In the last verse of the Old Testament, the prophet Malachi reports that God “will restore the hearts of the fathers to their children and the hearts of the children to their fathers, so that I will not come and smite the land with a curse.” (Malachi 4:6) Clearly, the Israelite families were in trouble. Fathers were not passing on their faith to their children, and the nation had turned away from God because of this failure. Today in the US, we face an even greater crisis. Christians are failing to pass on our faith to the next generation at alarming rates; some estimate that “88% of Christian teens are leaving the church by their second year of college.”1 What is worse is the fact that a rising number of American families do not even include a father, much less one who could pass on his faith to his children.
“In spring 2008, an estimated 13.7 million parents had custody of 21.8 million children under 21 years of age while the other parent lived somewhere else. The 21.8 million children living with their custodial parent represented over one-quarter (26.3 percent) of all 82.8 million children under 21 years old living in families… Mothers accounted for the majority of custodial parents (82.6 percent) while 17.4 percent were fathers.”2 This alarming statistic means that one in four children is living in a single parent household, and the majority of those children are living without fathers. The number of babies born into homes without fathers has increased drastically in the past fifty years. “In 1964, fewer than 10% of babies were born to single mothers. Today that number is above 40 percent for the overall population and even higher among Hispanics and African-Americans (50 and 70 percent respectively).”3 This is a deeply disturbing reality, and the number of single-parent households continues to grow at a depressing speed. “The percentage of children under 18 living with two married parents declined to 66 percent in 2010, down from 69 percent in 2000.”4
The impact of growing up without a father is serious. Many of the children being raised by single mothers face significant poverty, so their lives are physically difficult. “It is estimated that approximately two-thirds of single-parent mothers live below the poverty level.”5 Greater still, however, is the emotional fallout of a fatherless upbringing. Children raised without a father are “4.6 times more likely to commit suicide, 6.6 times more likely to become teenaged mothers (females), 24.3 times more likely to run away,15.3 times more likely to have behavioral disorders, 6.3 times more likely to be in a state-operated institutions, 10.8 times more likely to commit rape (males), 6.6 times more likely to drop out of school, and 15.3 times more likely to end up in prison while a teenager.”6 From Genesis to Malachi, there are thirty-five direct commands or rebukes from God concerning the care of the orphan, the fatherless, and the widow. The God who was so passionate about caring for orphans and widows throughout the Old Testament is surely just as broken-hearted at the plight of single mothers and their children today.
One great crisis facing American families, therefore, is the complete absence of fathers in a rising number of households. Equally disturbing, though not as clearly documented, is the number of children growing up with fathers who are in the home but not necessarily involved in any way in leading the family or raising the children. “As a cultural idea, our inherited understanding of fatherhood is under siege. Men in general, and fathers in particular, are increasingly viewed as superfluous to family life: either expendable or as part of the problem. Masculinity itself, understood as anything other than a rejection of what it has traditionally meant to be male, is typically treated with suspicion and even hostility in our cultural discourse. Consequently, our society is now manifestly unable to sustain, or even find reason to believe in, fatherhood as a distinctive domain of male activity.”7 Whereas fathers used to work alongside their children in the fields and farms, now most fathers work outside of the home for a minimum of forty hours a week. With children’s increased number of extra-curricular activities and the pervasive dependence on television for entertainment and relaxation, any father who wants to spend quality time with his children faces an uphill battle.
Whether fathers are absent entirely or simply absent in terms of spiritual leadership and personal interaction, the impact on children is powerful. It is tempting to think of the destructive wake of fatherlessness as a modern phenomenon, but the Bible is filled with stories of the influence fathers have on the faith of their children. The records of the kings of Israel and Judah offer a litany of wickedness passed down from one generation to the other. And though we fixate on David’s sin with Bathsheba, it is clear from the turmoil of his later years that while he may have been a man after God’s own heart, he was certainly not a godly father. We can trace the failures of human fathers from the favoritism displayed by Isaac and Jacob to the lectures given by Solomon, whose life failed to teach his sons the wisdom he wrote of so eloquently. As a counterpart to these failed human fathers, however, the Old and New Testaments offer a perfect example for us to emulate—our holy, loving, and merciful heavenly Father. It is His example we must follow and teach in order to reconcile and unite fathers and children.
History, culture, and the Bible all reveal that excellent fatherhood is not our default setting as humans. Yet excellent fatherhood is the commanded standard: “And, ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath: but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.” (Ephesians 6:4) Clearly, we must aim for this high standard, and we must rely on the power of the Holy Spirit as we train and encourage fathers to turn their hearts to their children. Luke’s description of John the Baptist underscores how important this restoration of fatherhood is to the people of God. “It is he who will go as a forerunner before Him in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers back to the children, and the disobedient to the attitude of the righteous, so as to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.” (Luke 1:17) God considers holy, discipling relationships between fathers and children as part of righteousness, of being in right relationship with God Himself. “The fifth commandment implied that the home was essentially the school of the community. There, in a ‘world in miniature,’ authority and submission, love and loyalty, obedience and trust could be learned as nowhere else and, with the word of God as guide in the home, society could be changed.”8
Fathers whose hearts are turned toward their children offer the world both a picture of the restorative work of Christ in the hearts of believers and a picture of the loving Father we have in God Himself. It is vital, therefore, that the church work to empower, equip, and encourage fathers in leading their homes, loving their children, and effectively passing on their faith to the next generation.
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1. Voddie Baucham Jr., Family Driven Faith, (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2007), 10.
2. http://www.census.gov/prod/2009pubs/p60-237.pdf
3. http://blog.heritage.org/2010/12/22/fewer-teen-moms-but-more-babies-born-to-single-moms-than-ever/ This article cites statistics from the following report: http://www.heritage.org/Research/Projects/Marriage-Poverty/Marriage-and-Poverty-in-the-US
4. http://www.census.gov/newsroom/releases/archives/families_households/cb10-174.html
5. Jack O. and Judith K. Balswick, The Family (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2007), 313.
6. http://fathersforlife.org/divorce/chldrndiv.htm
7. David Blankenhorn, Fatherless America (New York: Harper Collins, 1995), 2.
8. Joyce Baldwin, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi: an Introduction and Commentary (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1972), 252.
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