I am still so captured by this movie but need wrap up my posts on it and move on to writing again…. So pray that I am not posting much in the next little while as it means that I have gone back to the writing board so to speak…and get this book going again.
The very last scene of the book is so very moving. It is the final chapter on how God wants fathers (and in my mind, mothers in a similar but not identical manner) to parent their children. Before I provide the link to watch it I want to post some of the script and comment…because the visual needs to be the last thing to look at from my blog today, it needs to be what makes the hairs stand up on your arms and what motivates you to say ‘I will’….
"I've seen first hand the deep hurt and devastation that fatherlessness brings in a child's life. Prisons are full of men and women who loved recklessly after being abandoned by their fathers. Wounded by the men who should have loved them the most. Many now follow the same pattern of irresponsibility that their fathers did. While so many mothers have sacrificed to help their children survive.. They were never intended to carry the weight alone. We thank God for them. Research is proving that a child also desperately needs a daddy. There's no way around this fact!"
For so many families this is the case… Mother’s do everything for their kids, mentor them, encourage and lead them, teach them morals and standards to live by…ensure that they know what they need to in order to survive. And father’s provide for their family. They look after the money, they bring it in, they decide how to spend it, they see the need for more and work harder, longer to provide more and more…all the while, they miss out on their kids best years.
I believe that God desires every father to courageously step up and do whatever it takes to be involved in the lives of his children. More than just being there or providing for them he's to walk with them through their lives and be a visual representation of the character of God, their Father in Heaven. A father should love his children and seek to win their hearts. He should protect them, discipline them, and teach them about God. He should model how to walk with integrity and treat others with respect and should call out his children to become responsible men and women who live their lives for what matters in eternity. Some men will hear this and mock it or ignore it. But I tell you as a father, you are accountable to God for the position of influence he has given you. You can not fall asleep at the wheel only to wake up one day and realize that your job or hobbies have no eternal value, but the souls of your children do!
We are responsible for our children, we are held accountable. Often in society we hear this when we talk about young offenders and the consequences for their actions being put, to some extent, on their parents. But that is not even remotely the accountability that we should be worried about. God is a much more powerful judge than one in court and His judgement of us is much more important than anything in this world.
Some men will hear this and agree with it, but have no resolve to live it out. Instead, they will live for themselves and waste the opportunity to leave a godly legacy for the next generation. But there are some men who, regardless of the mistakes we've made in the past, regardless of what our fathers did not do for us, will give the strength of our arms and the rest of our days to loving God and to teach our children to do the same and whenever possible to love and mentor others who have no fathers in their lives, but who desperately need help and direction."
We are inviting any man whose heart is willing and courageous to join us in this resolution.
In my home, the decision has already been made.
You don’t have to ask who will guide my family, because by God’s grace, I will.
You don’t have to ask who will teach my son to follow Christ, because l will.
Who will accept the responsibility of providing and protecting my family? I will.
Who will ask God to break the chain of destructive patterns in my family’s history? I will.
Who will pray for and bless my children to boldly pursue whatever God calls them to do?
I am their father. l will.
And I am their mother, I am his wife and I will…I will be there to support him, to encourage him, to respect and honour him. I will encourage him when he’s feeling beaten, I will lift him up with words of reassurance. I will be a model for my boys to live by, I will show them how to treat a woman by being an honouring mother and wife and working with my husband, not against. I will do this, I will.
I accept this responsibility, and it is my privilege to embrace it.
I want the favor of God and his blessing on my home.
Any good man does.
So where are you, men of courage?
Where are you, fathers who fear the Lord?
It’s time to rise up and answer the call that God has given to you and to say, “I will. I will. I will.”
To Sherwood Pictures, the production company who created “Courageous,” ( a ministry of the Sherwood Baptist Church in Albany, Ga… all church scenes in all of their movies are actually shot in their chuch and many of the actors are members of the congregation) I say thank you for bringing this much needed film into the homes of many Christians and non-Christians and for encouraging all parents to say ‘I will”
And finally….here’s the final scene….
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