A Father to the Fatherless

Thy congregation hath dwelt therein, thou, O God, hast prepared for thy goodness for the poor. The Lord gave the word, great was the company of those that published it. Kings of armies did flee apace, and she that tarried at home divided the spoil. Though ye have lion among the pots, yet shall ye be as the wings of a dove covered with silver, and her feathers with yellow gold.

When the Almighty scattered kings in it, it was white as snow and salmon. The hill of God is as the Hill Of Bashan, and high hill as the Hill Of Bashan. Why leap ye, ye high hills? This is the hill which God desireth to dwell in. Yea, the Lord will dwell in it forever. The chariots of God are 20,000, even thousands of angels, the Lord is among them. As in Sinai in his holy place, thou hast ascended on high, thou hast led captivity captive, thou hast received gifts for men. Yea, for the rebellious also, that the Lord God might dwell among them. Let’s pray together.

Our Lord, we come to you now in the name of the Lord Jesus, and we ask your blessing and help as we study your word, as we try to see truths in this about you. Lord, this whole Psalm is about the Lord God Almighty, about his care for his people and his help for his people and his shepherding of his flock. And so, Lord, help us to learn more about You and, Lord, to instinctively turn to You for our needs and to see You as the answer.

And so, Lord, help us. Give us wisdom. Give us understanding and be our teacher tonight. We ask in Jesus’ name. Amen. Now you’ll notice in verses one and two, actually in verse three as well, it speaks of God’s enemies and also they that hate Him. And it says, let his enemies be scattered and them also them that hate him flee before him. So this idea of of the enemies of God being before God or in front of God.

And then it says, verse two says, as smoke is driven away, so drive them away. As wax melted before the fire, again, you have this this proximity. You have the enemies of God are near God. They’re so near that likes like wax, they’re melting. Okay, so this idea of of of being close to God. So let the wicked perish at, here it is again, the presence of God.

It says, but verse three, but let the righteous be glad, let them rejoice before God, let them exceedingly rejoice. Sing unto God, sing praises to his name, extol him that rideth upon the heavens by his name John, rejoice before him. And so, I just wanna point this out, I wanna really focus on verse number five, but just as as we pass by, notice that the in in both the the first part of the Psalm as well as getting down into verse number three and four, you see both sets of people, you see the enemies of God, as well as the righteous, the saints of God, who are both coming close to God. They’re both approaching God’s presence.

But even though God is the same in both cases, and even though the proximity is the same in both cases, yet the effect is totally different. The bible says this in Proverbs 14 verse 32, the wicked is driven away in his wickedness. There’s that, that’s the first part. But the righteous hath hope in his death. And so when the the wicked draw near to God, the Bible says they melt. Right? That’s what this this is talking. In other words, the idea of judgement and so, obviously, the wicked do not want to draw near to god and you see that starting in Genesis chapter three when Adam and Eve went from innocent to wicked when they sinned against God, and their their first instinct was to do what? To run away from God.

And and so it is with this world, if you wanna kinda summarize the entire history of mankind, you know what it is? It is a bunch of sinners trying their best to get away from God. That’s that’s you that’s what you boil it down to. And it is only when a sinner, when Jesus remember remember what Jesus said, right? Notice, and I know we we pass over this and don’t pay attention to it, and just because we hear it so much. But when Jesus laid the invitation out to the sinner, what did he say? He said, come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden. The idea of come near but that’s the very thing that the natural man, that’s the very thing that the wicked, that the enemies of God, like we see in verses one and two, are not interested in.

They don’t get it close to God. They don’t wanna get close to God. And this is where, and I’ve said this before, but this is where you have this the fact of you you as a believer, sometimes we get far removed from what we were before we knew Christ, and we forget what that was like. When we avoided God, and we avoided everything related to God, and you know, so the idea of going close to God is not something that this world is interested in. So listen, this is why it’s silly to try and use positive methods like that in evangelism.

