Hi. I\u2019m Joe Foster and I\u2019m still here by God\u2019s grace, 100 percent. So, I want to share some information about a study that was done on what makes a successful life, and the study took 75 years. A book was published on this study called \u201cTriumphs of Experience: The Men of the Harvard Grant Study\u201d. Psychiatrists, if you can believe this, followed Harvard University students who were students of Harvard University in the late 1930\u2019s. They basically followed these guys their entire lives to find out what makes a successful life. Would you like to know what the conclusion of the study was?<\/p>\n
So, here\u2019s what the lead psychiatrist, who wrote the book, had to say. He said \u201cThe only thing that really matters in life are your relationships with other people. You could have career success. You could make a lot of money. You could be famous. You could even have good health, but if you did not have a few deep relationships, you did not have a successful life.\u201d\u00a0 So, as believers, we\u2019ve known this all along. God told us what the greatest gift is. I\u2019m not in a position to give any of this advice, but I can say it doesn\u2019t take any of us off the hook for trying to be the best dads and grandads we can be going forward.<\/p>\n
So, we\u2019re going to talk about \u201cThe 10 P\u2019s of Being the Dad God has Called You To Be\u201d<\/strong>.<\/p>\n Number one is “Personhood”<\/strong>, your relationship with the Lord. The most important relationship and the one thing the book missed, being a secular book, was our relationship with the Lord. The most important thing in our lives obviously is our relationship with the Lord.<\/p>\n In 1993, I went to lunch with a guy named Mike Downey. Mike Downey is a mighty man of God. God has used this guy in a powerful way all over the world. He started \u201cGlobal Missions Fellowship\u201d, which became \u201cE3 Partners\u201d and \u201cI Am Second\u201d. He now heads up a ministry called \u201cStrategic Impact\u201d. But he\u2019s kind of a mess too, like all of us, I guess. But, he\u2019s a mighty man of God. So, we go to lunch and right off the bat, and I was about 33 at the time, he says \u201cTell me about your relationship with God?\u201d I was a believer, but I really wasn\u2019t putting the Lord first in my life. I could\u2019ve lied to him or told him the truth but I said, \u201cYou know, I\u2019m a believer and all that\u2026 but I\u2019ve just been busy and blah blah blah.\u201d So, he challenged me, and one really huge thing that he got me doing was he got me spending time with the Lord first thing every day. So, number one is personhood and your relationship with the Lord.<\/p>\n Number two is “Partnership”.<\/strong> One thing that we get wrong sometimes, with my wife and I\u2026 one thing we were guilty of with our girls was putting our kids even ahead of our marriage. I think you\u2019ve got to have your relationship with the Lord, your relationship with your spouse, then your relationship with your children.<\/p>\n “Parenthood” is number 3.<\/strong> As I thought about this and got ready for this, it was so helpful for me to get my own act together. I was like \u201cOk, what am I gonna talk about; what is the Lord gonna put on my heart?\u201d Well parenthood, just a great example I like to use. How many of you know who Tony Evans is? Tony Evans is world renowned. How many of you know about his dad? I don\u2019t know much about his dad, but years ago I heard Tony talk about his father, and one of the main reasons Tony Evans is who he is, is his father. He had a dad who was a great dad. The fruit of Tony Evan\u2019s father was Tony and the legacy of that family. To me, we\u2019re called to make disciples. Well, the obvious first place we\u2019re supposed to start is our family. I\u2019ve been guilty of even forgetting that sometimes. I\u2019m thinking I\u2019m going to go and save the world; well it\u2019s our families before we go do that. So, \u201cParenthood\u201d is number 3.<\/p>\n Number 4 is \u201cPriority\u201d<\/strong>, put your family ahead of your career. We have 3 girls and I would drive them to school, and before the youngest was even able to go to school the older 2 were like, 8 and 6 or something like that. So, I was taking them to school every day. So, I drop them off, I may have been on my cellphone, who knows what I was doing. I drop off our 8 and 6 year-old girls off at school and I take off. I get a call later from my wife and it was a snow day; the school had actually closed. So, I was so focused on what I was doing, I drop my kids off, I\u2019m outta there. Don\u2019t do that.<\/p>\n Put your family ahead of your career. As guys, I think it\u2019s easy to do that, we feel like, \u201cOk, Lord I gotta make something happen.\u201d The feeling we have is like, it\u2019s the Lord who\u2019s going to provide but we think we gotta make it happen. Put your family ahead of your career; do not put career success ahead of your family.<\/p>\n Ok, number 5 is \u201cPresent\u201d<\/strong>. You know, be present. You gotta be there, number one you gotta be there and secondly, when you are there, you actually have to be there. So that\u2019s something else that\u2019s been tough for me is just, when you get home, you sometimes have to let it all go. Put your cellphone away; resist the urge to check email. It\u2019s just so easy to be sucked back into it. Number 5 is be present.