According to recent figures from the Census Bureau, over 27 percent of children (more than 1 in 4) in the U.S. lived without a father in their home in 2017.
That is sad, but even more shocking are the ramifications. Children without fathers are:
5 times more likely to live in poverty
5 times more likely to commit crimes
9 times more likely to drop out of school
20 times more likely to end up in prison
“The epidemic of fatherlessness causes a strain on young lives and leaves many young men with the burden of trying to figure out how to be a good man without any solid examples to look at,” writes Carl Kozlowski.
“Ninety-four percent of the prison population is male, 85 percent of which are without fathers,” cites Donald Miller.
Peter DeHaan writes about biblical Christianity to confront status quo religion and live a life that matters. He seeks a fresh approach to following Jesus through the lens of Scripture, without the baggage of made-up traditions and meaningless practices.
Peter DeHaan writes about biblical Christianity to confront status quo religion and live a life that matters. He seeks a fresh approach to following Jesus through the lens of Scripture, without the baggage of made-up traditions and meaningless practices.
Once, while at a party, I made a new friend. She was pursuing her PhD in Mathematics. Her course work was finished and she was focusing on her dissertation.
Interestingly, at one point in my life, I too wanted a PhD in mathematics, but she was the first person I’ve met who was actually doing it!
Aside from the math part, another intriguing aspect is what she’s researching. At the risk of over simplification, she was studying the teaching techniques used by the people who teach the math teachers.
Consider, depending on the circumstances, that during a career, the average teacher will directly influence 500 to 5,000 students.
And, again depending on the circumstances, during a career, the average teacher of teachers will directly influence 500 to 5,000 teachers—and thereby indirectly influencing 250,000 to 25,000,000 students.
Now, if she can help these teachers of the teachers be more effective, say 500 to 5,000 of them during the course of her career, the span of her influence will be vast and pervasive, beyond what is reasonable to calculate.
That is a profound amount of influence that one person can make. There is the very real possibility that she could improve and even change the way math is taught to the next generation.
And if you’re one who struggled with math in school, that should be some welcome news!
Peter DeHaan writes about biblical Christianity to confront status quo religion and live a life that matters. He seeks a fresh approach to following Jesus through the lens of Scripture, without the baggage of made-up traditions and meaningless practices.
Summer is officially over (for those north of the equator), lasting from June 21 to September 22 this year.
For me, summer effectively covers a slightly different span, starting on Memorial Day and ending on Labor Day, regardless, we must move from summer to fall.
Each summer, I have a mental list of things that I want to accomplish, some fun, some relating to home improvement, and some regarding work. Each year, summer ends before the list is completed.
Even so, this year I did better than most—regardless of when I mark the end of the season.
The weather, of course, is another transition that occurs on the migration from summer to fall. We usually start fall with highs in the seventies and lows in the fifties, even forties. (Of course, we end fall with snow and below-freezing temperatures.)
So with summer over, I need to review my to-do list.
Some items will be moved to my non-summer list, while others will be put on hold until next year, and the remaining items will be discarded on the junk heap of good ideas and mercifully forgotten.
Peter DeHaan writes about biblical Christianity to confront status quo religion and live a life that matters. He seeks a fresh approach to following Jesus through the lens of Scripture, without the baggage of made-up traditions and meaningless practices.
When Candy and I celebrated the wedding of our daughter, Laura, to our new son, Chris, it was a wonderful day that we had been building up to with increasing anticipation and focus.
1. Are you Nervous?
In the weeks and days leading up to the nuptials, I was surprised by the number of people who asked if I was nervous. It struck me as a strange question.
My part in the ceremony was minimal. With great pride and joy I would escort Laura down the aisle—with all eyes on her—and then say four words: “Her mother and I.” On a personal level, there wasn’t much for me to be nervous about.
If their questions implied a deeper significance, no one bothered to clarify. Even so, most were surprised when I shook my head “no.”
2. How Do You Feel?
On the day of the festivities, I was often asked, “How do you feel?” Granted, my emotional state isn’t apparent to most people, but that question also struck me as a bit odd.
I was (and am) ecstatic for Laura and Chris’s marriage, excited about the journey they are beginning, delighted at the opportunities they have before them, and most proud of the union that has begun.
