You Have to Want It

[I apologize for no posts in the past couple days. The following is of a personal nature, and I sincerely hope you can find some value and insight in it. – D.H.]

I want to be a dad.

I often sit and dream about what my daughter is going to be like. As I’m driving down the road, I sometimes imagine what conversations we might have, and what we might do during daddy/daughter time. I want to be a dad.

Why?

Why, when I know what kind of world she’s coming into? Why, when I think about the difficulties that lie ahead of her mother and me, and even her? Why, when I know that some day she’s going to belong to someone else?

Why? Here’s why:

1. Children are a blessing. I admit, this is probably a semi-selfish reason, but nonetheless, Biblically backed. In Psalm 127, the idea is of letting the Lord build the house. Well, how does he build it? Children are one way. Children are pictured as a gift or inheritance (vs. 3), a reward (vs. 3b), also [practically] as security in old age (vs. 4). “How blessed is the man who fills his quiver with them!” (vs. 5, NET)


2. I want to see God’s Kingdom continue. I won’t always be on this earth, but my children (and grandchildren, and great-grandchildren) can continue my influence, just as I continue my father’s Christian influence on me. Now this is not to say that I’m going to be solely responsible for populating the Lord’s Church in the future, and that if I don’t it has a danger of disappearing (see 2 Peter 1:11, underline “everlasting”). Rather, I’m excited about the ways that my bringing up this child (and children) in “the training and admonition of the Lord” (Ephesians 6:4) can have a positive, lasting effect in God’s Church in the future. Actually, it’s quite humbling if you think of it that way, and the responsibility that fathers have becomes even more obvious.


3. I want to start a procession of souls toward Heaven. Not just of my own children, but of their spouses, children, friends, children’s friends, spouses, children (see Deuteronomy 11:18-21 as well as 2 Timothy 1:5)… I think you get the point.

Why would I not be excited? It’s just something you have to want.

~Daniel Howell