<\/p>\n Number 6 is \u201cPut Others First\u201d<\/strong>. Serve together. One of the pivotal moments in my life was 1998. I was 37 years old, and I went on a mission trip with Global Missions Fellowship, the organization that Mike Downey founded that I was telling you about earlier. Just seeing people\u2026 you know, when you share the Gospel over there. Number one, it\u2019s easier than sharing the Gospel with your next door neighbor. You\u2019re going through a translator. I think those people are more poor in spirit, and there\u2019s places like that here in Dallas where you can do this. It blew me away when I saw people cross over from death to life right before my eyes; they genuinely trusted Christ. That completely blew me away.<\/p>\n Then we got our kids doing it with us. Serving with your family is a powerful thing. There\u2019s so many good opportunities right here in Dallas; there are plenty of places you can serve with your family. You don\u2019t have to go across the world. So, put others first, serve together.<\/p>\n Number 7 is \u201cPassions\u201d<\/strong>. Look for the unique gifts and passions in each of your children. Be their chief encourager, not their chief critic. Just help them to be what God has called them to be.<\/p>\n Number 8, \u201cPursue Grace and Forgiveness\u201d<\/strong>. You know, every family, every one of them has got issues. We had a run with our youngest. I\u2019m not going to go into all the details, but I\u2019m sure everybody here can share some war stories. But, at the end of the road, we have got to pursue grace and forgiveness. In light of what we\u2019ve been forgiven for, in light of the Gospel, how can we not forgive? So, pursue grace and forgiveness.<\/p>\n Number 9 is \u201cPosition Yourself with Like-minded Dads\u201d.<\/strong> Surround yourself with like-minded dads. I heard something, literally a month ago, that got my attention. What the guy said, and I believe it\u2019s true, he said \u201cYou are a direct reflection of the five people you spend the most time with.\u201d The five people you spend the most time with, you are a direct reflection of them.<\/p>\n Our youngest daughter, the one who gave us a run for our money, the cool thing is she\u2019s really a great young lady. She\u2019s going to be a teacher and work with kids with Autism. God\u2019s grace prevails.<\/p>\n Number 10.<\/strong> The big thing is to talk about and \u201cPray about the application\u201d<\/strong>. Lord, we just worship you as the one alone worthy of our lives, and Lord I just thank you for this great group of men in this room who are just an army of men who have been in the battle and trained well. Lord, I can just tell every single one of them is someone who loves you, and follows you wholeheartedly. So, I pray that you would just continue to bless them and their families and that you would do everything that you can to help them to continue to be great disciples, and disciplemakers. That their kids would all come to know you or know you more deeply, and that they too would in turn have families who are Godly families that impact the world. Lord that\u2019s your plan for the world, to impact individuals through individuals and families.<\/p>\n And, I pray for this ministry. I pray that you would help this ministry to impact the world. We know it\u2019s an impossible task unless you do it. I pray that you would be the one to go before us. Thank you for Bill, for the leadership of this ministry, and for what you\u2019ve already done. What you\u2019re doing in places like Cuba and other parts of the world, and so Lord we just give this ministry to you. Lord I pray that you would speak to each one of us individually and tell us an area that you would encourage us in or an area that you want to help us to be even better at following you and being the dads that you have called us to be.<\/p>\n I pray this in your name Jesus, Amen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A successful life Hi. I\u2019m Joe Foster and I\u2019m still here by God\u2019s grace, 100 percent. So, I want to share some information about a study that was done on what makes a successful life, and the study took 75 years. A book was published on this study called \u201cTriumphs of Experience: The Men of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6715,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"image","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[60,77,78],"tags":[153,91,82,177],"class_list":["post-3592","post","type-post","status-publish","format-image","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-abiding","category-blessing","category-encouragement","tag-amazing-stuff","tag-btd","tag-parenting","tag-wisdom","post_format-post-format-image"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/af2.musiimes.space\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3592","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/af2.musiimes.space\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/af2.musiimes.space\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/af2.musiimes.space\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/af2.musiimes.space\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3592"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/af2.musiimes.space\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3592\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/af2.musiimes.space\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6715"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/af2.musiimes.space\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3592"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/af2.musiimes.space\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3592"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/af2.musiimes.space\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3592"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}A prayer for this ministry and you<\/h3>\n