Culture of the Kingdom
Today’s Topic: Fellowship: Patriarchal Order Part 2: Spiritual Fatherhood
Scripture: 1 Corinthians 4:14-21; Matthew 28:17-19;
Greetings Kingdom Citizens
God appoints spiritual fathers in the lives of the children of God to mature them, and instruct them in righteousness, correct them, to approve them, to encourage them. Now these aspects of the spiritual father are accomplished and done by humans who God appoints. This is why Paul can say to the Corinthians: “I write these things to you as my beloved sons and I have begotten you through the gospel” (1 Corinthians 4:14,15). Now pastoring has taken on a unique shape and form in the church that is not helping to promote the culture of the Kingdom. Scripturally, pastoring is one of the descriptive functions of the spiritual father. It is what a father does. Let me give you a small example. The first pastor in your life or should be, is your biological father. Now of course if you did not know who or were not able by the hand of God to be reared by your biological father, then it is that man God sends in his place to serve as a father figure in the home. Now where did we get this concept of youth pastors and youth ministers? Well when fathers stop teaching at home and the mindset in the home is that we go to church to learn about God, the man then tries to outsource his responsibility given to him by God in Ephesians 6:4, to the church and make it the church’s responsibility to teach Christ to the child. This mentality has given rise to the development of the youth pastor when in actuality the youth pastor should be the father in the home. Now I am not downing youth pastors because even in my local church where I serve and work with youth from another 40+ churches, I have been given grace to teach the Kingdom of God and establish order in the lives of these youth. So thank God that He has provided men in the Body of Christ to be in place and serve as these spiritual fathers. However, and this is a big however, just because God does that and provides that on a local level, it does not take the responsibility away from the father and fathers will be held responsible for the upbringing of their household. Just like Adam was held responsible, so shall the fathers of the home be held responsible. So how does spiritual fatherhood work?
Spiritual fatherhood is steeped in the concept of discipling people. Discipling people begins with receiving those who God sends you. So far we should be okay. But here is where it begins to go wrong for the church, the first step or element of spiritual fatherhood is God assigning who the father is and who the sons are. Now if you do not establish or know that we can stop the message here. I had the privilege to work with over 40 youth (High school, middle school and college) students over one week and I asked the question: “Do you know who your spiritual father on Earth is?” Seems like a heavy question but as born again believers under the pastors they should know or have been taught about who their spiritual fathers are. Whether it be their biological or non-biological fathers, they should have been taught or know who it is. So if you do not know who your spiritual father is, forget about maturing in the Kingdom because that is exactly how God matures you.
When Adam sinned in the Garden it produced a condition on the Earth that is the most devastating condition to man and it is Fatherlessness. Now we talked about this once before. But I want to revisit it because when it created Fatherlessness, it also created orphans. The worst thing that can happen to a nation is that it be lead by an orphan. Let me show you this and we will talk about orphans in the next message.
Isaiah 3:4,5,12: “And I will give children to be their princes (rulers) and babes (immature) shall rule over them. And the people shall be oppressed, everyone by another, and everyone by his neighbor: the child shall behave himself proudly (arrogance) against the ancient (elder), and the base against the honorable. 12: As for my people, children (orphans) are their oppressors, and women rule over them. O my people, they which lead thee cause thee to err, and destroy the way of thy paths”
Do we see the devastating effects of the orphan on the land? It is time for the spiritual fathers to be revealed and for the sons of God to come into the knowledge of who their spiritual father is.
At the Father’s Service,
Elder Calvin Calhoun Jr.
