“But now, O Lord, You are our Father; we are the clay, and You are the potter; we are all the work of Your hand.” Isaiah 64:8
Father’s Day is this Sunday and we’re reflecting on how the Father continually molds us, shaping us in His image. Join us as the fathers of the Bethel Music Collective share lessons they’ve learned about fatherhood.
FAITH // “You can’t control or force your kids to know God, even though every parent at some point probably tries that. The perfect parent knows the best balance between keeping them guarded from drama in life, and exposing them to some of it so they can see God’s hand in your life and the world around them. You want them to see complete void without God and then see the light, when God comes through. Let them watch you worship through the pain and see what it looks like to co-labor with Him.” -Brian Johnson
GIFTS // “So many times I run away with the gifts He has given me. I try to figure them out all on my own, like an orphan clutching the gift with a fear that it will be taken away. I think that I must perform to keep the gift. I think I must use the gift to earn my place in the world. I have looked at the gift to give me identity, instead of looking to my Father to define me. But as I watched my son’s kite reach higher into the sky that day, my heart saw the love of a Father who only gives good and perfect gifts — gifts that require His presence to fly.” -Jonathan David Helser
PRAYER // “In our family, we pray out loud, invite the Holy Spirit, and ask Him to help us. This is showing our kids how we rely on our Father, how we desire for Him to guide us in every day situations.” -Josh Baldwin
UNCONDITIONAL // “I think the unconditional aspect of God’s love is what He has planted in every earthly father’s heart. As soon as I laid eyes on my son and daughter, I knew there was never anything that could happen that would cause me to not love them. It’s in our DNA to love like God loves, and when you become a father, you understand the love of God so much easier and more tangibly.” -Paul McClure
PURITY // “My kids remind me that there’s such a purity and an innocence in how we relate to God. There’s a lack of negativity– a purity and a light in children. They teach you how to be present and in the moment because that’s all that they know. They’re not filled with thoughts of the future, they’re not obsessing about the next day, they’re just present in the moment.” -Jeremy Riddle
LEGACY // “More than being a well-known worship leader or speaker on a platform, I want to build a legacy of kindness and love in my home. When my grandkids talk about me years down the road, I want them to say “He was the kindest man I ever knew.” Some of us didn’t have parents who walked with God. Some of us didn’t have mentors to look up to. Well, guess what: You can rewrite the story for your family. Be the father or mother you never had. Be the spiritual leader you never had. Redeem the years. Build a legacy.” -Cory Asbury
Thank you so much for these. God’s word to me was “You are David helping Solomon build the temple”. So I am preparing my kids to do great things, to go further than me, to stand on my shoulders so that my ceiling will be their floor.
In the 2 years before my grandson Cameron Gover died from Schinzel-Giedion Syndrome, and was Called Home to Heaven to be with his Heavenly Father on 11th November 2012, God poured out an abundance of His Love, Joy and Peace, to show me just what the Heart of the Father is like. 2 Years of complete unconditional Father Heart of God. The cost of LOVE is ultimately Death, as Jesus died upon His Cross on Calvary because John 3:16 affirms “God so loved this world that he gave his one and only son to die upon the cross”.