Fanning the Flames

Last post, I closed with the thought that we husbands need to show our wives by our actions that we are in this child investment effort together.  As dads, we can be big talkers about how important our family is to us.  But our wives know the real deal.  They know if we are serious about our claims.  And they know by our actions, not just our words, whether we truly are in this thing together.

Let me give a small example of what this “showing by our actions” looks like.  Several years ago, I became the Exploration Manager for the Houston office of a small oil company headquartered in New Orleans.  My management position involved not only many video conferences with the main office, but several trips to New Orleans for prospect presentations, board meetings, etc.

Several times these meetings started at 8 am in the New Orleans office.  For a variety of reasons my boss at the time did not want me to fly over the morning of (potential weather delays, unpredictable rush hour traffic from the airport to the office) and strongly suggested that I fly over the night before and they would put me up in a hotel.  Say for a Wednesday morning meeting, the suggestion was to fly over after work on Tuesday, hang out with the New Orleans management for happy hour and dinner, spend the night in the Hampton Inn, and be set for the meeting the next morning.

I could see early on that this was going to be too many evenings with Rhonda holding down the fort on her own.  It was not that she was incapable; it was just not how we operated as a couple.  So I came up with a plan (approved by my supervisor, of course).  I left work a little early on Tuesday and made it home in plenty of time for dinner.  I reviewed any necessary homework, played a game or shot some baskets with the kids, and talked over the day with Rhonda.  Then when the house was beginning to quiet down around 9 PM, I left for Houston’s Intercontinental airport.  I caught the last flight to New Orleans, usually taking off around 10:30 pm, and arrived at my hotel around midnight.  And I was ready to go at 8 am the next morning.

It may seem a small thing, but it spoke volumes to Rhonda that I would put her needs and time with our family as more important than making possible career-enhancing  connections in the company.  I found a balance where I was able to accomplish both the family and corporate jobs with a little creative thinking.  Let me encourage you to put some thought into a creative balance in your responsibilities rather than just accept the status quo.  Especially, if the status quo has you letting your family down.  Remember, we show our wives (and our children) by our actions that we are in this together.

Kevin Leman, in his book Home Court Advantage, has an excellent chapter on work.  He writes, “Your quitting time at work is your starting time at home.”  Have you ever made this connection?  Your quitting time at work is literally your starting time for what is arguably your more important job; leading and serving your family.  Therefore, when it comes to work, we need to be just as punctual about our quitting time as we are about our starting time.  Think with me about what this looks like in practice.

How many of us would show up an hour late to work and say to our boss, “You know, my wife and I just had SO MUCH to talk about this morning.  We needed to hammer down some plans for today and the time must have just gotten away from us.  There is a lot to talk about with five kids and their schedules and a car in the shop so to get all that covered I just needed to get down here a little late.”

Or how about, “I am going fishing this weekend and saw that Carter’s Country is having a 24 hour sale.  So I stopped by on the way into work and, of course, it took a little while to look over all the deals and make my purchases.  I guess it just added up to an hour late to work.”

Or who would say to their supervisor, upon arriving at the office mid-morning, “I ran into some old college friends yesterday and we decided to get together at the Black Walnut Café for a happy hour breakfast this morning.  It was great to catch up.”

We would not say or do any of these things if we wanted to keep our jobs.  But we say these things, or something similar, to our wives all the time.  Are you with me?  We often treat our quitting time at work with either a casual attitude or a “too-much-to-do-at-work” attitude that gets us home later than necessary.  And the message it sends to our wife and children is that the job at home is really not that high of a priority to Dad.  Your quitting time at work is just as important as your starting time.

A corollary to this is to pitch in when you are tired.  Sometimes we arrive home in the evening weary and feeling spent.  One of the best ways we can serve our family is to set those feelings aside and look for where we can contribute.  When I ask Rhonda, “What do you need from me right now?” I am telling her that I am ready to pitch in now.  Not later.  Not after I have had a chance to wind down.  Not in some unknown future.  But right now.  Pitch in when you are tired.

Doing these things regarding our starting and quitting time and pitching in shows our wives that we are in this family thing together.  So many wives, based on our actions as husbands and dads, feel like they are working alone investing in their children.  By my actions, I often implied to Rhonda that she was alone in the family effort.  And alone is not a good thing.  Show your wife, by your actions, that you are in this together.

I began this set of posts on balancing family, work, and ministry with a diagram to summarize our time commitments. 