God is so good, you just wanna I mean, God is good, and that is a fact and part of it. But if you think you’re gonna woo people because because of god is nice and he just wants to give you a big hug, they don’t want god. They don’t want him. They’re trying to find some way to get around him and the reason they won’t get close is because they wanna keep their sin and maintain that, and so they don’t wanna get close to God. This is a well established scriptural fact, doctrinal fact about mankind. We call it the depravity of man, that’s what we’re talking about. Man is wicked, and he’s evil and adverse to God.

Well, one day though, think about it. When you read verse one and two, the Bible says that as wax melted before the fire, so let the wicked perish at the presence of god. There’s one day that they will not have a choice. You know, the Bible says that at the at the judgment before the great white throne, that all the earth and the heavens will have fled away and but there’ll be no place for them. In other words, there’ll be nowhere to run.

And the wicked, small, and great will stand before god and they’ll be in god’s presence and they will not be able to escape that fact. It’s It’s dreadful, and I wanna tell you something. As scriptural fact, I would say that the final judgment, the judgment of the wicked is something that is more dreadful to those people than the eternal punishment that comes after. Now that might be hard for us to wrap our brain around, but anything to get away from God, anything.

I’ll go anywhere, do anything, whatever, just but that is something they’ll never be able to escape. God will bring them into His presence. And you take the saint. You take the saint. Of course, we know what God says to us. He says, draw nigh to God. And it’s the very opposite. In fact, to the wicked, the wicked draw near to God and they melt and they perish. That’s what the that’s what these two verses say. But as the righteous draw nigh to God, draw near to God, they rejoice. That’s what verse three says, but let the righteous be glad. Let them rejoice, what does it say?

Before God. That’s what verse one says, flee before him. Verse three says, rejoice before God. So the wicked get close to God and they melt, the righteous, that’s you as a believer, the righteous get close to God and the closer you get to God, the more joy that there is. If you and I have a lack of joy in our lives, sometimes it’s easy to point to a circumstance that is robbing us of our joy perhaps, maybe a difficulty, right, in our body, in our life, in our money, whatever. We point to that and those things do tend to rob our joy, do they not? And we can point to those things, but and from a human perspective, we get that, right? But really the place when you want that joy restored, the place to get it is to close the distance between you and the Lord.

And that’s where the joy comes from. Close the distance between you and the Lord. Well, that doesn’t take away the problem. It doesn’t. It doesn’t. But it does give you joy back. So that’s the whole thing. The Lord’s presence getting close to God. The wicked want to avoid it, but the saint wants to get closer. What is heaven? We talk about that, we talk about, we’ll see this in little bit maybe, but what is heaven? Heaven is the saint always close to God.

Without the without anything between, without without the flesh, without life, without without any of that, it is the saint drawing close to God being with God forever, being with the Lord Jesus Christ forever, which is why it is such a place of joy and bliss.

If you would look at verse number five and six. This is where I wanna spend a little bit of time tonight, not very long. The Bible says, speaking of God now, a father of the fatherless and a judge of the widows is God in his holy habitation. God saith the solitary in families, He bringeth out those which are bound with chains, but the rebellious dwell in a dry land.

You know, in the Scripture, in the Old and New Testaments, you often find things, and as a student of the Bible, look for things that occur together in scripture. Like, well, there’s lots and lots of things that occur together in scripture. But like you, as an example, heaven and earth, they go together. That can be a study. Or you can go into a lot of things that are like that, but this is one of them.

The fatherless, you might say orphan, the fatherless and the widow. You see them paired in the scripture. In fact, they’re paired some 31 times in the scripture. And in the Old Testament, as well as the New Testament, which of course is built upon the truths of the old Old Testament, there’s a number of commands and and it’s actually built into the structure of civil law in the Old Testament, that Israel was to care for the fatherless and the widows, and was to maintain their justice and not allow them to be oppressed because they were vulnerable.

And so there’s a lot in there about how the Lord looks upon the vulnerable, and not just the fathers and widows, but others that we might think of as vulnerable. The Lord looks upon those with compassion. Man, just if we just meditated on just that one thing of so many, we could see just one more little facet about God and God’s heart toward people. God is a God of compassion.