Their wedding was an affirmation to the work of their respective parents for the prior twenty plus years and a pleasant reminder that despite a few parenting deficiencies along the way, the end result is two mature adults ready to start a life of their own.
For me to feel anything less is incomprehensible.
3. How Did It Go?
A third question—and this one understandable—has been commonly voiced after the wedding: “How did it go? It was wonderful. True, a few minor elements could have gone better, but all the important things transpired as planned and without a hitch.
We were most pleased with the ceremony and the reception embodied simple elegance; guests made many positive comments about both.
A few people did make remarks about “losing a daughter” or Dan now being “an only child,” but that’s not how we see it—our family has grown—and we couldn’t be happier.
Peter DeHaan writes about biblical Christianity to confront status quo religion and live a life that matters. He seeks a fresh approach to following Jesus through the lens of Scripture, without the baggage of made-up traditions and meaningless practices.
A few years ago lightning struck our house. It seems most of the energy was safely dissipated via a ground wire, as intended.
Yet some took a variant path, following along the eave trough and blowing the downspout away from the house, before jumping to an unused underground cable and heading towards our prized maple tree.
The telltale sign of the end of its path was mound of dirt over where the wire once was. The height and width of this trail diminished as it approached the tree, disappearing a few feet from the trunk.
I expected the leaves to turn brown in a couple of days. I braced myself to watch my tree die. To my relief, this didn’t happen. The tree lived the rest of that year and all through the next.
A year and a half later, just as the leaves began to unfold in the spring, they stopped growing and turned brown. Within a couple days, my maple tree was dead.
The likely explanation was the lightning damaged the root system enough to where the tree couldn’t recover.
Above the ground, the tree looked healthy and alive. Yet, hidden from view was a tree fighting for survival. Though it hung on for eighteen months, it couldn’t recover.
Such it is with life. Every action has ramifications. Yet if the effects are delayed, we can easily assume everything is fine.
With an unwise action, the lack of an immediate consequence can lull us into assuming everything is all right and embolden us to repeat our reckless behavior.
On the outside, everything may look fine. But what no one can see—what we may not even realize—is that on the inside we are wounded and moving towards death, be it literal or figurative.
We need to do what is good, even when we see no benefits from our wise actions or no consequences because of our unwise acts: we never know what may await
Peter DeHaan writes about biblical Christianity to confront status quo religion and live a life that matters. He seeks a fresh approach to following Jesus through the lens of Scripture, without the baggage of made-up traditions and meaningless practices.
Several years ago, I realized that a ritual had crept into my morning hair-combing routine.
This added activity was inconsequential, not contributing in any way to my final appearance, yet morning after morning, I persisted in this needless habit.
It took only a few seconds and eliminating it did not substantially increase my free time each day—I calculated that time I freed up through the elimination of this habit garnered me an extra 30 minutes per year.
Another Needless Habit
Recently, I noticed another time-wasting habit relating to brushing my teeth. For some reason, I would wet my toothbrush, apply the toothpaste, and then wet the paste, before brushing.
Why? I don’t know. It’s not in the instructions—-in fact, the instructions don’t even say to use a toothbrush.
I eliminated the initial application of water on the brush with no discernible change in the teeth-cleaning experience.
Removing the second hydration only slightly changed the initial feel of toothpaste in my mouth, but likewise did not detract from the final outcome.
However, this has been a hard habit to break.
First, I would catch myself after it was too late. Within a week, I would stop myself after turning on the water, but before inserting the toothbrush into the water. The next phase was catching myself as my hand moved towards the faucet.
Now after a month of effort, the first application of water has been successfully stopped. However, avoiding the second time still requires some effort.
It is well worth it, however, because once I have successfully broken this habit, I will gain an extra two hours of free time a year.
Now, if I could just identify a bigger needless habit, then I would really gain some free time.
Peter DeHaan writes about biblical Christianity to confront status quo religion and live a life that matters. He seeks a fresh approach to following Jesus through the lens of Scripture, without the baggage of made-up traditions and meaningless practices.
When we were first married my bride and I experienced road rage. We were headed home from work, making a detour for groceries. I drove down the area’s busiest street, full of rush hour traffic, and attempted to pull into the left turn lane.
Due to various reasons, I made a couple of partial forays into it, only to return to the lane for regular traffic. This infuriated the driver behind me, who began vehemently sounding his disapproval through the liberal use of his truck’s horn.
