't tell me you've always walked with God. Don't tell me you've always praised Him. There were times you said, God, I don't want to hear nothing from you. And God didn't go off and say, You know what? I'm done with you. But you know what God did? He stepped back. I'm gonna preach all this. And he waited. And then he saw another opportunity. And he started to minister in our life. We pushed him away again. God stepped back, okay? I'm gonna let you have your way. And he waited. And then he stepped in.

SPEAKER_00 30:37

And over the years, and as we got of order, as we tried to reject him, we began to see he really wasn't trying to reject us. He really loved us. And now we know something about God. If God did that for us, we ought to do that for our children and love them like fathers.

SPEAKER_01 31:01

And those are the good steps. Or the steps, I should say, of a good father. Let's close with a word of prayer. Father, we bless you and thank you again for your word. I thank you for every dad here today. Thank you for the fathers that are online listening and watching. I know it hadn't been easy. I know it's been difficult. But Lord, I believe you're with us every step of the way. And Lord, I pray that the way you have ministered in our lives, that you would do the same with us with our kids. Patience, the strength, the truth, but the compassion. Sometimes we have to wait prayerfully. And Lord, when you open those doors, let us remember how you stepped in our lives in the same way. Let us not forget that. And we'll surely give you the glory. I just thank you for every dad here today. And I pray that He is mightily encouraged to continue the journey no matter where he is as a father, whether it's toddlers, elementary, middle school, high school, or adult children. He would be the father that I know you're calling all of us to be. Help us to be the best fathers for our children. And I know we'll turn this thing around for you. In Jesus' name. And everybody say it. Amen. Come on, give the Lord a hand clap of praise.