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You’re tired.
Not just physically; though yeah, that too.
You’re tired in your bones. In your soul.
Trying to be a steady husband, an intentional dad, a man of God… but deep down, you feel like you’re falling short. Like you’re carrying more than you know how to hold.
Dad Tired is a podcast for men who are ready to stop pretending and start healing.
Not with self-help tips or religious platitudes, but by anchoring their lives in something (and Someone) stronger.
Hosted by Jerrad Lopes, a husband, dad of four, and fellow struggler, this show is a weekly invitation to find rest for your soul, clarity for your calling, and the courage to lead your family well.
Through honest stories, biblical truth, and deep conversations you’ll be reminded:
You’re not alone. You’re not too far gone. And the man you want to be is only found in Jesus.
This isn’t about trying harder.
It’s about coming home.
Hey guys, before we jump into today's episode, I wanna thank my friends over at Dwell differently for sponsoring today's episode. You've heard me talk about Dwell Before. They're absolutely one of my favorite brands out there that gives tangible resources to families to help them memorize scripture. If you're trying to lead your family well, if you're trying to be the spiritual leader of your home and point your family back to Jesus and you just feel stuck, or that feels really overwhelming to you, one of the most practical things you can do.
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I was talking to this guy who works with the FBI, which is the best way to start any story because it, you know, even though I'm don't personally work for the FBI, in my mind I did for this minute and he, he started talking to me about. Like crime scenes and the first questions he asks when he gets in the crime scene and the things that he's really focused on.
And he told me something that was kind of revelatory to me. And before I get to that, I kind of set it up with this idea of how many ways do we define ourselves as people? You know? It feels like every year we get a new test, whether it's like, which Hogwarts house do you belong to are, are you an ENF? E or an INTJ, like what's your Enneagram type, what's your, like, you know, there are a thousand ways I'm, it's not getting into the depths of all of those different things, but it feels like we just keep getting more ways to understand one another and, and really sometimes it can just be an argument or a reason by which to speak about ourselves more.
But again, I have the privilege of leading premarital classes and, and teaching forums on marriage and going to conferences and getting to talk about those kind of things. And. Um, one of the things that I find that's so remarkably interesting to me is when you talk to a couple and they have like the list, do you have a list of when you were in high school or college and you were looking for a significant other, or maybe you still are, and as you do, you read through those things?
Like I, it's just for me, when I read back on that list of what I wanted in a wife, it's just cringeworthy. It's not just cringeworthy because. Now looking back on it, it just seems so remarkably like shallow and weird and whatever. Like one of mine was like, she needs to make me laugh and or whatever it is.
And, and again, I, I recognize wanting to have a good sense of humor, but that. Now just seems so trivial in the grand scheme of things, right? Like being a father of five kids and having gone through the different things in life that life throws at you. And so many of you know my story, but I lost my wife two years ago when she was 28 years old.
And, um, working through that and walking through everything and, and what it takes to be a mom of multiple kids or a dad of multiple kids like you, just, you would look back at some of these lists that you see from people and you just kind of, you smirk because there's an innocence to it. But, uh, foolishness also at the same time, and.
And as you're working through that, you want to give them advice, but you know that you know what you know about yourself, which is if someone would've told you the things about what it takes to get married, you would've thought that they were foolish or they just don't understand because you have found this unique special love that no one else has ever found.
And so on their list, they look at what they're, they're looking for and, and look at any potential pitfalls and things like that. And there's a way that I think. That maybe it's important for us to have a conversation about, about that. Scripture seems to bring up again and again, like when Jesus talks to people, when Jesus confronts someone, when, when Paul, even when he goes to teach at Mars Hill or when he has conversations with non-believers or even with Christians or people who claim to follow Jesus, he, we kind of revolves so much of his thought talk conversation around one idea, and that's the idea of idolatry.
That no matter how you wanna identify yourself, like, you know, I'm a, I'm a summer person. Like I really like Cocoa Puffs. Or if I was a ice cream flavor, I would be Rocky Road. We do all these things, but, but the Bible seems to almost give us this indicator that if you wanna really know, I. What it's like to be around someone, or if you really wanna understand yourself, well recognize what you tend to worship when you're not worshiping Jesus.
