Made Me Do For Love

Made Me Do for Love 1 John 3:1; 4:7-16 Cascades Fellowship CRC, JX MI June 19, 2005 Father’s Day 2005 One of my favorite songs in the world is sung by Bobby Caldwell – I am not sure he is the original artist, but his is the version I know. The song is titled “What You Would Not Do for Love.” Now that sounds like a strange title, but those of us who have even been infatuated – much less head-over-heels in love understand that title all to well. Something happens to our blood chemistry when we become infatuated or fall in love. We start doing weird stuff, things we would never do in our right mind. I remember a Star Trek: Voyager where one of the characters describes the first blush of love as a sickness. She recites the symptoms like a litany from a flyer on the flu.

Elevated body temperature, flushed skin, dilation of the

circulatory system, nausea, sleeplessness. Sounds fun doesn’t it? No wonder we like romance so much. Love does something to us – it changes us. It softens rough edges, it puffs up sagging courage, it strengthens weakened hands and weakens strong knees. It refocuses our attention, changes our values, alters our desires and dreams. In a very real sense, love makes a new person out of us. Try as we might to be the same old person we were before we became smitten, it just doesn’t work out that way.

In the song by Bobby Caldwell he sings, “My friends wonder what is wrong with/ Cause I’m in a daze from your love you see/ I came back to let you know/ Got a thing for you and I can’t let go…. Although I only want the best, it’s true/ I can’t believe the things I do for you./ What you won’t do, you do for love/ You’ve tried everything and you won’t give up./ In my world there is only you/ Made me do for love what I would not do.” Have you ever been there? You just can’t believe the things you do for a person – the changes you go through just to see his or her smile? Boy, I have – thankfully Rachel likes weirdoes and screwballs, so all the changes in me were for the better, but they were changes I never thought I would make nonetheless. And if that were the only time we had a major shift in our values and thinking, that would be enough. But then, another one of life’s big moments come along. You become a parent and once again, everything changes. All the rules change once kids come on to the scene – nothing is ever the same after that. I remember when Abby was first born, I was a mite overwhelmed by the enormity of it all. Suddenly, it dawned on me that I had no idea about what I was doing. I tried to think about what my mom and dad did, but I was the youngest, so I never watched them deal with an infant. I began to wonder how they dealt with the responsibility. Here was this little human life, and God was asking, “I want you to help me shape this one into a useful vessel.” I was terrified! Sure, fatherhood had been tried by billions before me, but this was my first at bat and I

felt like I was holding the wrong end of the bat and facing the backstop! What if I screwed her up so bad it would take an army of therapists, a warehouse of drugs and a library of self-help books to straighten out what I had twisted? Becoming comfortable in the skin of fatherhood did not even seem like a remote possibility. Parenthood is a massive – even a cosmic responsibility. We all go into it, I think, with more questions than answers. You can read everything available and still face situations as a parent for which you have no clue on a regular basis. Parenting is not easy, whether you are a mother or father, doesn’t matter. It is tough. But there is something about being a father that is unique. I realize the same can be said of being a mother as well, but this isn’t mother’s day. It is Father’s Day, so this morning I want to talk specifically to the fathers, but also more generally to everyone, so don’t check out just because you’re not a father. While looking at fatherhood this week in preparation for this sermon, I came across a site that listed the benefits of having and being father. Listen to the things that I have high-lighted in this report. [read report] What is it about fatherhood that makes it so special? Why do statistics show that the decline of our youth culture correlates perfectly to the increase of father absenteeism and single parent homes? What does a father do that makes him such an important part of the family unit – really an indispensable part? I think part of the answer finds it root in the Fatherhood of God. When I look at this morning’s text, I find three principles of fatherhood that can be easily understood and with some effort applied in our own lives as fathers. For those

who are not fathers, these principles are still applicable – they are universal in scope, but particularly challenging for fathers.

We can learn much from the

Fatherhood of God. The first principle I find is that God supplies security for his children by providing them with an identity. Now that sounds very cerebral, but it is actually quite simple. Look with me at 1 John 3:1. How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him.1 Notice two things about John’s statement here. The first is that he seems to be suddenly overwhelmed by the enormity of God’s love. And it is not some sort of fuzzy, esoteric, abstract idea of love. John’s animation comes from a realization – a concrete reality of being loved by God. I have to ask – when was the last time you stopped in your tracks and said, “Wow! God loves me!” How long has it been since the reality of God’s love has hit you like a ton of bricks? If the answer to that question leaves us a little uncomfortable – or worse yet, a little bored – maybe we ought take a hard look at our relationship with God. Now, what is it that John sees or understands that makes him so certain of God’s love and its enormity? “…That we should be called the children of God!” Back about a year ago, my neighbor’s uncle was caught in bad auto crash that burned over 60% of his body. The uncle recently died as a result of complications. Jim and I talk about a lot of things, but rarely about extended 1 All Scripture texts taken from The New International Version, (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House) 1984.

family. But the day after the accident I knew to ask Jim about whether anyone in his family had been injured in a car accident recently. How? Was it some sort of premonition or angelic visitation that revealed it to me? No. Nothing so fantastic. I read about the accident in the paper and recognized that the victim shared a last name with my neighbor. I identified the accident victim with my neighbor through his name. When our children are born, if our name is Smith, we don’t name them Vander Lay – although in West Michigan we might be tempted to so that your kid fits in. No, our last name is given to them. Why? To identify them with us. Before our children distinguish themselves in any other way, we set them apart from every other child in the maternity ward by giving them our name.

