Restoring Warriors Core Values | Fatherhood

Fatherhood is one of the greatest callings a man can carry—and one of the greatest responsibilities.

This message is a wake-up call for men to stop drifting through fatherhood and start leading with intention. Most men were never handed a healthy blueprint. Many grew up without emotional safety, spiritual leadership, or consistent presence. But the answer isn’t just trying not to become our fathers.

The answer is becoming more like God the Father.

Biblical fatherhood is not about perfection. It’s about presence, consistency, discipleship, and responsibility. It’s about creating peace instead of fear, leading with truth instead of control, and shaping your children before the world does.

Because if fathers are not actively forming their children, culture will.

Your kids don’t just need you nearby.
 They need you anchored.

This message challenges men to stop parenting passively and start shepherding intentionally—through Scripture, consistency, conversation, discipline, and example.

Big Truth:
You don’t have to give your kids what you received.
You can give them what God is building in you now.

Big Question:
What kind of father are your children experiencing when life gets hard—steady and grounded, or reactive and distracted?

Challenge:
Spend at least 10 minutes in Scripture every day this week. Let your kids see it. Invite them into your walk with God without pressure.

Reminder:
You’re not just raising good kids.
You’re raising disciples.

Prayer:
Lord, teach me to father the way You father me—with consistency, truth, compassion, and strength. Heal what is broken in me so I can lead my children well. Help me build a legacy of faith that lasts beyond my lifetime. Amen.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Hello, men. Welcome to Restoring Warriors. Hey, it's an honor to be with you tonight and to do ministry alongside you week after week. Hey, before we get going, I just want to remind you of something really important. Restoring Warriors is more than just a men's group or a weekly gathering. This is a ministry where we're a 501c3 and we exist for a really clear purpose to reclaim biblical masculinity and to raise up men who lead their families with courage and discipline and with Christ at the center. And men, your fuel, uh your giving helps fuel that mission. And it sends, uh, helps send men on retreats to on mission trips. It provides devotionals, uh, study guides, and it helps us launch new home groups. And these are groups that are changing family dynamics, breaking generational cycles, and building a godly legacy. So if you believe in what God's doing here, restoring warriors, I invite you to partner with us, whether that's through a one-time gift or a recurring commitment or making restoring warriors your place of tithe. Together, we can build something that will outlive all of us. So before we jump into it, let us pray. Heavenly Father, we lift this night up to you. We come before you as sons, acknowledging you as the ultimate father, one who leads with purpose, instruction, and intentionality. Lord, your discipline is loving. Your presence never leaves us. I pray for the fathers and the future fathers in this room, for those raising children, co-parenting, walking through separation or fighting daily to point their children toward you, Lord. We pray for your wisdom, clarity, and endurance. Help us raise not only responsible citizens, but disciples of Christ. We place this night in your hands, Lord, and it's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. All right, men. So last week we talked about our core value of leadership and leadership through sacrifice. All right, we said that the loudest person in the room often falls flat. But kingdom leadership looks like serving first, obedience, and surrender rather than control. All right, so tonight we build on that foundation as we talk about fatherhood. And whether you're a father or not, this message is for you. At restoring warriors, we define fatherhood this way. Okay, fatherhood is one of the greatest responsibilities a man can bear, and we take it seriously. This ministry equips men with the tools to be godly fathers, whether you're co-parenting, dealing with the pain of separation from your children, or striving to be a better dad. We address the real challenges of fatherhood with practical biblical wisdom, helping you leave a lasting positive legacy for your children. All right, so with that foundation laid, let's dive into our lesson for tonight. So, so fatherhood, like it says in the definition, it's one of the greatest responsibilities we bear as a man. And most of us are trying to carry it without a blueprint that we trust. So here's just the facts we are products of our environment. When we were growing up, many of us lacked emotional safety. Um, spiritual leadership was absent, uh, consistent presence wasn't there. And that was true in my own home. I didn't grow up with a clear picture of what it looked like for a man to walk with the Lord and lead his family towards them. Not in the slightest. Some of us had fathers who were absent, uh, whether that was emotionally, physically, or both. Others had fathers who were present but uh emotionally unavailable. Some of us grew up under pressure, performance-based love, silence, harsh correction without any sort of compassion. And here's the temptation. All right, the temptation is to believe this lie is that this is all I know. So this is all that I can give. All right, but scripture tells us something different. God never called us to recreate our fathers, he calls us to reflect him. All right, most of us remember saying when our first child was born, I'll never parent the way I was parented. I'll never be like my dad, right? And then life happens. You're tired, you're stressed, you're overwhelmed, and then you react, you snap, you say something you swore you never would, and then it hits you in that moment. Man, I sound just like him. And I'll tell you, for me, that realization was a gut punch, but but let me tell you, it doesn't disqualify you. All right, it just reveals the need for a better model. Avoiding our fathers, trying not to be like them, it's not enough. We need a reference point, and that model isn't found in less reaction, it's found in reflecting