If you really wanna understand yourself well, there's this tournament of champions in your mind, right? And let just think of like a sweet 16 bracket. I. And each of those different things is each of those different slots for a team is made up of something important to you. Family, friends, money, job success, cars, things, video games, progressing in your fantasy football league, right?
There's, there's all of these things. And imagine you pushed, randomized. And all of those things were randomly pitted up against something else in your life. And then you had to, someone looked at your life and let's say the first matchup was fantasy football versus your job. Right? And it's kinda a fun thing to think about because to be honest, you probably spent a lot of time at your job doing your fantasy football or, or vice versa, whatever it might be, but.
Something would come out as a winner. If you looked at your time, your energy, your emotions, your mental status, what you give importance to how much time you spend doing it. An outside observer could say, in this person's life, his job is more important. Sure, he loves to do fantasy football and whatever, but I mean, look at the time he spends at his job.
Look at the focus he has on his job. Look at the progression he's made in his job. His job wins this round and then it moves up, and now instead of a sweet 16, you've got. You're Elite eight, and these are the eight things that still stand at this point of most importance to you. And, and ultimately the Bible kind of says, when this tournament of champions is done, God should be standing alone, that everything else might be important to you.
And, and, and hopefully the, the Bible seems to indicate to us like we should, if you're a father. And a husband with kids. Your top four should be pretty much always the same with God coming out as a clear winner. But then obviously your family, your wife is next up after God, and then you've got your kids, and then you've got your occupation.
And so there's not a lot of wiggle room in that. But the Bible says What happens to us is that other things kinda sneak in. That other things kind of jump into that Final four or maybe even that championship game and, and there can be whole seasons where our heart is controlled by something different or what we want most is actually not God, but something else.
It's idolatry clearly defined. I think this is a really great explanation of it. Idolatry is when we use things that are meant to be worshiped or we worship things that are meant to be used. Idolatry is when we worship something that was meant for us to treat as a thing. As a useful tool, or it's when we create, treat as a tool, something that was meant to be worshiped.
So when God becomes an object or when objects become Gods, that is really when idolatry hits. And so going back to what we were talking about previously, about what is the. That list that you made for your spouse? I think one thing that we don't talk about, we might talk about like love languages. Like I like getting gifts.
I like to, and I'm not, there's nothing, it's not unimportant, but I, I think in reality what we struggle with most and, and I think like what the people around us struggle with most is what we tend to idolize. There's things that are in our lives that are idols of our heart and our families and our kids and our wives and our husbands.
They really are the ones who receive the brunt of the pain of us navigating that our hearts were made to be ruled by God, but right now they're being ruled by something else. That's really where the rub lies, not just in in ourselves personally, but but in a lot of our marriages and in our parenting.
Right. I, I would say this for myself. Most of the tensions. That have arisen historically in my marriage or that arrive with my kids is when what is most important to me is out of alignment as of what God wants to be most important to me. And my counselor said this not that long ago, and I thought it was brilliant.
He said, your family doesn't actually have to deal with your insecurities. They have to deal with the way that you cope with your insecurities, right? So my, my family doesn't actually feel the weight of me feeling less than, or like not a good provider or. That I don't have what it takes. My family feels that I have to deal with that.
And so I do so by maybe overcompensating. I do so by anger means, or I do so by, that's what people around me feel. They don't actually feel my insecurity, they feel me trying to fix my insecurity. They, they feel me trying to make sense of it. And so I won. Go back to the thing I was talking about, the beginning with the FBI guy and, and he said.
He told me something that was so important. I was asking him about like murders and everything, and I was like, tell me your best stories. Tell me everything. And he said, when I show up in a crime scene, I know that the, the murder was committed for one of three reasons. I. And I'm like, what? This is, no, not just three.
And he said no. After 30 years of investigations, he said I could take every murder that's ever happened and put 'em into one of three categories. And it got me thinking. It got me thinking enough to go, like, I wonder if those categories for what we would murder for, I. Are the same categories in a big view of what we idolize in our hearts.
And I think I've come up with a system that's been pretty helpful for me. And as I've been talking to couples that are walking into marriage and hopefully can be helpful for you today as you're navigating your own sense of idolatry or your own sense of why do people feel this weight for me? Why is it difficult for people to be around me?
