Brett and I had the same work schedule. That means we also had the same workout schedule. Several times a week we ran into each other at the health club.
 
We did the typical guy-talk thing. You know—news, weather, and sports. Nothing that would require too much vulnerability. We men don’t readily bare our souls with other men. Especially when we’re talking in a sauna wearing only towels.
 
But as Brett’s and my friendship continued to grow, our discussions began to involve more important matters. One morning, as we sat in the whirlpool after working out, I noticed that conversation wasn’t coming as easily as it usually did. Brett seemed preoccupied.
 
After several unsuccessful attempts to engage him in discussion, without even looking at me, he said, out of the blue and completely void of emotion, “My dad called me last night from California. He told me he was dying.”
 
I went into full-scale counselor mode. “Oh, no,” I said. “I am so sorry.”
 
I’ll never forget the look on his face when his eyes locked with mine as he said, “Don’t be. I hope it’s a long and painful death.”
 
Over the course of the next few weeks Brett doled out more and more of his gut-wrenching story. His dad walked out and him and his mom when Brett was just ten years old. He never saw his father again. The only tie between them were monthly child support checks received in the mail. There  were never “How are you?” notes included. There were no Christmas cards or birthday wishes. Not even a phone call. For almost two decades. Until his father's call to share his diagnosis.
 
If Brett’s father thought the news would evoke sympathy and compassion and would magically undo all the damage he had caused his son he was badly mistaken. The family tree had been uprooted, its branches splintered. In Brett’s eyes, his old man was dead wood.
 
Brett’s story is all-too-familiar in the world in which we live. Kids trying to make it through life void of love from the one who gave them life. For way too many people, the term good father is an oxymoron. And society is reaping the results.  

Allow me to explain what effective fathering entails.

A good father is someone who not only tells his kids he loves them, he shows it.

A good father is someone who is true to his word. 

A good father is someone whose love for his kids is not dependent on their behavior. 

A good father is someone to whom his children can always come for advice, for encouragement, or to simply listen. 

A good father is someone in whose presence his children always feel safe. 

A good father is someone who teaches his kids to be kind, to accept others, to be responsible, to forgive when they've been wronged, and to live each day to the fullest.

A good father is someone who wants what is best for his children, even if that means he sometimes has to say, "no." 

A good father is someone who beams with delight at the mere thought of his kids. 

Healing from our father wounds begins when we understand that we all have a Father like that. Every one of us. We have a Heavenly Father who thinks the world of us. Who seeks to fill the void left by earthly fathers who, for whatever reason, didn’t do their job. Who longs for us to find in Him what we didn’t get from our dads.
 
The sooner we discover Him, the sooner we will find the peace, hope, love, and healing we're looking for. 

"See how very much our Father loves us, for he calls us his children, and that is what we are!"      ~1 John 3:1a, NLT 
​

There are so many people in the world today with “father wounds.”  People who have been forsaken, abandoned either physically or emotionally from one who should have been our primary source of encouragement and love.

The pain lingers well into our adult lives. There is a void in our soul that only the love of a father can fill. And because of His great compassion for His children, God opens His arms to us and offers to fill that void.

Look at these words from Psalm 27: “Even if my father and mother abandon me, the LORD will hold me close.” (v. 10, NLT)

God is a Father who will never walk out on His kids. He will never disengage from us. It is against His nature to leave us. We will always have His full attention because we are forever in His embrace. There is no better place to be.

Fatherlessness encompasses much more than a father not being physically present in the home. Many children are growing up with dads who live under the same roof, but who are distant, preoccupied, addicted, or are clueless about what it means to be a dad. Author and former NFL coach Tony Dungy states it clearly: "We have a whole generation of men who don't understand how much they mean to their kids."

As a former preventionist, I have been exposed to a number of different strategies designed to curtail adolescent drug and alcohol abuse. Some focus solely on building children's self-esteem. Some are all about cracking down on kids; creating tougher laws and school policies for those who use. Some drug and alcohol programs are fear-based, designed to scare kids with statistics and simplistic messages like alcohol kills brain cells, marijuana is addictive, and drugs can kill you. And speaking of simplistic, years ago, children were told the solution was to "just say no."

