Are fathers really the providers?

The answer to my post about fathers and what is expected of them really is simple. The explanation of that simple answer though is the difficult part of this post.


It sounds rather irresponsible to say that father's are not supposed to be the providers; though if you think about this situation from an abstract perspective, it can make a lot of sense.

We think ourselves to be autonomous and separate from almost every possible supplier of things that we need. We honestly think that we; as working adults; provide food, money and shelter for ourselves and our family. Is that the case?

From the practical aspect, yes the father should work to earn money which then can be used to care for the needs of the family.

To look at it from the abstract as stated in the beginning of this post, provision is truly much more than money.

Money cannot provide love.
Money cannot provide friends.
Money cannot provide a spouse.
Money cannot provide family.
Money cannot provide a home.
Money cannot provide children.

Money is in a sense powerless. It is the value placed in a currency that is exchanged for services rendered by a worker for the employer.

In past centuries, exchanging currency for labor was something that the wealthy were able to participate in with the upper class citizens. On the other side of the society a system called "bartering" was used to repay services. Most of the time the objects used in bartering were foods or clothing. In some cases a tenant would work for the land-lord to pay for that months rent of property and house.

Even still it is not the work which provides these needs. The father did the work, as also the mother may have engaged in some craft to barter for food items in the market.

The past centuries I mentioned where bartering was more practiced, could be the 1st through the 6th centuries and even as late as the 19th century. If in the 1st century someone were to suggest that God was not supplying their needs, they would receive a strong reaction from anyone who heard such an accusation, because atheism was unheard of and Gnosticism was largely unthinkable although growing.

Why such a strong reaction? Perhaps the better question is "Why such a weak response today?"

The answer is this; by our pushing further away from God there is less cause to draw distinctions between good and bad, right or wrong. In fact not only is there less cause to draw such distinctions but it has become offense to do so!

If atheism is true, because God does not exist then right or wrong is subjective and what is right to one person could be wrong for another, but in the end is not truly wrong because there is no standard to measure either right or wrong. So that distinction between right and wrong really becomes "I can do whatever I want." It sounds good; until you begin to see that you really are not able to care for your needs much less the needs of anyone else because it is just as right to do what you want as to do what someone else wants!

If Gnosticism is true, because God is aloof (meaning that He is not personally involved in our lives), then right and wrong is only as objective as I need it to be to preserve my wealth, health, family and pride. This also sounds good until you realize that everyone else lives the same way that you are and you really come back to the same problems with which the atheistic society is dealing.

If God is true, because God created the world and all the matter/substance in it; then He provides our food, clothes, spouse, family and shelter. He demonstrates true love to us because He created us and has been taking care of our needs ever since! We enter the picture and exchange our sweat for money and in turn exchange it for the things we forget He is providing.

It is our self-centered ideology which turns our reasoning into self-reliance or self-sufficiency when we could do nothing if He had not created us first; kept us maintained second; and third loved us so much as to let us go off in our selfishness so that we might learn He is really our provider!

This brings me to this simple answer I mentioned at the start of this post. "No, fathers are not the providers. Father are simply the person who is supposed to be in the presence of God (by prayer)  listening to Him as He asks the father of his family's needs and answering in humility with respect."

Can it get any more simple than that?