God more. Okay, so if we're gonna grow as fathers, we have to start here. Before the Bible ever talks about human fathers, it reveals who God is as a father. In Psalm 68, verse 5, it says this a father to the fatherless, a defender of widows is God in his holy dwelling. God doesn't father us from a distance, he he's near, he fathers us with presence, with compassion and consistency. He is holy, but he is also so near to us. He's engaged, he's attentive, he's involved. And the scripture also shows us how God disciplines his children too. So in Hebrews 12, verses 6 and 7, it says this because the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and he chastens everybody he accepts as his son. Endure hardship as discipline. God is treating you as his children. For what children are not disciplined by their father? And I get it, many of us uh associate discipline with anger or fear. Maybe we got spanked growing up or hit or or worse, right? Some of us swing the pendulum and avoid discipline altogether. But God's discipline, it's not reactive, it's not, it's not impulsive, it's it's intentional, it's measured, it's loving, and it produces peace, not fear. So the question we have to ask ourselves is this do I want my children to fear me or do I want them to feel secure around me? Security doesn't come from comfort, all right? It comes from consistency, consistent boundaries, consistent expectations, consistent follow-through. Children thrive when the man leading them is anchored. So we have to ask ourselves, what are we anchored in? As men of God, we're called to be anchored in Christ, anchored in the Father. And when we live anchored, our children feel it. You know, one of the things I always encourage my kids to do, I have this vision that when they're in their 20s, when they're in their 30s, when they're in their teens and they're going through something difficult, or maybe somebody offers them drugs or alcohol, I want them to be able to come to me without shame, without guilt, without any fear of reaction. So whenever my kids come up to me and they say something like, hey, dad, I just did this, and they admit to something that they did wrong. Regardless of what it was, I always say, buddy, thank you so much for telling me. All right, and then we deal with the discipline, but I want them to feel feel comfortable coming to me just like we can feel comfortable going to our father. All right. And so one of the most paralyzing lies that men carry into fatherhood is this belief that their past disqualifies their future. So one thing about God is he doesn't require you to possess what you didn't receive. Okay, he doesn't expect you to have all those answers of things that you didn't receive, but he does ask that you receive it from him. So if we go to 2 Corinthians, okay, verses uh chapter 1, verses 3 and 4, it says, Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion, and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God. So the stuff that God is healing within us is meant to flow through us and towards those that we're leading. Our children, right? That's why this scripture places formation first on the Father's heart. And if you want to go go deeper here, I Deuteronomy 6, verses 6 and 7, it says this These commandments that I give to you are to be on your hearts, impress them on your children, talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. All right, you don't you don't need to lead your children out of memory, you lead them out of out of an overflow, okay? So perfection has never been the requirement, but but submission has submission to God, submission to his word. Our kids don't need us to be experts in everything, right? But they they they really need us to be students, students of the word, students of the father and his word and his instruction. When our children see see a father learning in the word, right, submitting to God, they learn that faith is alive and it's not something that's inherited. It encourages them to do the same. There's a big illusion out there right now. There's this illusion of presence. So millennial and Gen Z parents statistically spend a lot more time physically near their kids than any other generation in history. They call us helicopter parents because we spend so much time with our kids. And yet, anxiety, depression, suicide, gender and identity confusion, and obesity are all accelerating at massive rates. So if spending time alone with our children was the solution, then the outcomes wouldn't be getting worse. All right, so so presence without intentional formation is not protection. We're not protecting our kids just by being around them. We need to be intentional about this. If fathers aren't actively shaping their children, something else will be. All right. I see this epidemic where you go out to a restaurant and you see all of these children with iPads in their face or iPhones in their face and they're not engaging with the family. You know, back in our day, that never would have happened, right? And I get it, sometimes it's easier to give your child a screen. So I'm not judging anybody, but I want you to know that if you're if you're not actively shaping your children, if you're not using those opportunities to shape your children, something else will, right? Those screens that they're on, they're not passive. The algorithms that are are molding, that are, that are, that are feeding your kids material or content, it's not neutral. Entertainment is discipling our children. And when cultural and educational narratives reject God's design for truth and identity, the urgency here becomes really clear. All right, and this isn't something just to spread fear or make you fearful. No, it's awareness, right? If the loudest voice in your children's life is on a phone, it's on a scream, and instead of being rooted in scripture, then the world is going to fill that gap. Intentionality is no longer optional in the way that the world is today. We have to be intentional about the way we're shepherding our children. All right. So the world presents fatherhood oftentimes in these extremes, right? It's either this passive father or it's this controlling father, and the passive father is, you know, he's the deadbeat. He doesn't, he doesn't show up for his kids. He kind of just lets anything happen. He's not helping