We covered the various time categories that get “squeezed” when children join the mix.  We also talked about the time we invest in our families.  We emphasized that family time is not babysitting or childcare; it is investing in our children’s future and our legacy.

Let’s wrap up our discussion with a few thoughts about work.  It is easy to find our significance in our work.  I think this is especially true if we feel unqualified or uncomfortable on the home front.  But rest assured, God has qualified and gifted you to be a success as a husband and father.  Everything you were given at your new birth – a new heart, a new identity, a new power, a new disposition, a new Spirit, a new nature – are available to you to invest in your family.

I think sometimes those of us in ministry to fathers sound like we are negative toward work when we address the topic of overwork or finding our significance only in our work.  Work is a good thing.  In fact, we have posted previously four biblical reasons to go to work.  Our goal is to learn the balance between doing our work with excellence while at the same time not becoming totally wrapped up in our work.

One principle that has been helpful to me is the idea that “You may feel indispensable at work; you are indispensable at home.”  Don’t give everything you have at the office.  Save some time and energy for your family.  Not to denigrate the importance of the work you do, but there is probably someone who could step in and do your job in a pinch if you were not there.  There is no one to “step in” at home.  You are it.  And your presence and influence are indispensable to your family.  You are the one.  Remember, you may feel indispensable at work; you are indispensable at home.

Finally, we invest in our children when we teach and model the concept that love trumps knowledge.  Paul writes in I Corinthians 8:1, “Knowledge puffs up, love builds up.”  Or in another translation, “Knowledge makes arrogant, but love edifies.”  Paul could not be more direct.  When the apostle expounds on the topic again in I Corinthians chapter 13, he explains that knowledge without love is useless.  According to Scripture, knowledge without love is of no value whatsoever!

This prominent message of the New Testament has tremendous implications in your family and in your community of believers.  In our legitimate quest to get things right, we can forget the love.  In our effort to get our kids to fly right, we can damage the relationship with a lack of love.  In our search for Bible knowledge, we can become hearers and studiers of love instead of doers of the Word.  The knowledge we advertise in our gossip often harms the ones we claim to love.  Our desire to be in the knowledgeable inner circle can leave us stepping over our less-connected brothers and sisters.  And in our effort to be biblically correct on current trends, such as homosexuality, we can lose our love for the individual caught in its grip.

I have seen our children take this message to heart.  I have seen the idea that love trumps knowledge played out in their lives over and over.  It would be self-serving to share their stories, but it warms the hearts of their parents.  Did we value knowledge in our household?  Very much so.  Bible knowledge is important.  Academic progress was encouraged and rewarded.  But it must always be subservient to love.

Soon after Rhonda and I were engaged to be married, I flew up to Alaska for a job assignment while Rhonda finished her last semester in school.  She gave me a book as I boarded the plane and wrote this verse on the flyleaf, “Let all that you do be done in love” (I Cor 16:14).  Little did we know then, over 35 years ago, that this verse would become a theme for our family.  Rhonda has always been a doer of the word when it comes to love, but I guess on that day she was a prophet as well.

Oops, I see that I skipped 29 ways to affirm your children.  Let me make it succinct:  Affirm, affirm, affirm your kids.  Affirm them for their gifts.  Affirm them for their personalities.  Affirm them for their spiritual interest and maturity.  The essence of Christian child-training is celebrating our children for who they are while at the same time spurring them on to greater development and maturity.

Now parents sometimes wonder, “Will Junior take advantage of all this affirmation?”  In my mind, it works a lot like grace.  Legalists worry that too much emphasis on grace in our practice and teaching will somehow lead believers to take advantage of God’s gift.  But I see it as just the opposite.

The more I know and experience of God’s grace, the more I desire a close relationship with Him.  I do not want to sin more.  I want to sin less, because I am in a love relationship with my Father and I do not want to disappoint him.  In a healthy believer, you could say that grace – and the relationship that comes with it – is self correcting.

Affirmation is very similar.  Children run to where they are affirmed.  Your affirmation builds a relationship with your child that, generally speaking, they will not want to break or disappoint.

Now if this does not describe your own childhood and affirmation does not come natural to you, it will take some intentional effort.  But we have something to help.  We have previously published 29 ways to affirm your children and have collected these posts in this archive.  This list is extensive, but is not designed to weigh you down with more to do.  They are ideas to incorporate into your every day family life.  And I know you can do it!