Becoming A Pro Dad

So tell me men, what’s your profession? That thing that you are “proficient” at, that you went to college for, trained for, worked hard to achieve, have dedicated your vocational life to?

Perhaps you do not consider your vocation to have much of a professional status, but I encourage you to look a little closer to home for a moment. Inside the home is where the greatest of vocations begins. It doesn’t get much pay, possibly little recognition or appreciation, but it is has had the greatest impact on generations of people. It’s the job of being a dad.

It takes just a moment and relatively little effort for a man to become a father, but it takes that man a lifetime of success and failure, of joy and sorrow, of pride and disappointment, of laughter and tears to become a dad.

Mark Twain said of his father, “When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years. -”.

I don’t know about the rest of you, but when I got the announcement for the first time that I was going to be a father, I didn’t receive my copy of the Father’s Manual in the mail. Come to think of it, that thing has never arrived!

As young fathers, we naturally look at the success and failures of other men, and to a large degree our own fathers, to try to formulate our own path of paternity. We see one who is strong yet gentle, firm yet understanding, smart yet practical and we try to emulate him as our model for parenthood. We see the man whose children are well mannered, well behaved and who adore him, and after we get his autograph, we ask for the secret astonished that the humble response could be so simple, ‘it’s just being a dad”

How many of you would like to find out the secrets to becoming a Pro Dad?

Whether your children are grown and out of the house, you’re just starting your life with that lovely young lady, or you’re a young man still at home, these three keys will help you to become that Pro Dad you have always wanted to be.

I like the story of the three boys in the schoolyard who were bragging about who had the better father:

The first boy says, “My Dad scribbles a few words on a piece of paper, he calls it a poem, and they give him $100.”

The second boy says, “That’s nothing. My Dad scribbles a few words on a piece of paper, he calls it a song, and they give him $1000.”

The third boy says, “My Dad is ever better than that. He scribbles a few words on a piece of paper, calls it a sermon, and it takes 6 or 8 men just to collect all the money!”

There are three Pro aspects of being a dad that I’d like for us to consider this morning.

A Pro dad is a Provider

1 Timothy 5:8

But if anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.

The Greek word here for provide means to “think it through beforehand” “plan out”.

That’s a pretty good concept in a day when bringing home a paycheck, or a portion of one constitutes provision. But “bringing home the bacon” is not the end all of our responsibilities a s fathers.

In the context of 1 Timothy 5, Paul is speaking about financial and monetary provision. – And I can not overemphasize the need for men to set up to the plate and provide for their families. I said provide, not “just get by”!

But we need to take that provision to a broader dimension. To be a Pro Dad, you must see your self as your family’s provider in three areas; and I believe that they are also listed in the order of their importance in focus.

1. Provider of Spiritual Leadership

a. Don’t call yourself the head of the house unless you are the head of the family alter.

b. I don’t know of a scriptural reference where a woman built an alter – it was always a man’s responsibility!

c. Let your children see you pray, read the Word, and worship.

d. (It’s why our children remain in the service with us through worship – Dad, mom your kids should be right next to you during worship – they need to see your worship!

2. Provider of Emotional Strength and Presence.

a. Prisons are full of young men who hung with the wrong crowd because dad never hung with them.