We

provide them a place in the world by giving them an identity. In a very real sense, that is what God does when he calls us; he provides us an identity that distinguishes us from the rest of humanity. He calls us his children, the ones born to him who carry his name like a banner. He identifies us with himself, so we can be certain of his love for us – because God would never deny himself.

We can sing with the psalmist in Psalm 27:10, “Though my

mother and father forsake me, the Lord will receive me.” We can be that certain of God’s love, we can be excited about God’s love because he has made it real by calling us his children.

The second principle of Fatherhood arising out of this text that explains the importance of fathers is embodying the values and character you want in your children. A strange dog once came to a preacher’s house, and his three sons soon became quite fond of it. It so happened that there were three white hairs in the animal’s tail. One day an advertisement was seen in the newspaper about a lost dog which fitted that description perfectly. “In the presence of my three boys,” said the minister, “we carefully separated the three white hairs and removed them.” The real owner discovered where the straying canine had found a home and came to claim him. The dog showed every sign of recognition, so the man was ready to take him away. Quickly the minister spoke up, “Didn’t you say the dog would be known by three white hairs in its tail?” The owner, unable to find the identifying feature, was forced to leave. The minister said later, “we kept the dog, but I lost my three boys for Christ.” His sons no longer had confidence in what their father professed. He hadn’t practiced what he preached. 2 The apostle John, in writing to followers of Christ who were having some trouble distinguishing between those professing a true Christianity and those proclaiming a false one, wanted to clarify for his readers who they should be listening to and hanging out with.

Like we might do with our daughters in

2Tan, Paul Lee, Encyclopedia of 7,700 Illustrations, (Garland, Texas: Bible Communications, Inc.) 1996.

teaching them to date the right sort of men or pick the right sort of friends, John explains how we can identify the real servants of God. It’s all in the love, he says. God is love, he is the source, the well-spring of love. He is more than love; he is the source of love, the originator, the Grand Master of Love. Love finds its genesis in the heart of God. Just as goodness, holiness, justice and even life find their origination in God. God is love because without him, love would not -- could not -- exist. Essentially, John is telling his readers that if you want to know who a child belongs to watch what he does because the adage “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree” is more than just an old-wives tale. Look at vv. 7-8 of chapter 4. “Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.

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Whoever does not love

does not know God, because God is love.” Fathers, this should bring us up cold in our tracks. When we realize that what we are imprinting on our children is not so much what we say, but what we do …. Oh man, is that a scary thought. What has your children seen in you that has become etched upon their heart and soul? What habits, what behaviors, what values have you passed on – possibly without even meaning to? The other day Abby was walking through the house and suddenly exclaimed, “Dag-nabbit!” This caught my ear because few people in the world say, “Dag-nabbit!” I am one of those few. I never sat down with Abby and taught

her when and how to say it. She knew by watching me. Now, the real question is will she learn anything of value by watching me. O Lord, I pray so. The final principle of fatherhood I see arising from our passage is that a father’s love holds nothing in reserve. Look with me at vv. 9-10 of chapter 4. “This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him.

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This is love: not that we

loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.” We live in a day where everything is economized. We carefully guard our time, budgeting our minutes like they were our last hand-full of pennies 2 days before payday.

Whether we are talking about money or personal space or

anything in between, we are usually taught to reserve some for ourselves – to hold some back in reserve for our own purposes. We are taught that this is wise. If that is wisdom, then fathers ought to be fools. Let me ask you, what did our Heavenly Father hold in reserve?

What did he hold back for himself?

Nothing. He gave everything – including his one and only Son to secure our adoption as children.

He held nothing back, but went all out to ensure his

children were provided for. I am struck that in Ephesians 5, husbands are called to give their lives for their wives, even as Christ gave up his life for the church. I am confident that God intended for men to do that for more than just their wives – I believe he had the whole family in view.

You want to talk about boosting a child’s self-image! The child who sees that his father would do anything – give up anything – for the child, knows he is loved and valued. He understands that he is worth something because the father was willing to give up everything for him. One of the things that Rachel always wanted me to do for her is sing. And I have tried – love will make you do things you otherwise would not do. Quite frankly, I am too reserved to sing publicly – to perform. But then came my girls. Suddenly, I find myself singing to them all the time.

I put aside my

embarrassment, I put aside my own ego and fear of being laughed at, and I sing. I sing at home, I sing in the car, I sing in the store, I sing in the hospital, wherever I am – if I am with my girls – I sing or at least am willing to. I do for love what I would not do. Why? Because that’s what fathers do. They hold nothing in reserve in providing security, identity, and setting an example for their children to follow. Father’s let us love our families with the same love that our Heavenly Father has loved us. Let us hold nothing back, willing to give up everything so that our children know who they are and show to whom they belong by the things they do.