Thank you so much for the opportunity to be here and the warm welcome that I received. Happy Father's Day to all the fathers here. I don't know if you knew it was Father's Day. How many fathers here? Good. Thank you.

My scripture today, and if I can have somebody read it for me and put it up on the screen to begin with, is Deuteronomy 5, verse 16: "Honor your father and your mother, as the Lord your God has commanded you, so that you may live long and that it may go well with you in the land the Lord your God is giving you."

Another scripture that I would like to read is Ephesians 6, verse 2: "‘Honor your father and mother’—which is the first commandment with a promise— ‘so that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth.’"

Also, amen. The next is Matthew 7, verses 9 to 11: "Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!"

When you say the word "father," what does it mean to you? What picture comes to your mind? For some of us, it can be blank. For some, it can be a traumatic experience. I'm going to read something somebody has written:

"I was 25 years old before I could say the word 'father' while praying. The word was foreign to me. It didn't roll off my tongue the way it did for many other Christian friends. I felt like it was a word from a foreign language. In one regard, it meant nothing to me. But in another, it meant a world of things to me. It meant broken things in my home. It meant scary things. It meant hurtful things. How was I supposed to use a word that, for me, brought to mind everything a parent shouldn't be? When I was in conversation with God, whom I had been told was everything my dad wasn't."

We all go through traumatic experiences in life. This is the tale of two fathers. Each of us has two fathers—some eyebrows are going up—you have an earthly father, and you also have a heavenly Father. Each of us often sees more of our earthly father, and the image that we get of our earthly father becomes a reflection, and that's what we think about the heavenly Father. A lot of us cannot connect to God as a father only because of the things that have happened to us and because of the weaknesses of our earthly father.

For some people—and I've talked to a lot of people, especially—this was something that I wrote in the middle of the night. One night, I got up, and I know that when I get a thought pattern, a word from the Lord, and if I don't write it down the next morning, I will just be so upset with myself that I didn't write it down. So that night, I wrote this. It came like a flow, you know? Different types of fathers we have.

Some of us had authoritative fathers. The father thinks that unless he's authoritative, that's the way a father should be—something like a pecking order in the home. Okay, and they exercise authority, which they should, but excessive authority can push our children far away from us.

Let me tell you my story so that you will understand what it is. Sometimes authoritative fathers also punish the children, but they punish the children, and the punishment is excessive, not proportionate to the wrongdoing of that child.

Then we have alcoholic fathers—fathers who ruin lives, their family, because of their addiction to alcohol. We also have unfaithful fathers—men who choose another love, leave their home, leave their children, leave the wife to bring up that child. Workaholic fathers—I equate alcoholic fathers and workaholic fathers on the same level, except that the workaholic father earns bread and keeps it on the table but has absolutely no time for their children. Your child needs you—not your presence but your presence in the home. And I learned it, I learned it in my life.

Because when you're involved in the ministry, the people want your attention. Sometimes, at the cost of our own family, with the new world that we live in, your cell phone can bring somebody right into your home with a call. And how about fathers who are sitting on the computer in the office and at the same time come home and sit with a computer, and your children have to call you twice to get your attention? I hope—I hope I don't disturb the feathers here. Wives will be nudging their husbands, etc. I'm not responsible. I am teaching God's word.

Then we have abusive fathers—fathers who have abused their spouses, their children. Some fathers, in my 35, 36 years of ministry, I've also seen fathers abusing their own children sexually. I mean, I can't understand this. It is demonic, and yet they come to church, and the wife can't talk about it, the children can't talk about it. Abuse can be of different levels—verbal abuse, demeaning children so that their identity is lost as they go into the horizon of life. They don't know what to do when the protector in the home is the one who violates everything.

"My dad is supposed to protect me, and he becomes the abuser." Then that's a challenge. Usually, daughters are more attached to the father, and sons are more attached to the mother. The mother will cover up the wrongdoings of the son. The father will protect the daughter from getting a verbal—you know, punishment, a verbal—what do you call it—as correction from the mother.