Once we were fully into the left turn lane, he began to roar past us when my spitfire of a wife stuck out her tongue. This sent him into a full fury. He screeched to a halt in the middle of rush hour, opening his truck door hard into the side of our vehicle.
He ran around our car and challenged me to a fistfight in the middle of the road. Talk about road rage.
Being of sound mind, I stayed in my car. This irritated him even more. He stepped towards the driver’s door and cocked his arm. Just then, oncoming traffic cleared and I gunned the engine as he swung his fist towards my window.
But due to the car’s acceleration, he ended up shattering the rear window instead, spraying glass throughout the car. He then returned to his truck to give chase.
We drove around the store’s parking lot, playing cat and mouse between the rows of cars. Eventually, I was able to maneuver to the front door, letting my bride escape and summon police.
She was sure she was going to become a widow.
I figured I could continue playing “keep away” until the police arrived—or I ran out of gas.
Fortunately, I was too cagey for him and he soon gave up the chase. One witness got this license plate number and a bored cabby followed for a while to make sure he wasn’t coming back.
The police ran the plates; the truck’s owner had a history with the police and was well known to them. They arrived at his home to find his right hand wrapped in a bloodied bandage.
He confessed to the whole thing and admitted he was aiming for my head when he swung his fist.
He was later found guilty and required to pay court costs and make restitution.
I’m glad he wasn’t carrying a gun, or this road rage story could have had a different outcome.
Peter DeHaan writes about biblical Christianity to confront status quo religion and live a life that matters. He seeks a fresh approach to following Jesus through the lens of Scripture, without the baggage of made-up traditions and meaningless practices.
A number of years ago my wife and I were witnesses to road rage—and our car was the victim. As the police officer took our statements, he asked if the assailant walked around the front of our car or the back.
My bride quickly answered “the front” and just as promptly, I replied “the back.”
We gave an incredulous glance to the other, with real concern over the other’s sanity.
I attributed our contradicting testimonies to the trauma of the situation and later wondered if eyewitness testimony in a court of law could really be depended upon with any degree of accuracy.
This has all been brought back to mind with our “52 Churches” journey, where we will be visiting a different Christian church each Sunday for a year.
Each week as we drive home from church and later process our experiences, we all too often recall details differently.
Usually, these are over trivial facts, but occasionally our conflicting observations are over more substantive matters.
It will be pointless for me to suggest who is normally right—especially since my bride will be proofreading this post—so I will declare it to be 50-50.
Peter DeHaan writes about biblical Christianity to confront status quo religion and live a life that matters. He seeks a fresh approach to following Jesus through the lens of Scripture, without the baggage of made-up traditions and meaningless practices.
In my newsletter a four years ago, I recommended we periodically check our credit reports. This is a wise move in order to correct reporting errors and catch possible identity theft.
Other finance-related initiatives include making an annual budget, having life insurance, establishing an emergency fund, and planning for the future.
On the health front is scheduling appointments with the doctor and dentist. In addition, some people regularly check their pulse or take their blood pressure. Even stepping on the scale is a form of a medical checkup.
Aside from health issues, we regularly have the oil in our car changed and follow recommended maintenance to keep it running great. Many take similar steps with their homes.
I also do periodic checkups on my schedule to avoid over-commitment and guard against under-involvement.
So we take control of our finances, watch our health, care for our possessions, and protect our time, all by preforming regular checkups.
What about Relationships?
I too often take relationships for granted. Either they work or they don’t. But I should be intentional about them, too. I need to do a relationship checkup. Maybe you do, too. In my checkup, I ask these questions:
Am I investing in the relationships that are important to me? Do I seek to make our interactions significant? Do people anticipate spending time with me?
Conversely, am I protecting myself from toxic relationships that demand much, give little, and drag me down?
Am I looking to build relationships with others?
Do I need to remove myself from some relationships?
Am I in any enabling relationships?
Even more important is my relationship with family. They, too, deserve a thorough checkup.
On the spiritual front, is God, the most important relationship of all. Maybe we should do this checkup first.
Peter DeHaan writes about biblical Christianity to confront status quo religion and live a life that matters. He seeks a fresh approach to following Jesus through the lens of Scripture, without the baggage of made-up traditions and meaningless practices.
