Husbands and Fathers

For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named. EPHESIANS 3:14–15

Derek Prince became a husband and a father in one day. When he married Lydia Christensen in Jerusalem he took on not only a wife considerably older than himself but a household of adopted daughters who had known no father at all. It was a strange apprenticeship for a Cambridge philosopher, and it gave his later teaching on the family an unusual seriousness. His book Husbands and Fathers is addressed to men, and its concern is simple: that men should take up the responsibility God has given them in their homes, and that they should do it in the likeness of the Father from whom all fatherhood is named.

Fatherhood begins in God

Prince began not with the human family but with God. Paul says that every family in heaven and earth takes its name from the Father. Fatherhood, then, is not a human arrangement projected onto God. It is something in God first, which human fathers are meant to reflect.

Like as a father pitieth his children, so the LORD pitieth them that fear him. PSALM 103:13

This cuts two ways. It lifts the calling of every father: he is meant to show his children something of what God is like. It also exposes the failure of many fathers, whose children grow up with a picture of God shaped by absence, harshness or indifference. Prince, who spent years ministering to the rejected, knew how much damage a failed father can do. He also knew that God is a father of the fatherless, and that He can make up what earthly fathers withheld.

A father of the fatherless, and a judge of the widows, is God in his holy habitation. God setteth the solitary in families. PSALM 68:5–6

Prophet, priest and king

The best-known part of Prince’s teaching on the family is his description of a man’s threefold role in his home, drawn from the three great offices of Christ. As a priest, the father stands before God on behalf of his family: he prays for them, intercedes for them, and brings them to God. Prince liked the example of Job, who rose early to offer sacrifices for his children in case they had sinned.

And it was so, when the days of their feasting were gone about, that Job sent and sanctified them, and rose up early in the morning, and offered burnt offerings according to the number of them all. JOB 1:5

As a prophet, the father represents God to his family: he teaches them the Scriptures, speaks truth, and shows by his own life what obedience looks like.

And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart: And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children. DEUTERONOMY 6:6–7

As a king, the father governs his home — not as a tyrant, but as one responsible for its order, protection and direction.

There is much that is good in this. Many Christian homes lack exactly what Prince describes: a man who prays for his wife and children by name, who opens the Bible with them, and who takes responsibility rather than leaving it all to his wife.

Headship as service

Yet this teaching, too, needs to be handled with care, and Prince’s own history shows why. The Shepherding Movement laid heavy emphasis on authority and submission, including within the home, and in many places the result was not servant leadership but control. Wives were silenced; children were governed by fear; men used the language of headship to excuse selfishness. Prince repudiated the movement, and the lesson carries over. Any teaching about a husband’s authority that does not begin and end with Christ’s self-giving love has gone wrong.

Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it. EPHESIANS 5:25

Paul’s instruction to husbands follows directly on his call for all believers to submit to one another in the fear of God. And Jesus explicitly contrasts authority among His people with the domineering authority of the world.

But Jesus called them unto him, and said, Ye know that the princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them, and they that are great exercise authority upon them. But it shall not be so among you: but whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister. MATTHEW 20:25–26

Peter adds that a husband who does not honour his wife as a joint heir of the grace of life will find his prayers hindered (1 Peter 3:7). Christian readers differ over what headship means in practice. They should not differ on this: the husband’s authority, whatever it is, is the authority to lay down his life.

Fathers who do not provoke

Paul gives fathers one negative instruction, and it is surprisingly specific. They are not to provoke their children.

And, ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath: but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. EPHESIANS 6:4

Colossians adds the reason: lest they be discouraged. The father is to nurture, not to crush. His discipline is to be consistent, fair and warm. His children should know that they are loved before they know that they are corrected. Prince, the reserved Englishman who found himself raising a houseful of girls, knew that tenderness does not come naturally to every man. He also knew it could be learned, and that it must be.

Turning hearts

The Old Testament ends with a promise that God will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers. Prince saw the breakdown of fatherhood as one of the deepest wounds of modern society, and the restoration of fathers as part of God’s healing.

And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers. MALACHI 4:6

That promise is a hope for every family — including those where the father has failed, is absent, or has died. Where earthly fathers fall short, the heavenly Father does not.

FOR REFLECTION AND ACTION

1. If you are a husband or father, pray for your wife and each of your children by name every day this week. Ask them what they would like you to pray for.

2. Open the Bible with your family, however briefly, at least once this week.

3. Ask your wife honestly whether she experiences your leadership as service or as control. Listen without defending yourself.

4. Think of one way you may have provoked or discouraged your children. Apologise to them specifically.

5. If your own father failed you, bring that wound to your heavenly Father, and forgive your earthly one.

6. Look around your church for a child or young person without a father at home. Ask how you might show them something of God’s fatherhood.

A PRAYER

Father, from You every family is named. Thank You that You are the Father my heart has always needed.

Where I have failed those You have placed in my care — by absence, by harshness, by neglect — forgive me, and give me grace to begin again.

Teach me to pray for my family, to teach them Your Word, and to lead them as Jesus led: by laying down my life.

Turn the hearts of fathers to their children in my home, in my church, and in my land. And be a Father to the fatherless. Amen.