June 2016 Press Toward the Mark

From the window, the father watched his children struggling to move a boulder at the edge of their lawn.  Valiantly, the young brother and sister team labored to move the large rock.  Finally exhausted, they slumped beside their challenge in defeat. When their father's shadow fell over the pair, they looked up into the kind face they loved and admired.  "Why didn't you use all of your resources?" asked their father.

"We did," came their reply.  "The rock is too big for us," they explained.

"No, you didn't ask me," answered their father.  Then, he knelt beside them.  Together, daughter, son, and father moved the boulder.

Few would disagree that families today need godly fathers.  Godly fathers help their children face the boulders and rocks in life by modeling dependence upon our Heavenly Father.   As we celebrate Father's Day this month, let's praise God for godly fathers and pray for more of them.

Mission Ohio seeks to help men become godly fathers.  To become a godly father, a man must begin with conversion.  A man must repent of his sin, believe in the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ, and ask Jesus to save him.  This begins a man's personal pilgrimage toward becoming like Christ.  The Holy Spirit performs this work of holiness and righteousness in a converted man's life.  As a converted man grows in holiness and righteousness, he becomes a more godly father. 

A multitude of godly fathers is one of the desired results of Mission Ohio.  Mission Ohio is the cooperative mission plan of Southern Baptists in Ohio to reach 1,000,000 people for Christ in 2,020 congregations by the end of 2020.  Let us press toward that mark.