Heavenly "Dads"

Around my house most days it is the same routine. We get up, we get ready for work as my wife and on occasion me (but mainly my wife) get the children ready for school and daycare. And that is where it starts, "Settle down Guys." "Veronica why are you crying?" "Junior why are YOU crying?""Isaiah get away from the Dog/Kitty food""V don't be mean to your brothers, Moose DO NOT hit your sister!""Isaiah stay out of the garbage!""AND PLEASE STOP YELLING YOU ARE GOING TO WAKE THE NEIGHBORS!!!".....Yup and all of this around a thousand times between 6:00am and 7:45am. GRRRRRRRRRRRR.

Like most fathers, all I want is my children to behave, listen to my words, make good choices and to stop whining. Is that too much to ask?!?!? Now of course I love my children, and nothing they do will ever change that. But now that I have a moment to stop and think, they learned all of this behavior from us...

As you read through the bible, how many times can you spot God telling us to behave, or to listen to HIS words? By doing those two things we will be making good choices. But what about the whining? How many of our prayers are whining? Or as Pastor Steve said on Sunday how many of our prayers are "WEJUST" prayers? (i.e. Lord ,WEJUST want you to bless us...")

How lucky are we to have a Father who works on grace? What kind of state would we be in if God was as hard on us as we can be with our children? What if every time we misbehaved we got punished?

So, I am going to challenge my self and all of you Dads out there to stop and think "Is this what our Heavenly Father would do to us?" I can bet you that 99.9% of the time the answer is "No." So the next time one of your children screams at the top of their lungs, or eats the dog food, or flushes your phone or keys down the toilet, stop give them a hug and tell them how much you love them. And of course CALMLY explain how their actions were wrong, and then don't punish them.

I know I am going to struggle with this but I strongly believe that this will help me be a better father.

So to all you dads (and moms) out there, Good Luck and God Bless.