Chariot April 2006 - Norm Wakefield  

Two new individual messages by Norm now available on CD and MP3, Anchored in Christ and Resurrection of Life
http://www.spiritofelijah.com

Sowing and Reaping

     We express our tremendous gratitude for those of you who contributed to  the Spirit of Elijah Ministries, International as an expression of your love and encouragement by helping to provide with the funds necessary for the South Korea trip this past month. God's provision through you all has not only been an answer to prayer but a direct encouragement to us in preaching God's Word. Thank you! A report of the South Korea trip (currently underway, Norm returns May 5th) is forthcoming soon. Your prayers are greatly coveted.

The Calling Out of Sons – Part 5

    Last month, we gleaned two insights from Luke 3 about calling out our sons into manhood. We noticed that:

·         By the age of twelve a son needs to be involved with his dad.

·         A father needs to establish his son's identity with himself in his father's house.

    Jesus' relationship with His Father provides more insights for fathers in preparing their sons for manhood. Luke 4:1-14 reveals important issues for fathers and sons to walk through together. After Jesus was baptized, His father led Him into the wilderness to be tested and prepared for His public ministry. Let's continue to observe what the Father of Christ did with His son.

Luke 4:1 Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led around by the Spirit in the wilderness

Luke 4:2 for forty days, being tempted by the devil. And He ate nothing during those days, and when they had ended, He became hungry.

Insight Number Three: A father needs to be the son's source to prepare the way for God being the source of his life.

    Jesus was full of His Father's Spirit after His baptism and therefore could be led by His Father's will. This gives insight in what we are to do with our sons. As the Heavenly Father led His Son, so we must lead our sons. We want to fill them with all that we are in Christ. Just as the Son of God knew He had the heart of His Father, so our sons should know they have our hearts. God has given them an earthly relationship to prepare the way for the spiritual relationship to come.

    Who better to lead a son to the Heavenly Father than his own earthly father? Many men may answer that question by suggesting, "The youth minister or pastor." However, no one has the day-to-day availability like a father, and a young boy inherently knows his father is to be his guide. Even if a father has outstanding weaknesses, he should be encouraged by how the Father of Jesus Christ trained his own Son. He gave Him an earthly father.

    Inherent in the concept of father is the idea of genesis, or source. Young men should think of their fathers as their God-given source. You came from him. You were in him. Your very life principle was in your father, and that was by God's design and appointment. You have been irrevocably called to be the son of your biological father. And a father, God has also irrevocably called you to be your son's earthly source of guidance in life. As a father, you must reveal to your son that it is God's way for a son to be prepared for the Lord by submitting himself to you. He must learn to obey. He must learn to do everything you say. Now is the time when he practices that. If he practices being stiff-necked with you, where will such an attitude lead him in the future at work or with God's Word?

    God's way of preparing a young man for a relationship with Him is through the father/son relationship. As sons, we need to practice looking to someone who shows us how to live–our fathers. One of a father's goals should be to faithfully demonstrate sonship to his Heavenly Father before his children. In that way he leads his children and prepares them for relationship with the Heavenly Father.

    Have you ever considered that the Lord was trained for manhood by being in subjection to two sinners? After the encounter in the temple at age 12, we're told Jesus subjected himself to Joseph and Mary until he was 30! Think about that the next time you don't think you can submit to someone unless they're qualified. God can work through the weaknesses and sins of men to bring about His will. Can you subject yourself to someone you know is not as good as you, or someone who doesn't know what you know, or someone whose blind spots and problems are obvious? It is vital that a son learn to do so. If a young man doesn't learn to subject himself to his father, he may struggle with authority the rest of his life. He may later excuse insubordination to leaders who aren't perfect in his eyes and bring destruction to himself and his family.

    Would you put a man in leadership who had never demonstrated that he could follow? Probably not. You put a man in leadership who has displayed loyalty, submission, selflessness, and an ability to surrender his own self-ambition for the sake of another. Experience tells us that a man who will not be a follower is a man who will be unmanageable. Certainly you don't want that millstone around your son's neck.

    One of the most destructive things a young man can do is not submit to his father, to the one God has appointed as his source of guidance to the Heavenly Father. Manhood boot camp requires harnessing self-will and self-ambition. Of course, this can't happen without a relationship with the Holy Spirit, The Great Sanctifier, who leads a young man to put to death his flesh (Romans 8:12-14). God will use a young man's relationship with his father to confront the sin, which will punctuate his need for the power of the Holy Spirit in his life.

    A father must lead his son by his spirit, a spirit that's dependent upon God, with a view to preparing his son for God's purpose. We know if our sons are going to be useful for God, they must learn to listen to their fathers in preparation for listening to God. Many realize the importance of this because of personal experience. Many of their struggles in life relate to this issue. They struggle with God telling them what to do or with God giving situations that are uncomfortable. I'm suggesting that many responses were developed in our relationships with our fathers when we were children and young adults. We want to give our sons a different legacy. So remember this third insight: A father needs to be the son's source to prepare the way for God being the source of his life.

Insight Number Four: A father needs to lead his son to be attentive to, to depend upon, and to obey his word.

Luke 4:3 And the devil said to Him, "If You are the Son of God, tell this stone to become bread."

Luke 4:4 And Jesus answered him, "It is written, ‘MAN SHALL NOT LIVE ON BREAD ALONE.'"