And when he sees someone who is weak, and when he sees someone who is vulnerable, he is moved with compassion. Know, and you might compare it to you know, when you hear about some some child who’s harmed or something like that. You know, you feel this like this indignation rises up in you, right? It should, indeed it should, but why? Because you see a vulnerable person. You know what that is? That’s reflective, it should, it is reflective of God’s nature toward the vulnerable.

And so, this fatherless and the widows, in both cases, they are destitute, especially in this society. They’re destitute because in the case of the fatherless, he does not have a provider. And in the case of the widow, she does not have a husband, she does not have a provider. In both cases, they’re destitute because daddy and because husband is missing. And that’s, that is usually the one who is providing for the family and protecting the family.

Psalm 27, in this same vein, Psalm 27 verse 10, which we’ve already covered, but it says this, when my father and my mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me up. Now it doesn’t say God is a father to the fatherless, but it carries that same idea. Did you know that this verse, verse number five, is the only verse in the Bible in which God himself is called a to the fatherless. He very often tells Israel and tells the church to take care of the widow and the fatherless, but in this one verse he says, I am a father to the fatherless.

I am a father to the fatherless. Even if a person is fatherless, if God be his father, he can never be truly fatherless. Now, think about the idea of fatherlessness. Now I say that word and what probably comes to your mind is what comes into my mind is not so much orphans as people, the epidemic, we might say of fatherlessness in our country. It’s often cited as a statistic, and that’s a real thing, and I’ll talk about that in a minute.

But first, in this particular verse, when we’re talking about fatherlessness, we’re we’re most directly speaking of someone who has no father in the world at all, maybe through death or maybe through some absence of some kind and so that’s what directly is being spoken of here. The physical destitution resulting from fatherlessness. But we can extend that a little bit further, because we know that in our world, first of all, in our country, there there are a lot of, you know, I I’m not, I don’t wanna just preach at society because I know who I’m talking to. But in our country, there is a big, big problem with fatherlessness in the sense of fathers who just aren’t there at all and so, there’s something to be said about being present, right? Even if you’re not everything you should be, is there something that not to be, is there is there not something to be said about just literally being with your family?

Right, I mean that’s important and that’s one thing in our country that’s in some segments of society, it’s a big, big problem, dad is not there. Some people don’t even know who their dad is.

And that’s a plague, that’s not good. In fact, in this passage throughout the whole Bible, you read it yourself, you’ve seen it many times, is the state of fatherlessness something to be commended?

No, it’s not the ideal. It’s a gross disadvantage to somebody’s life. Basically in scripture, what is it presented as? It presented not having a father, or in this case a husband, is a one way ticket to destitution and poverty in scripture. All the way down at the bottom, begging. That’s why with the story of Ruth and her mother-in-law, Naomi, the reason why that’s so important is because Naomi wasn’t destitute, and the reason she wasn’t is because she had Ruth who provided for her. That’s why the faithfulness of Ruth and the loyalty of Ruth is such a major part of the book of Ruth.

Because in the context of widowhood, that was a serious serious matter. She was a widow and she lost her sons. Naomi did. And so, of course, in in this world, we have situations where people they have a father, he’s still alive, but he’s nowhere to be found. What what a, listen, I’ll just say it. Let me just let me just stomp on that a little bit. Listen, that is a vile, vile human being that would abandon his family. But sin will do that to men.

Sin will do that to men. It’ll make them lose their minds. And it is so common. So we’re not even talking about a father who dies and there’s there’s nothing you can do about that. We’re talking about a father who could be there and chooses not to be, but there’s another kind of father. You know, there are people in this world who have a living father and they have a living father who is present in their life.

But he is no father in spiritual things at all. Right? In other words he’s there, but as far as because there’s different levels of fatherhood. You have the genetic level, which is what we’re talking about. Every one of us has that or has had that, if our father has passed away already. Every one of us has the genetic father, else we wouldn’t be in this world. And then we often have a father who maybe is present, and that’s good, and that’s the way it should be, but that doesn’t necessarily mean you have a father who is a spiritual father, who is taking the role of a father. Maybe I should have preached this earlier in June, right, On Father’s Day, but this is where we are.

