Fatherhood

It was Father’s Day yesterday (hopefully that didn’t escape anyone’s notice) and the event has led me to ponder the meaning of fatherhood. Not the day to day stuff of mending toys, wiping bottoms and telling small people not to talk with their mouths full but the deeper aspects of fatherhood: the empowering; the championing and the calling out of identity (and many, many more things besides). In an effort to get my head around it all a bit better, and to seek to anchor all my ponderings in God’s Truth, I picked up an old copy of ‘The Father Heart of God’ by Floyd McClung and flicked through the pages. One part that caught my attention was the retelling of a conversation he had with his daughter when she was five years old. She had asked him that age old question that seems to pass the lips of most small children who have grown up hearing about God: ‘what does God look like, Daddy?’ He thought the question over for a moment and then told her that he looks like Jesus. In the book he then talks about the passage in the gospels where some mums bring their children to Jesus to be blessed and the disciples try to turn them away. Jesus chastises his friends, calls the children over and blesses them. Floyd goes on to observe that Jesus undoubtedly had time for children, he was happy to talk with them, play with them and listen to their fanciful tales. He wasn’t afraid of a bit of sick, or snot, or a grubby hand. He probably even tolerated a bit of innocent beard tugging. He is patient and cares even about the little things in life. He, like our Heavenly Father, wants to engage with us.

I was talking with my colleagues at work the other day and we got onto the subject of fathers. I asked then how they felt about their own fathers and the overwhelming response was that they knew their dads cared but that they were somewhat distant and disengaged. I don’t know about you but I don’t want to be that kind of father. I don’t want to be dependable but uninspiring, giving but not sharing, present but not really there. I want to be someone who fully engages in my children’s lives, who has time for them even when I’m tired and broken, who cherishes them and encourages them to be all they can be. As I think I realise that I still have a long way to go as a father (and, yes, as a husband too) but thankfully I don’t have to figure it all out on my own. Perhaps I should read some more of that book. That should be a good start.