This small book is the edited transcript of an eighty-one-minute sermon I preached in 2001. At the time, I was thirty-one years of age and the father of Ashley Marisa and Zachariah Blaise. My wife, Grace, and I have since added Calvin Martin, Alexie Grace, and Gideon Joseph to round out the Fantastic Five, and I have included a few illustrations from life with them. This book is a simple attempt to help God’s men be a “poppa daddy,” as my kids call me. Some day when my children are older, I hope to, by God’s grace, write a more thorough book on fatherhood, since I expect to learn from my mistakes and gather more wisdom on fathering in the ensuing years. Until then, I hope this book can be of some service to the men to whom God has entrusted children, for God’s glory, the children’s good, mom’s gratefulness, and dad’s gladness.
Blessed is everyone who fears the LORD, who walks in his ways! You shall eat the fruit of the labor of your hands; you shall be blessed, and it shall be well with you. Your wife will be like a fruitful vine within your house; your children will be like olive shoots around your table. Behold, thus shall the man be blessed who fears the LORD. The LORD bless you from Zion! . . . May you see your children's children! – Psalm 128:1–6
According to the Psalmist, the good life for a man is to be blessed by God. That blessing includes fearing God, walking in his ways, working an honest job to provide for his family, enjoying his believing wife, eating dinner around his table surrounded with children, and living long enough to buy ice cream for his grandkids.
The means to this end is simply the grace of God. The first thing we must note is that before a man can be a good father, he has to be a good Christian. To be a good Christian he must realize that God is his Father, as Jesus taught us to pray.
