Day 11

 

If It's Good Enough for My Father

 

"These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up."

 

Deuteronomy 6:6-7

 

Paula's dad was an alcoholic. He had been known to be a little violent when he was drunk. Paula was in high school and had learned to fear her father. Her greatest fear was that her dad would one day hurt her younger brother.

 

I was in college and Paula was my friend. She would call me up on the phone and we would discuss her fears. She told me,  "I have seen what alcohol can do. I will never touch a drop."

 

Sometime later I heard that someone had to go to a local club in the middle of the night and give Paula a ride home. She was drunk. I called to see what had happened. I told her, "Why, of all people, knowing what alcohol can do to you, why did you go out and get drunk?"

 

I'll never forget her answer. "If it's good enough for my father, it's good enough for me."

 

Obviously it wasn't good for her father or for her. At the time, as young as I was, I couldn't understand it. Now, I know that way too often parents pass down things to kids that should never be passed down.

 

God's plan is that we should pass down a heritage of faith to our kids. His commands are to be ingrained in our hearts and demonstrated in our actions so that our children cannot help but catch them and own them for themselves. We are to go beyond just hoping they catch them though. We are to systematically teach them. This is primarily a parent's job not the church's job.

 

In Exodus 20 with the command to not make idols, God warns that the sins of a father can last generations. The Bible also teaches that we all have free wills. Paula did not have to choose to follow her father's footsteps. His actions just made her making the right choice a lot more difficult.

 

Years and years after this happened I got a phone call from Paula. By that time I had made several moves and was living in a different state so how she got my phone number I'll never know. She called to tell me that after years away from God she had had straightened her life out. She had a child of her own and had married a good Christian man. I was delighted to hear it. Now she can pass down the right kind of heritage to her child.

 

Upon Further Review:

 

Read Deuteronomy 6:1-25

• What is the command that Jesus will later say is the greatest command? (v.5)
• To what lengths were they to go to in order to teach the commands to their children?
• What were they to be careful not to forget? 

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