We also have fathers who are absent due to death. And I watch children in our church who lost their fathers, especially when they are young. So when we, as fathers, relate to our children—a simple thing like putting your arm around your child—I mean, they'll be watching you.

So I had an incident recently where one of our pastors took his daughter out. There's a little child who lost her father in COVID and her elder sister. So four of them went out to a restaurant, and the pastor and his daughter sat on one side, and the elder sister and this little child sat on the opposite side. The pastor—I mean, had no intent to do anything wrong in terms of the action that he did. All he did was he put his hand on his daughter's shoulder, and he was sitting. This child said in Hindi, "Mera daddy nahi hai."

Small child going to kindergarten. See, you need to open your eyes and your heart to the pain of people. We live—we are so busy that we don't see the pain of the person sitting next to us, even in Church Father, who are absent, fathers who are irresponsible. A father figure is responsible to bring food on the table in the home, and I've seen fathers who have never worked. It's the mother who works and brings food on the table. Irresponsible, does not provide for the home. Then we have issues with stepfathers, and I realized in my journey in life, no widow will ever want to get married. And often when they get married, it's only because of their own children. Is there somebody who can come into our life who can bring up these children for the sake of those children? This widow will sacrifice everything, do you understand?

But we also have a loving father. We have fathers who are loving to the children. So this is the tale of two fathers. You know, I want to ask you today as parents, being Father's Day, what does the word father mean to you? Does it bring pain? Does it bring memories in your life that have etched a scar in your life? Let me tell you, as I said, I'll tell you my own story. My father, in the year 1970, accepted the Lord. But when he came to know the Lord, he was an angry man. This seems to be the trait in our family history. I have relatives sitting here; it's in the genes of the family. I think my father was an angry man. I hope there are no angry fathers here God has sanctified you all. My father's reactions to normal violations as children were excessive. So one day, I was sitting, and I was actually out of the room, but I was playing with a ball. And my father had night duties, and he was sleeping. And it was a plastic ball. So when you throw the ball on the wall and it bounces back, it makes a sound. So I was doing that continuously outside on the balcony. My father got up and he beat me till blood came out of my leg. I have not forgotten it till date and probably will not forget till I die. But if I go to my father and ask him, "Do you remember?" I was in standard one. If I ask him, "Do you remember this?" I'm sure he will say, "No." I can carry it as a scar in my life till I die. The second thing I realized is what I disliked and hated in my father slowly became part of my own character. My father was an angry man, and I began to, as a young person, I began to be an angry man.

Okay, I have a sibling, my elder brother. So I used to hate, well, I'm eating. If somebody touches my food, I hate that. I don't like it. And so what would happen is, my elder brother, to irritate me, would come and put his finger into my food. And the next thing that happens is, I would take that plate and I would fling it. That was my anger. But as I began to follow the Lord, way before my marriage, she hasn't seen those things. Okay, way before my marriage, I began to realize that I need to deal with this area of my life. The very things that I hated my father for slowly surfaced in my own life. And unless the Lord deals with that, you don't get rid of it. Anger or rage, this is rage. Actually, this is not anger; this is rage. Rage is uncontrolled. But you know, when rage comes in, usually people know what to throw and where to throw and what to break and what not to break. For example, when rage comes in, they don't break the television, the LED TV in the home. They know. So when you say rage is uncontrolled, I don't believe it. Moses lost his entry into the promised land. Imagine, 40 years you labor and you couldn't step in because of rage. So I began to, "How do I get out of it?" I began to realize that I need to get out of it. And so I begin to pray every day. Morning, I would get up and pray, "God, today I don't want to get angry." If I try to keep away from anger, that's not going to work. You have to surrender to God fully. If I could get out of my weaknesses on my own, I don't need God. It's an act of faith. I ask myself, "Can I remain calm for one hour?" What do you think the answer is? Can I remain away from anger for one hour? What do you think the answer is? Huh? Keep you by yourself. Is it possible to remain, huh? Without anger? Yes. Two hours? Possible. Five hours? Huh? Seven hours? Twelve hours? Why is it no? And why is it easy to remain three hours? Here's this human effort. This is like a guy who's smoking ten cigarettes a day saying, "I want to stop smoking." He kind of takes the whole cigarette packet and crushes it and throws it in the bin. Next morning, it's back again. You need God. Get it clear. You need to surrender that part to God so that God will kill that part so that you can be free. And so that's exactly what I did. And I would pray and something in the day would trigger it off. But I realized, as I continued to pray, God removed that fully from my life. Will you allow God to deal with your life? Now, many things are inherited in the sense, because of things that have happened to us, we begin to do things in the same manner. I want you to know that your father was not your choice. You cannot choose your father. God chose your father. We don't get the opportunity to choose our parents. That's not our choice. And I also want you to know that God saw us even before we were formed in our mother's womb.

