The San Diego Zoo acquired a few young elephants in the early 1980’s. These elephants were young males. These elephants were on their best behavior for a while. They eventually became rowdy! They would fight, chase the zoo keepers at feeding time and generally just be very difficult to handle. No one knew what to do. So the idea was to buy an old adult male to put into the enclosure with them. So that is what the zoo officials did. And then it happened! The old male had one tough day with the younger males. On day 2, everything changed. To quote the Bible, the older male “taught them the way more perfectly.” He changed their behavior. Those younger males needed an older male influence. Every family needs the good influence of a strong man. On this day, we celebrate the Fathers of our Homes in our Nation.
God has told us that Fathers are important. A healthy family has a strong father, a strong mother and children learning how to be strong. Psalm 103:13- “Like as a father pitieth his children, so the LORD pitieth them that fear him.” We as fathers often have pity on our family. We see the hardship of our wife as she lives in a difficult world and it hurts us. We see the frustration of growth of our child and wish we could help more. That also hurts us. As we have compassion toward those in our family, the father is not weak. When we have compassion toward others we are just like God, our stronghold. Try to image how God wishes He could help and at time just do it for us! A strong father in this world is very important.
We can see the benefit our family has with a strong father. A father provides for his family. A father protects his family. A father loves his family. A father laughs with his family. A father spends time with his family. I’d like to add this- It is a good thing for the children in the house to see a father hold his wife’s hand, kiss her and hear him say “I Love You”.
Most importantly- our families need a strong fathers to lead his family to Heaven. Give your family the example to follow Jesus as your first priority.
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