    In tempting the Son of God, the Devil aimed his attack at Jesus' source of power–His relationship with his Father, "If you are the Son of God…" Our adversary knows if he can separate us from God's ordained source of power and get us to act independently of Him, sin is inevitable. Worldly wisdom encourages a young man to be independent. Manhood from a worldly perspective involves self-confidence and self-actualization. But God's way to manhood is exactly the opposite: Trust in God to work through your father and learn to be dependent on and obey his every word.

    Look at this first temptation carefully. Satan's suggestion to Jesus to transform the stone into bread, in essence, was to suggest that He act separately from His Father. "Make yourself happy and comfortable, Jesus. Get yourself out of this difficult situation. Use your power for yourself, for your own ends." Jesus' answer is enlightening. Matthew gave the full sense of what was in the heart of the Son of God, "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God" (Matthew 4:4). Jesus Christ was so dependent on His Father that every word from His Father's mouth was more important than physical food. We might understand Jesus to be saying that He would eat when His Father told him to eat, or He would turn the stone into bread when His Father told Him to do so.

    Fathers, how important to you is your son's response to your words? Can you see that one of the most important things you can do to prepare your son for manhood is to train him to listen to and obey your words? True eternal life is living by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. This may arguably be the most difficult aspect of calling out your son. It takes constant attentiveness on our parts as fathers, and it takes the greatest amount of self-restraint and self-control on the part of the sons. Repeatedly, we are going to ask our sons to do something we know is not going to be happy and comfortable for them if we're going to train them for life. We can't allow them to ignore our words when we speak and expect them to become responsible, faithful men of God.

    Consider how God calls His sons out to Himself. He creates situations which make them totally uncomfortable, which call for the greatest amount of self-control and dependence upon the Word of God. This trains them to be more attentive to the Word of God than anything else. Before a son can really be a man, he must reject the worldly attitude that the goal in life is to be happy and comfortable. Instead he must learn to live by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.

    The best prep for being sons of God is being sons of fathers! You can see how it prepares them for the Lord if fathers and sons have this understanding. Then when the Lord comes and speaks to the sons, hearts are prepared and ready to hear His word.

Fathers speak God's Word

    If we stress to our sons the importance of listening to our words, we feel the responsibility of speaking words that are from the Lord. Jesus trusts his Father to always speak what is right. Can our sons trust in us to always speak what is right? For this to happen, we must practice the very same attentiveness and selflessness we are asking of our sons. We must live by the Word of God! When we speak to, teach, or train our sons, they need confidence that we are leading them in wisdom, truth, and love.

    How well do you know God's Word? Not everyone can be a gifted speaker or teacher, but there's no excuse for anyone not knowing what God's Word says about how to live life. God's Word is available to us, and there are many resources today to help find out what it says about any subject or situation. Furthermore, if we don't know what God's Word says about something, most of us know someone who can answer our questions.

    However, knowledge of God's Word isn't all there is to speaking God's Word. Surely you've heard the old adage, "Actions speak louder than words." Most people don't care what we know unless they observe sincerity and integrity in our lives. That's why it is vital that a son be around his father in order to see the reality of his relationship with Jesus Christ. A father's attentiveness and dependence upon Christ provides the authority for his spoken words to his children. When we realize that our testimony before our children may be the foundation for their receptivity of our words and ultimately God's Word, we should be motivated to pursue a sanctifying relationship with Jesus Christ.

    This process of calling out our sons becomes a process whereby God calls us out as His sons. Are there wilderness situations in your life right now? Situations where you feel like you are starving–needy? Listen to the Lord! He may be saying, "This is just where I want you, son, because I am making a man out of you. I am getting the little boy out of you so you learn to live by My Word."

    We must be men of God who live by His Word in order to raise sons who will become men of God who live by His Word. We can only call our sons out to what we are. This humbles us and makes us dependent on the Lord, doesn't it? Perhaps as you have read this article, a greater awareness of your need to depend on God's Word has developed. I invite you to take a few moments and repent to the Lord for being inattentive or stubborn in your relationship with Him, if that has been the case. Thank Him for His patience and forgiveness in Christ and set your heart to live and speak what God says for, "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God."

Join us at a Summer Family Camp!

    Some of the best family memories may be built at a summer family camp. Spiritual encouragement, family activities, and wonderful fellowship with families with similar values and vision make family camp a highlight of the year. This summer I'll be speaking at two family camps and invite you to join us.

June 23-30 – Camp Spofford in Spofford, NH

August 19-26 – Horn Creek Conference Center in Westcliffe, CO             (www.horncreek.org)

Would you like to be on the Elijah Ministries Prayer Team?

    The backbone of Elijah Ministries is the prayer team who pray diligently for God to turn the hearts of men to Himself, their wives, and their children. Before I leave to speak, I send out a prayer team invitation to those who will intercede for God to work for His glory in us as a team for the Kingdom. Not only is it a blessing to those whom I speak and myself; but it is also a reminder to the team about the direction of their own hearts. If you would like to enter into the labor together with me, you may go to my website and click on "Prayer Team".

    If you haven't visited our website, www.spiritofelijah.com, please stop by sometime. You'll find:

*   Resources to equip you and your family

*   Previous Chariot articles

*   Norm's speaking schedule

*   Free MP3 downloads  

*   Various pages translated and available in Spanish  

*   An online store to purchase resources and make tax-free contributions by credit card