Living Truthfully With Your Children

The sermon begins by presenting a grave social crisis in Hong Kong and many other countries: millions of children grow up without a father or with a father who refuses responsibility. Statistics show that 63% of youth suicides come from fatherless homes, 90% of runaway and homeless children come from fatherless homes, 85% of children with behavioral disorders come from fatherless homes, and 85% of youth in prison grew up without a father. These devastating statistics demonstrate that the absence of a father is a pressing social problem requiring urgent attention.

However, the Gospel brings good news for those who grow up without an earthly father: when they believe and receive Jesus Christ as Savior, they are adopted by God and have Him as their Father. No other religion allows people to address the Almighty as "Father" as does Christianity. The Apostle Paul writes that believers do not receive a spirit of fear but a spirit of adoption, enabling them to cry out "Abba! Father!" and the Holy Spirit bears witness with their spirit that they are children of God (Romans 8:15-16). Similarly, in Galatians, Paul teaches that believers are children of God through faith in Christ, and because they are children, God has sent the Spirit of His Son into their hearts, making them no longer slaves but sons and heirs (Galatians 3:26; 4:6-7).

The most important characteristic of God is that He is truth, and in Him there is no deception. The three persons of the Godhead from eternity have never deceived one another but rather exist in perfect truth because God is truth and reality. The opposite of truth is deception, and Scripture teaches that Satan is the father of all lies—from the beginning he was a murderer and does not stand in truth (John 8:44). Scripture also teaches that "every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change" (James 1:17). This fact—that God is a perfectly truthful Father who never changes or deceives—is reason enough to teach fathers in Christ that they must live honestly and authentically, without hypocrisy or deceit.

Therefore, fathers must live truthfully and speak truthfully with their wives and children. If a father lives differently in public than at home—saying one thing but doing another, living one way at home but differently in society, behaving properly in church but using ungodly language at work—that is deception. In daily life, everyone needs people who live authentically: mechanics, car salesmen, doctors, and dentists. What is the most important quality of one who teaches God's Word if not truth? When believers look at the pulpit and see only a hypocrite with a double face, their ears and hearts surely close. The same applies to the family: spouses cannot live together without trust, let alone experience happiness. This sermon does not come from the experience of a perfect father without fault or lies, but rather is the sincere reflection of a father who has made many mistakes in raising his children. What is different is that this father intentionally listens to God's Word, receives correction and rebuke, and chooses to change.

Scripture affirms the necessity and blessing for children when one lives with integrity: "The righteous who walks in his integrity—blessed are his children after him!" (Proverbs 20:7). This is the greatest legacy a father can leave—not to do everything at any cost for his children's sake, but to live with integrity, live truthfully, without hypocrisy or deception. If a father lives with integrity, his children will be blessed. Concrete evidence of such authentic living is seen in the life of the Apostle Paul with the believers of the church at Thessalonica. Though he stayed in Thessalonica for only a short time (approximately three weeks to three months), Paul established a church and wrote letters showing that the believers there knew his real life intimately—not through the reports of others but through direct observation. The Thessalonian believers knew how Paul lived, how he dealt with them like a father with his children, encouraging, comforting, and urging them to live worthy of God. Throughout Paul's epistles, 1 Thessalonians uses the phrase "you know" or "you remember" at least ten times, and most of these refer not to abstract knowledge but to direct experience from living with Paul. Paul is living proof of what a person who lives authentically, without hypocrisy or double-facedness, can accomplish in making a lasting impression on those around them in a short time.