I've got a theory about how to prevent our kids from engaging in reckless and harmful behaviors. How about men stepping up the the plate and learning how to be good fathers? How about dads understanding their God-given role and being actively involved in their kids lives--spending time with them; listening to them; loving them; taking every opportunity to show them that they have value; teaching them, as the Proverb says, to choose the right path. 

Instead of telling our kids to "just say no" to irresponsible behaviors, perhaps we should be teaching men to "just say yes" to being responsible fathers.  

 I'm thinking it just might work.

“We serve an all-powerful, amazing, strong God. But we don’t focus enough on that aspect of him. Consequently, our churches are filled with people who are scared and weak. It doesn’t look right for such a powerful God to have such weak children. Powerful is not an adjective I would use to describe most of the people filling churches today. We should talk about the strength of God. God is strong.”

While I wholeheartedly agree with that statement from author Francis Chan First, I also recognize that many who have hoped that God's power and strength would save them from difficult, often dangerous situations have been left disappointed. 

The reality is, while God is powerful enough to make the mountains tremble, He never promises to protect His children from all that makes us tremble. We will struggle with pain in heartache in life. That has been the case for every human being since sin entered the world. Storylines that include imprisonment, illness, depression, drunkenness, infertility, marital unfaithfulness, and fatherlessness are not reserved for Days of Our Lives. The most beloved biblical characters had skeletons such as these in their prayer closets. 

God does not always shield us from evil. But our Heavenly Father always protects our identity as children made in His image. Our Heavenly Father always provides avenues for us to appropriate our true value and worth. Our Heavenly Father always protects us with His ever present strength in every situation. That strength may not prevent bad things from happening to us, but it does prevent us from being defined by those things.

Problems in life provide God an opportunity to prove how much we need Him. It is in our deepest struggles that our relationship with Him is deepens. It is in going through adversity that our understanding of Him is developed. It is when our hearts hurt the most that they connect with His heart the best.

Safety is not found in the absence of danger; it is found in the presence of God. In other words, we are always safe in Him.  

Our Heavenly Father is by our side and, at this very moment, is offering to give us the security, the strength, the power, the peace that we crave. He wants nothing more than to turn our heartache into hope, our frustration into fearlessness, our insecurity into invincibility. In fact, only He has the power to accomplish that. We are safe in His arms. Our God is strong.

We learn from the Bible that God is our Refuge; that He is a High Tower, where we find safety. The psalmist David referred to God as my hiding place (Psalm 32:7, NIV) and a shield who saves the upright in heart (Psalm 7:10, NIV).

Yet, we must realize that even though God is our Protector, He never promises to shield His kids from all of life’s problems. 

The world can be a scary place. For many, even our homes aren't safe. We often find ourselves fearful; our peace and sense of security threatened by circumstances out of our control. Ever since sin entered the world people's lives have been marked by trouble and turmoil. Storylines that included imprisonment, debilitating illness, depression, drunkenness, abuse, marital unfaithfulness, and fatherlessness are not reserved for Days of Our Lives. The most beloved biblical characters had skeletons such as these in their prayer closets.

God does not always shield us from evil. He does not always protect us from pain. But our Heavenly Father always protects our identity as children made in His image. Our Heavenly Father's ever-present strength may not prevent bad things from happening to us, but it does prevent us from being defined by those things. We are His beloved children. And nothing can change that.

Problems in life provide God an opportunity to prove how much we need Him. It is in our deepest struggles that our relationship with Him is deepened. It is in going through the agony of adversity that our understanding of Him is developed. It is when our hearts hurt the most that they connect with His heart the best.

Safety is not found in the absence of danger; it is found in the presence of God. Our Heavenly Father is always by our side and at this very moment is offering to give us the security, the strength, the power, the peace that we need. He wants nothing more than to turn our heartache into hope, our frustration into fearlessness, our insecurity into invincibility.