“See, I will send the prophet Elijah to you before that great and dreadful day of the Lord comes. He will turn the hearts of the parents to their children, and the hearts of the children to their parents; or else I will come and strike the land with total destruction.” (Malachi 4:5, 6 NIV)

We had another rather full day here of things that were not anticipated. As a result, I saw the finger of the Lord on the above passage, putting into a new light.

I had already seen that it was not talking about old creation fathering or parenting, but rather about the parenting of a new creation, done by the Spirit in believer’s lives.  But what was underlined for me today is the fact that it is fathering or parenting that is found wanting, and the result of such want is: “the land stricken with total destruction.” 

Aren’t we glad that the good side of this promise applies to spiritual relationships, and not old creation relationships?

It also hit me today is that it is not mentoring, discipleship, leadership, or even “brothering or sistering” that is lacking today. No, it is fathering (or parenting) that is wanting.  That, I see, is the warning in this verse. There is something about the lack of parenting that results in “total destruction.”

Spiritual fathering or parenting is not given for the purpose of supplying just any relational deficit, but specifically for the deficit in healthy parenting. This includes negligence, dysfunction, abuse (both religious and otherwise) and various forms of abandonment. We have just seen the result of what that deficit looks like where national politics is concerned, and sad to say we have seen the result of that deficit in what’s been calling itself “church” for two millennia.  As I thought about this in the context of my day today, I realized that the truth of this was at the center of every one of my experiences with my spiritual children. I was not given to them, and they were not given to me, to supply just any deficit–but parental deficits in particular. And looking back I realized that in every case, I had been given what was needed for the healing of those deficits.  I didn’t always do very well in bringing that supply to their lives, but it was always there, supplied by the same Spirit who supplied the relationships to begin with.

This is so very important to understand, because failure to do so results in wrong, and broken expectations. Parenting or fathering is a different supply from discipleship, mentoring, leadership, or even “brothering and sistering,” for that matter.  It is possible to be an ill-equipped brother or sister, but not have a deficit where parental content is concerned–and vice versa.  This is to say that the content of a parent-child relationship is different from a sibling relationship, so not being so good at being a sibling doesn’t disqualify us as a son, daughter, mother or father.

Perhaps enough said about this for now.  The importance of this understanding is tremendous in light of the “total destruction” that resides in our misunderstanding of the promises of God.

Love!