out around the house. You know, you spend enough time on TikTok, you're going to see, you know, these women that are bashing their husbands for being that way, right? Or you've got this controlling dad who who's a disciplinary and authoritarian and talking down to their kids and they rule through fear. All right, but but scripture offers a completely different model, a completely different model, and it's it's shepherding. It's shepherding our children. So if if we go to Proverbs, and we're in Proverbs 4, uh verses 1 through 6, okay, it says this listen, my sons, to a father's instruction. Pay attention and gain understanding. I give you sound learning, so do not forsake my teaching. For I too was a son to my father, still tender and cherished by my mother. Then he taught me, and he said to me, Take hold of my words with all your heart. Keep my commands, and you will live. Get wisdom, get understanding. Do not forget my words or turn away from them. Do not forsake wisdom, and she will protect you. Love her, and she will watch over you. Wisdom will watch over your children. All right. It is our job to instruct our kids how the world works, to provide them wisdom and biblical wisdom on top of that. All right, this is direction. Okay, we're directing our children. We're not dominating them, we're not dominating over them with this. A shepherd doesn't hover, a shepherd doesn't micromanage, he leads, he walks ahead, he is the example, he protects the path. All right, go to Proverbs 22, verse 6, and it says this start children off on the way they should go. And even when they are old, they will not turn from it. There's comfort in that. There's comfort in knowing that if if I am giving my children a push in the right direction, that they will continue down that path. Masculinity, it's not about having more control. There's a big responsibility to it. It's saying that I will lead even when it's uncomfortable, and I'm gonna speak even when it's unpopular. If you have a teenager, you know what that means. I will stay engaged even when it's exhausting. We don't raise disciples on accident. We we raise them intentionally and deliberately. So, how do we get our kids into the word? We have to be careful that we don't overwhelm them. Okay? Faith that is forced, it often produces resentment. We all know the kids that went to Catholic school growing up and they they resented against it and they rebelled against it, right? Um, if that was some of you, you know, I've heard your stories in small groups, so so I can feel confident saying that it does exist. But if you go to Ephesians 6 4, it says it very clearly here. Fathers, do not exasperate your children. Instead, bring them up in the training and the instruction of the Lord. You don't want to provoke them to anger or discouragement. All right, formation is meant to be woven into life. It's a consistent thing, it's not something that you just drive into your kids. It's something that you model over and over and over. It's meant to be woven into your life. If you go to Deuteronomy chapter 11, verses 19 and 20, it says this. It says, Teach them to your children, talking about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. All right, it's all about consistency. This happens through daily rhythm, all right, by reading scripture at breakfast or going into scripture at breakfast, prayer in the card, uh, excuse me, prayer while you're driving in the car, letting your kids see you in the word and inviting them into real conversations. One of the things I love the most about my time with my kid, my kids are there's always opportunities to weave the Lord's instruction and the Lord's wisdom into daily conversation. You don't have to overbear them with scripture and recite it perfectly or anything, but you can give God's principles and biblical principles in daily conversation as anything comes up. And when you become really consistent with that, your kids start to pick up on it and they start to repeat it back to you sometimes. And it's pretty cool when that happens. The thing about it is your kids don't need a perfect father, all right? They need a submitted one. They need one who is submitted, one who is intentional, and one who is a hundred percent on board and committed to walking them in the instruction of the Lord. All right, so here's the challenge for this week. Your challenge is to be present even when it's uncomfortable. It's to be consistent even when you're tired, it's to be anchored in the word even when life shakes. So so here's a simple path forward. Right? Something easy to commit to that that can that can check these boxes. Be in scripture every single day. Open your Bible every single day and let your kids see you do it. Let your kids see it and invite them in without any pressure. Remember, we're we're not just raising good kids, alright? We're raising disciples. And the legacy that we leave won't be measured by what we build, but by who our children become when they build their lives on Christ. I'm in. Let's pray. Father God, we come before you humbled and grateful that you have entrusted us with the hearts of our children. Lord, give us the eyes to see where we've been present but not intentional, and the courage to lead where we've been silent or hesitant. Lord, anchor us in you when we're tired, when we're overwhelmed or unsure, and teach us to shepherd with wisdom, with consistency and love, not from fear, but from obedience. Lord, help us model a faith that is lived and not just spoken. Give us the humility to keep learning, the discipline to stay engaged, and the grace to lead our children towards you one day at a time. Lord, we place this week our homes and our fatherhood in your hands. Make us men who reflect you well. In Jesus' name. Amen. Hey, man, thank you so much. Hey, you're I'm gonna kick it back off to your group leaders where they're gonna go through the small group ground rules and break you in into your small groups. The leader will also model a check-in. Hey, I'd love to hear from you. I'd love to hear your thoughts. I'd love to hear success stories, I'd love to hear where you're struggling at any time. Man, feel free to shoot me an email. My email is below. I'd love to hear from all you guys. I'm praying for each and every one of you. Make it a great day, make it a blessed day.