In Eighth Grade, writer/director Bo Burnham’s quiet sledgehammer of a film, Kayla is a socially awkward girl with her own YouTube channel, posturing herself as a savvy dispenser of advice on how to navigate life. Her faux-confident persona barely hides her fragility. Kayla’s single dad is working hard to reach her, but feels like he’s failing. After a disturbing encounter with a guy who tries to take advantage of her, Kayla despairs of ever uncovering a me that anyone could love. She asks her dad for help burning a box of mementos she’s been keeping since sixth grade. Together, they gently place the box in their backyard fire pit.
Dad: What was in there?
Kayla: Nothing, really. Just…sort of my hopes and dreams.
Dad: Right…and you’re burning them?
Kayla: Yes.
And then Kayla asks if he’s sad because he’s stuck with such a disappointing daughter. Broken and moved, he leans in and responds: “You’re wrong. Being your dad makes me so happy, Kayla… A lot of parents have to love their kids in spite of who they are. Not me. I get to love you because of who you are.” And then Kayla slumps onto her dad’s lap and holds on, weeping under the cover of his refuge.
If you’re a dad, it’s impossible to watch this scene and hold back the tears. So many dads wonder whether they’re having any impact at all on their kids. They wonder how to connect when connecting seems so challenging. They wonder if their kids have any idea how much they’ve worked and sacrificed to make their life a little better. They wonder if their brokenness has so impacted their kids that close relationship with them will always, only, be a distant hope. And they wonder if their relationship with God—so important to them—is somehow infectious for their kids, or mere background noise.
In his book Handing Down the Faith, Notre Dame Professor of Sociology Dr. Christian Smith highlights the vital faith-forming role of parents—but particularly emphasizes the catalytic impact of fathers on their kids’ relationship with God. When fathers are actively involved in shaping their kids’ faith, he says, the impact is exponentially increased. They send a powerful message to children about the importance of faith in their family. Standing in the way of this impact are the sorts of hurdles Kayla’s dad faced—common to all dads. When my friend Mark DeVries, founder of Ministry Architects, entered the “empty nest” phase of life, he took a big, deep breath and took time to reflect on his own fathering hurdles, including:
- I was tired. Most dads are exhausted. They’re logging more hours at work, bouncing between obligations, sometimes caring for aging parents, and juggling the exploding time-bombs called teenagers. It isn’t that they don’t want to engage their kids about “God stuff,” they just can’t keep all the balls in the air.
- I wanted help. I longed for someone who could make my parenting job a little easier. I wanted my kids to spend time with godly adults, but I didn’t have the time or energy to “ride herd” over their ministry involvement and their faith-forming relationships.
- I felt like a failure. We weren’t having meals together regularly enough. We weren’t having family devotions consistently. We were mad at our kids more than we wanted to be. Expecting perfection in parents is shortsighted and misdirected. Parents need graced extended to them.
Lurking behind (or even underneath) these real-world challenges is something more subtle. Often, in their work, dads have clear goals and a studied path to reach them. Not so with fathering. That’s why, as a dad who deeply resonates with Mark’s short list of fathering hurdles, I found CNN contributor Jeff Pearlman’s “10 Commandments of Righteous Fatherhood” so refreshingly blunt. In his Father’s Day opinion piece “Dads, Wake the H*** Up!” Pearlman offers these ten in-your-face to-do’s…
- No golf on weekends: Seriously, it’s ludicrous. Your spouse is home with the kids all the time, and you think it’s okay to take five hours on a weekend day to pursue your own pastime? Selfishness, thy name is Father.
- Wake up: Literally, wake up. With your kids. On at least one of the two weekend days—and perhaps both. I know: you wake up early for work. Not even remotely the same thing. Rising alongside the kiddies is hard. And crazy. And (gasp!) sorta fun, if you’d just stop moping.
- Change diapers: If you have little kids, and you don’t know how to change diapers (or, even worse, refuse to change diapers), you’re pathetic. That’s no exaggeration — p-a-t-h-e-t-i-c. It’s not all that hard, and though the poop sometimes winds up on the fingers, well, uh, yeah. It just does. Wash your hands.
- Play with dolls and paint your toenails: How many fathers do I know who refuse to get girlish with their girls? Dozens. Dude, put aside the machismo, break out Barbie and slather on some pink polish. You’ll make a friend for life—and nobody else is watching.
- Do things you don’t want to do: It’s easy to take the kids to the driving range— because you want to be there. Now try spending the day having a tea party. Or crawling through one of those wormholes at the nearby kiddie gym. Fun? Often, no. But this isn’t about you.
- Give your wife a break: I recently met a mother who told me her husband hadn’t been alone with their 9-year-old daughter for more than two hours…ever. Inexcusable. Let your wife do her own thing: relax, take a run, whatever. Entertain your children solo. They don’t bite.
- Surprise! Just once, on a random day without meaning or purpose, show up early at your kid’s school/camp/wherever, say “Get in the car!” and take him/her somewhere special. Just the two of you, alone. A movie. A park. A hike. The memory lasts—I promise.
- Dishes Don’t Clean Themselves (Nor Do Toys): It’s amazing how this one works. You pick up a dish, run it under hot water with some soap, rub it down with a towel and place it back on the shelf. Then repeat.
- Wake up your kid: Not often. But if you want to score big points and create a killer memory moment, walk in Junior’s room at, oh, midnight, wake him/her up and go outside for 10 minutes to watch the stars.
- Tell your kids you love them: They’d probably like to know.
Yes, dad-ing is challenging, the same way tossing another ball into the mix for a juggler is challenging—maybe it’s more like tossing a few flaming batons into the mix… But there is a heart of courage in every dad longing to break out of the self-defeating patterns that insinuate into our soul. Maybe Father’s Day can be the artificial catalyst men need to consider their impact, plant their feet, and open their arms like a child to the one Father who can offer them the strength, stamina, and faithful determination they need…
Just For You
In Vibrant Faith’s 4th-Soil Parenting Project, we asked one of our ministry leadership coaches to create a series of video conversations that are by dads, for dads. We call this series Real Talk with Dads, and the churches in our project are using them before, during, and after Father’s Day to highlight the stories, advice, and wisdom of dads. We’d like to offer two of these short videos—each one with a single question to ponder at the end—to you, free of charge. Just click below to check them out and download. You can send them out to dads in your church via email, text, or on your website. Enjoy…
• Dads Got You
Rick Lawrence is Executive Director of Vibrant Faith—he created the new curriculum Following Jesus. He’s editor of the Jesus-Centered Bible and author of 40 books, including his new release Editing Jesus: Confronting the Distorted Faith of the American Church, The Suicide Solution, The Jesus-Centered Life and Jesus-Centered Daily. He hosts the podcast Paying Ridiculous Attention to Jesus.
