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Pastor Jay's Blog

Father’s day: An unneeded holiday for an unneeded person?

 

Unintended consequences are the thorn in the side of every good intention. Simply because intentions are good, does not mean the idea is good. I have heard of people trying to raise raccoons, only to be mauled by them. George Washington died in large part due to bloodletting, which was a standard medical practice of the day. These and countless other activities have led to disastrous effects, but certainly not because of bad intentions.

We are living in the middle of a moral revolution seeking to redefine marriage. Not everyone swept up in this revolution and supporting gay marriage has evil intentions. Evil rarely comes in such a blatant package. You won’t find anyone saying, “We are striving to cause relational havoc in children by removing fathers or mothers through same-sex marriage.” Only the most hardened people live their lives regularly intending to injure people and cause destruction. Because there are not many hardened people sold over to darkness, Satan has to work in the realm of deceit. This is why he is the father of lies. He conceals evil within good intentions. The good intentions of this moral revolution revolve around the ideas of equality, commitment, and love. These are the desires that are often expressed in the promotion of same-sex marriage. Who could ever be against equality, commitment, and love?

The problem then, is unintended consequences. God has warned us about them. God has promised blessing if we trust His design. But Satan muffles those warnings. He makes promises he can’t and never intends to keep; but which encourage people to lean on their own understanding instead of God’s. When one begins to apply these good intentioned ideals of equality, commitment, and love to situations and contexts that are outside of God’s ordained design, unintended consequences will come. This is the reason so many people are left wondering why such painful realities keep coming out of their good ideas.

One of the unintended consequences of same-sex marriage is the damage of denying children either a father or a mother. Father’s day exists for a reason. Mother’s day exists for a reason. Children need fathers and children need mothers. But same-sex marriage obliterates fatherhood and motherhood. What same-sex marriage puts in their place is love from two people. Same-sex marriage says that you don’t need a father or a mother; duel-parent love from whatever gender those two people might be will suffice. However, this does not correspond to anything we know about children and parenting. There is a mountain of family studies from a broad spectrum of researchers who confirm over and over again the need for fathers in the home. Children flourish when they have a father and a mother. Does not common sense tell us this as well? In simple terms, boys need to know what a father is and does so that he knows what to strive for. Boys also need to know what a mother is and does, not only to differentiate, but to know how to relate to the opposite sex and what to look for in a mate. This applies for girls as well. Same-sex marriage removes a gender from parenting and creates a void that stunts a child’s relational growth, understanding, and security. The intentions may be good, but the unintended consequences of denying children a father or a mother will be felt in the long run.

Can children survive such a void? Children survive in broken homes all the time. But the goal in childrearing is never survival, it is thriving. Out of love, the church must set forth God’s design for marriage and parenting. It does that through teaching, counseling, and the fellowship needed to work it out in real life. The gospel restores broken hearts, broken lives, and broken homes. God can use a body of believers to meet a variety of needs, even the need of fathers and mothers for those who lost theirs.

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