Before my mother held me in her hands, God saw me in the hidden womb of my mother. Every part of my body that was being formed was seen by God. And even before I was conceived, God saw me. God knew your name before you were conceived. God knew the date on which you were going to be born before you were even conceived. You were in the heart of God before you were conceived. This is the God of whom we are talking about. And if we really want to relate to God in a manner that will honor God, then we need to probably get rid of some of the baggage in our lives. I don't know what you've gone through in life. Okay? You—every father has his own weaknesses. And I've learned that no matter what happens to us, we have a choice to overcome and love our parents, honor our parents. And the Bible says this morning, we read it, "Honor your father and mother." It did not say when they are due for honor. So I want you to do some exercises. I do a lot of this. I will talk to people who go through trauma and ask them what did you go through, talking about fathers, a father who deserted his family for another woman. So I met a pastor, he's part of our New Life Fellowship. I won't mention his name. His father was in the army. They lived in the army quarters. Okay? The father deserted one fine day, he just didn't come back. Soon they had to be kicked out of the army quarters. You know where they went to? They went on the streets, under cardboard boxes, on the street. And as children grew up because of this trauma, the mother couldn't take it. Her mental status broke down. They had no money to treat her. He grew up, they were of another faith. Somebody shared the gospel with him in Mumbai and he came to know the Lord. The Lord changed his life. He went back to the city from which he came and started a new life church. So when he went back and he started working with his siblings and things like that, 25, 30 years, no pension, nothing. They don't even know where his father was. And one day, the doorbell rang. This man was in a horrible state, he was sick. And he said to me, "I didn't know whether I should punch him or whether I should take him in." In me, that emotion swelled up, "You come in." Now, where were you 25 years? Now, you've been kicked out from the relationship that you were in. Now come back to us. You know what he did? He took him home, took him in, served him till he died. This can only happen in Jesus. The trauma of fathers who desert their children. God commands us to honor a father and mother unconditionally. And the Bible said this morning that it will bless you with long life. It will go well with you and you will be blessed with long life. How many of you want to die early? Not a single hand going up. Then you need to honor this command of God. It's a command. It's not optional. Whether your father is worthy of respect or not, honor so that it will go well with you and your family, your children, and your generations. As I said to you, why should I honor my father even if he's not a good father? Because if your father was not there or if your father died at the age of seven, you wouldn't have been born. The gift of life came, the gift of life that you have received came from your father. That is why I need to honor my father. God used my father to give me the gift of life. So it doesn't matter the struggles that all of

us have gone through, if we look at God, I want to pray for you today. I want to pray for all the fathers who are not good fathers. You have an opportunity to honor. You don't have a very good father. God has sanctified it for me, but I can tell you that I know that in this house there are people who are suffering because they have not had a good father. And I want to pray that God will take away the scars from your life. But that's exactly what God did for me. He took away the scars from my life. That's exactly what God did for me. He took away the scars from my life.