I love being a dad. 


Saturday morning...cinnamon rolls for breakfast... watching my two little ones play together and use their imaginations to come up with crazy and fun stuff to keep them occupied. 


Bedtime prayers and bible stories. I love that my 4 year old won't go to bed without our devotional time... "what are we going to read about tonight, daddy?" As we pray together, or they say grace at mealtime it's incredible to see the transformation from a rote, scripted prayer to what is really in their hearts and minds. 


And the 5th grader, so full of questions on life and perspective that shows her growing from innocence to a greater understanding of life and purpose, and God's active place in her heart. 


Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it. Proverbs 22:6


It's amazing how much this verse, drilled into me by my own mother when I was young has provided direction for me in how I teach them about God. It IS training, and no less than the training that God uses in life to bring us closer to him. It has to be purposeful, consistent, and filled with the love only a father can have for his children. 


Therein lies the difference. 


I've not always been consistent, purposeful and diligent with the way I've been directing and guiding the steps and training up my children. I've made mistakes, and not always made the right choices. 


God, on the other hand, ALWAYS has our best interests in mind. He always allows only what (in his sovereign purposes) brings us ultimately into that closer, transformational relationship with him. And His ways are always perfect, he does not make mistakes, His purposes are always working behind the scenes to train us in the way He wants us to go. 


"..Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? if you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him?' - Matthew 7:9-11


Good things. Abundant life that surpasses the trials, the temptations, the distractions that try so hard to get our focus away from the gospel and Jesus's goal of restored relationship with our Heavenly Father. 


"...Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us I bow my knees before the Father from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us.."  Ephesians 3:14-20




And... there's the real gem....the nugget that we so often overlook. 


God Loves being a dad too.