I hope you all had a great father’s day.  I know I did.  I am very proud of my three boys and how they are maturing day by day and week by week.  But fatherhood is hard and it takes effort to raise children.  Sometimes I think raising kids may be getting harder in today’s culture, but then I consider fathers down through the ages.  They all had different,difficult crises to deal with and who knows whether our crises are harder or not than theirs.  I am sure they did not think raising us was easy either.  The main job is still the same: how to raise selfish, sinful, ignorant boys and girls to be selfless, godly, knowledgeable young men and women who will be able to repeat this task with their own children.  And there is no formal training and differing opinions on how to do this.  It is hands on training, in real time, and often we find ourselves “flying by the seat of our pants”.

It was no different with Joseph in the Bible either as we saw a bit in yesterday’s sermon.  Raising a perfect son was not much different from raising an imperfect one.  You need love, patience, and a lot of wisdom from someone far greater then us: our heavenly father.  So do not get discouraged if your children do not turn out as well as Joseph’s son did.