So, some people have a father in this world, but that father serves as no father to them in spiritual things. And so that person is, listen now, is the same on the spiritual level as an orphan is on the physical level. There’s no one filling that role as the shepherd of the family stepping up and leading his family and setting the example and instructing his family and doing all the things spiritually that a father is supposed to do to a family physically.

I think we probably, our society and in Christianity, if I can use it that broadly, there is an epidemic of fatherlessness for sure, there is. Of men who, though they be fathers and though they be present, are not engaged, they’re not functioning in the role. It would be the same in the spiritual world as a father who sat on the couch and didn’t get a job and tried to provide for his family. That’d be the same thing, but spiritually, which has far greater impact in the negative way than the man who would not provide for his own house.

You see, as I said a minute ago, being without a father is a disadvantage in scripture because fathers provide a vital role to their children, both physically, but also spiritually. I just wanna tell you something. In our family, you know, my wife tries to instruct our children, she does instruct our children. She sets an example for our children, she helps them, she gives them advice, and you know, all that you think about Anna having the baby recently, and there were all the advice still to this day, all the advice with babies, all the motherly stuff on the physical level, on the spiritual level, and all those things.

But my wife would be the first person to tell you that that is not the same as dad in the family. It’s not the same. They need dad too because there’s a certain thing that mom can’t fill, that dad needs to be there for.

Now that might sound discouraging, and this is where I wanna get and conclude here. The reality is though, and I’ll be the first one to say it, oftentimes we don’t have any control over what our dad does. In fact, we never have any control over what our dad does, right? We do not control, you know, if you’re a lady, you don’t control what your husband does. And so therefore, your kids are affected by what your husband does and you can’t do much about it. Right?

That’s just, look, my point is we live in a world that is less than ideal. Do we not? And I’m speaking mostly on the spiritual level. Although obviously there’s application to the physical. We live in a world that is less than ideal. That’s just life. And there are oftentimes nothing to do about it. Know if you’re a wife or if you’re a child in a family where dad’s not doing the job and he’s not leading the family, there you could say, know, hey, you can encourage him, you can ask him and implore him and and and treat him like the scripture says, to do the right thing and to lead and to guide and take us to church and read the bible and all the you can you can encourage him in that way, but ultimately if he doesn’t do it, you’re gonna be the one that reaps the whirlwind over As a result of that because that’s a disadvantage.

And you say, well, what am I to do? Well, here’s the thing. God knows we live in a less than ideal world. And what I love about this verse, in verse five, a father of the fatherless, in that verse is understood a less than ideal situation. The very fact that God calls himself a father to the fatherless is acknowledging a less than ideal situation, both physically and spiritually.

That the world is not always ideal. And so what God does in this example, this is one of many, He reminds us of the reality that this world is not ideal, and God knowing that, the Lord knows it is not ideal and ensures that his grace and his help is there to supply the need in a world that is not ideal. In other words, there’s a gap, father to the fatherless implies a gap. Where father should be, he died, father should be, spiritually, he’s absent, whatever.

God says there’s a gap, I know there’s a gap. I will fill that gap. I will fill that gap. And here’s the thing, in less than ideal world, there are all kinds of gaps. In a world full of sin that’s fallen, all kinds of gaps, they’re everywhere.

I want to tell you something, every one of them God will step up because He’s a This is what a father does, right? Anytime there’s a gap in the family, it’s daddy’s job to step up and fill that gap and pull up the slack. Nobody else’s job. Now does that always happen? That’s what we’re talking about. It doesn’t always work like that. But dad if you know there’s a gap in the family, whatever that gap looks like, maybe it’s a money gap, maybe it’s a spiritual gap, maybe it’s a time gap, whatever it might be. When you see a deficiency, when you see a gap in a less than ideal situation, it is our duty as the Father to put ourselves in that gap.

