Achan took some silver, a Babylonian robe and a wedge of gold, hiding them in his tent. When it was discovered, he told Joshua that he had coveted it, so he took it. On the instruction of the Lord, Joshua and the elders of Israel took Achan, his family and all he had and placed them outside the camp. Then all of Israel stoned him and his family, then burned everything they had. Removing the sin from the camp of Israel.
Nothing is said about his wife and children knowing what he had done, but yet they paid the price for his sin. In this age of grace that we live in, so many times we want to overlook this story and think that it doesn't apply to us today, but these stories are given to us for examples, so we need to learn from them, regardless of living in grace or not.
What I see here men, is that what we do, and the decisions that we make daily (right or wrong) affect our families. They will either bring good to them, or bad, and it's because of us as the leaders of our homes. This is not to say that our wives and children get a pass on life, and that everything that happens is because of us, no. They still have a will, and they still have choices to make too, but when it comes to the family, the buck stops with us as President Harry Truman said.
What we do in leading our family may be one of the most important things that we as men can ever do. Part of the reason for the decline in America's history is due in part I believe to the lack of fathers, and the leaders of the home standing up and doing what they must. Too many men have either given up, or just never began to lead. They're too busy working and trying to get a little extra pleasure for themselves. And families are falling by the wayside because of it.
And not all of the pleasures are sinful; some guys make lots of time to play golf, and a little time to play with their kids. A man told me one time that he didn't know what to do with his kids, he just was at a loss of what to do. I told him to just do whatever it was that they liked to do with them. I remember when my oldest child Micah was a little boy, probably around three, when I would come home from work to eat lunch I would spend about ten minutes in his room on the floor with him playing with action figures. We didn't talk as much as we just were together playing, and when I would leave to go back to work, he would look up at me with the biggest smile on his face. That ten minutes I could have been doing what I wanted to do; reading, watching television or napping, but instead I would take that little bit of time with Micah and the dividends it paid were huge.
Now I'm not saying that we should never make time for ourselves, we should. Actually if you're not making time for yourself, you're going to end up losing it and going off on your family. What I'm getting at this morning is that you are the leader, right or wrong, and whatever you do is going to affect your family, right or wrong. And ultimately the decisions that we make as the heads of our families will determine the direction that they go. I'm pretty sure that when Achan took that stuff he wasn't thinking about his family and what might happen to them, even though they ended up paying the price for his decision too.
You are male by birth, but you become a man by the decisions you make each and every day. Lean on the Holy Spirit to help you make the right choices. And if you don't know the Holy Spirit, I'd love to tell you more about Him and what His role on the earth is for you and your life. Email me at godsfirstknight@yahoo.com and I'll talk to you about Him and get you some information too. You can do this men, fight for your family, it's who you were created to be! Strength and honor!
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