The father is a life giver

Kilton Moyo

Talking of restoring family relations, you cannot ignore the central role played by a father in any home or family set-up. All relations in the family are dependent on how the father carries himself around and how much he desires to build a united family.

Often times we realise that many of us fathers spend more time dictating to our children and wives and forget to build relationships with them. Most fathers are at home but without any meaningful relationships with their families. Most relationships are based on fear and not love. They are based on demand and on lack of an alternative.

Did you know that most young people, once they leave home they do not want to return? Mostly that is because they have no relationships with their fathers. While they were home, the father spent much of his time accusing, blaming, shouting at them and forcing them into many schemes that he thought were good for them and yet this works against sound and lasting relationships. I want to attempt sharing a few ideas today on how fathers can help build lasting and enriching relationships within their families. I hope it makes sense to many of you reading.

Let us first understand that the father is a life giver in the family. Giving therefore requires a particular attitude that really gives and not takes away or suffocates. Unfortunately most of us fathers we give and take and suffocate our own offspring. To give life you must have it. Life to our children is given through love more than through material provisions. It is given through deliberately respecting the child as a parent and understanding their gifts and desires in life. Most fathers lack when it comes to sacrificially loving their children. They put too many conditions which make the family feel oppressed and many are iron fisted.

You give life by understanding their individual gifts and helping them at their pace in their gifts. I have seen many parents who want children to perform the way they want and who want children to fulfil the parent’s vision or desire.

This causes a lot of conflicts at home. I think as a father there is need to understand what each child is gifted in and what they desire to do with their gift. In this way you can then engage them within their line of interest. When you do so, dialogue easily takes place and it flows. They become confident when you talk about their passion and you support them without condemnation. Our children in this generation desire the endorsement of their fathers more than anything else. A father who will commend and endorse the child’s gifts and passion will build a lasting relationship with them.

Another way of building a relationship with your children is to see value in them. Children expect parents to believe in them more than anyone else. Your child is the best child on earth. I know of fathers who compare their children unnecessarily with other kids. Have you ever checked in Exodus 2 how other parents gave away their children to the system of the world that killed them while Moses’ parents saw differently? The Bible says they saw he was a good child and they hid him. It is important to see value in your child if you are going to walk their future and yours together.

When you see value you will protect them. You protect them even when they make mistakes. Some fathers will disown a child because they made a mistake.

The role of a father as a life giver is to protect and groom and train the family. In your training do not make them angry. That is what the Bible says in Colossians 3: 21. Most of us in grooming of our children we provoke them by rubbishing their potential and value and make them angry against us and when they are grown up they walk away from our lives.

I do not think it is a wise thing to make your children feel and think they were better off with the father next door. As fathers we need to understand the kind of children we have these days. We can build relationships with them if we engage them and inspire them in their own gifts. It is important therefore that as a father you know your children’s individual gifts and help them pursue them. Avoid comparing your own kids with each other. You are building and influencing unnecessary sibling rival. Your duty as a father is to build a united family that progresses and prospers together.

I never said it is easy. It is a tall order but it becomes bearable if we allow our children to be responsible partly for their own upbringing by engaging their interests. It becomes workable if we create room for dialogue and free talk. In the past many fathers were lions and their children never enjoyed freedom of speech and engagement. They had the families but did not have relationships with their families.

To me I think having a sound relationship with my children is the best thing I desire. It is of no use to have money and have it all but have bitterness within the family. All I am saying is that as fathers, let us prioritise having relationships with our children in these last days. There is nothing in any child that beats the father’s love. How willing are we as fathers to give that sacrificial love for our children?

I pray the best of your love today and pray that we can rise up as fathers and build with God great families that will honour him. I desire that when my energy gets low in my body by virtue of age, my children be there for me and inspire me in my old age. It will be a sad thing that when you eventually come to your senses at old age, you discover you never had a relationship with your children and they cannot be there for you. As fathers let us give them life now. Life is beyond the environs of our homes.

Kilton Moyo is creator of Fruitful Marriages, a renewal and enrichment program and is pastor, counselor and author of The Sex Trap. Call or whatsap on +263 775 337 207, +263 772 610 103 or [email protected]