No matter how hard it it it no matter how much time it takes, we have to stay up late, we have to get up early, whatever whatever it costs us, that is our duty to step in that gap.

That is what God does in this passage, because he is a good father, and that’s what he does. He steps into the gap in a world that is not right time and time and time again and plugs that hole and says, I will be that for you.

God himself calls Himself that thing that we lack. He fills the gap and meets our need. Listen to these verses as we close. Isaiah 54 verse four, fear not for thou shalt not be ashamed, neither be thou confounded. Speaking to Israel now, for thou shalt not be put to shame. For thou shalt forget the name, the shame of thy youth, and shalt not remember the reproach of thy widowhood anymore, for thy maker is thine husband.

What’s the In this case, what in Isaiah 54 verse four, what is the gap? What is the deficiency, the thing that’s not ideal? Here Israel has sinned against God, and now they’re presented kind of as a picture, as a woman who can’t have a husband. She’s destitute, she’s gonna be single forever and she wants to be married but she can’t. And God says, I will be your husband.

He steps up into that spot. First John two one, my little children, these things write I unto you that ye sin not. And if any man sin, that’s that’s the gap, right? If any man’s the the reality is we do sin. That’s the world we live in. And so what is god, what is god, how does he step into that gap? If any man sin, we have an advocate with the father, Jesus Christ, the righteous.

See that? We live in an un ideal world, is that a word? A less than ideal world, we need an advocate. God says, I will be that advocate. I will plead your case on the basis of Christ’s blood.

John six fifty one, I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If any man eat of this bread he shall live forever and the bread that I will give is my flesh which I will give for the life of the world. You know what’s less than ideal? Hunger.

Hunger. So Jesus says, I’m the bread. I will fill your hunger. John fourteen sixteen, and I will pray to the Father and He shall give you another comforter that He may abide with you forever. You know what, there was a less than ideal situation here. You know what that was? Christ was going away and they needed comfort. And they needed God’s presence in that gap that was being removed.

You know, you know, what God who God sent. He sent himself in the form of the spirit of God. Who is God? And he became their comforter. The same comforter that you have and that I have. Matthew nine twelve, but when Jesus heard that, he said unto them, they that be whole need not a physician but they that are sick.

In a world that’s fallen, you know what there is, there’s sickness. What do you need, physician? Jesus says, that’s me. John eleven twenty five. What’s John 11, anybody remember? Lazarus. Those in the school scripture you better know what John 11 is. John 11 is Lazarus. Lazarus has died because that’s what a sinful fallen world looks like, he’s dead. Jesus says, I am what? The resurrection. The resurrection.

Jeremiah twenty three six, in his days Judah shall be saved and Israel shall dwell safely. And this is his name whereby he shall be called the Lord our righteousness. In a sinful world where you’re full of sin and you have no righteousness, the Lord is himself, our righteousness. Psalm 91 verse two, I will say of the Lord, he is my refuge and my fortress, my God in him will I trust. Again, there’s a storm, there’s trouble, and we need somewhere to go, that’s not good, that’s unfortunate, that’s not ideal. And the Lord says, I am the refuge, come to me.

In the case of each one of these and many many more, we are presented with a problem in a fallen world, and the Lord himself steps up, fills that gap, takes that place, and He becomes the thing that we need. And so the exhortation is this, and this is where we end. The exhortation, the reminder is this, look to God to fill those gap places in your life.

In a family, ideally, it’s supposed to be that dad is leading the family spiritually. That’s the way God designed it, that is natural, that is right. And when that’s in place, God will use that to lead your children, God will use that to lead you. He will. That’ll be his means, his tools to lead you. But if those things are removed because dad’s not doing the job or whatever, dad’s absent for whatever reason and it’s not ideal, that doesn’t mean we just say, well, oftentimes we’ll use that as an excuse, well I didn’t have a good dad so you know, woah, woah. Oh yes you do because you have a God who will step into that gap and fill that void and be that to you, whatever that gap is.

Let’s pray together.