Why? Why do I often. Struggle so much with insecurities. Why do I do the things that I do at this? Like Romans chapter seven, Paul says, why do I do the dumb junk that I do? And why do I not do the right stuff that I know? And and it all probably all comes down to this, we idolize something other than God.
We find our worth in something other than God. We find our value in something other than God. We idolize something that isn't God. We worship something that isn't God. And the return of that investment of worship is not. Value, meaning importance, it's insecurity and a lack. And so for me, in my heart, I started looking at, I asked him, so what are the three things?
Like what are the three reasons that someone kills? He says, it's always for one of these three reasons, and I'm, I want to kind of. Pitch this to you as this idea of maybe for us to self-examine and say, what is the actual idol of my heart? It maybe you've never sat down and actually thought about it, but what actually is in that Sweet 16?
What tends to win when you're not paying attention? When you're not actively guarding your heart, not actively guarding the worship of your heart, what tends to slip in? What's that thing? That can sit on the throne of your heart for a season, or maybe it's sitting on it right now. Maybe you just haven't touched on it.
Maybe you haven't talked about it, maybe you haven't recognized it. But what I found in my life to be very important, it's the more that we're able to name and understand something, the better we're able to control it and to talk about it and to discuss it, and ultimately sometimes to even get rid of it.
And so I took what he said, his answer, and I broke it down into like further categories. But he told me this, he said. There's three reasons people murder, and I think these are the three common idols of the human heart. And he said, the three reasons people kill are for power, sex, and money. He said, I, you show me any dead body that's homicidal, and I will ask this series of questions.
Who had something to gain in power? Who had something to. Who was either objectified or subjectified through sex or was there a, an opportunity for that otherwise wouldn't have been there Or was there money involved? Was there this comfort is really what you should say is the, is there comfort involved here?
I. And so I kind of broke those down and I thought, man, that's such a brilliant way of understanding and systematizing the world of this guy who has been looking at murder scenes for his whole life. And he said it's, it comes under one of these three things. And I really think that for idols of our hearts as dads, it really comes down to the same three things.
And, and then I broke some of those down into further categories. But here's the question I wanna pitch to you, that I wanna pitch to myself. I wanna pitch to us as a community. Which is when we're not guarding our heart actively, when we're not paying attention, when the world gets its claw in us. When we get gripped by something, the insecurities that our families feel, that our kids feel, that get us in these, these moments where we we're kind of spiraling or we're anxious or whatever it is.
I think it all comes down to we're either worshiping something that's meant to be used or we're using something namely God that is meant to be worshiped. So here's the number one category that I think a lot of us as guys struggle with, is the same thing that, that he talked about power. Some of us have a power idol in our lives, and I broke these this into three categories.
Some of us are power. Idol is really the idol, even though it's under the category of power, it's authority, right? Our idols when we chase an idol and we don't achieve it, which that's what all idols are. Idols are an unachievable system of. Granting us value and meaning, and we just can't achieve it. You can't catch it.
You can't absorb it. You can't do anything with it. And so when we can't achieve something, it makes us feel insecure. And so a lot of times you can find out someone's idols because you can watch what makes them feel insecure. And so if you have a, under the first category of power, if you've got an authority idol, here's what I wrote.
I wrote, if I have an authority idol, as I'm reading through these, maybe try to identify what it is in yourself. So this might be you. This is certainly me. I tend to feel insecure when I'm treated unjustly, or I'm treated as less than I am. And then I cope. Right? That's what people feel. They don't feel that when I feel insecure, people don't feel my insecure, they feel me coping with it.
So if I have a power idol in my heart, that might be an authority idol where I, I tend to feel insecure when I'm treated unjustly or as less than I am. So I, what do I cope by doing? I cope with that security by being a shot caller, right? I gotta be in charge. I've got an authority idol. I have to be the one who's calling the shots.
And sometimes if I don't or if I feel like I'm not. Then I can be the worst follower ever. I can be rude, I can be undermining, I can be juvenile. I think of moments, you know, like maybe if all my guys are getting together to play like a football game and, but I wasn't really looped in on the conversation or I'm not really asked to help organize anything, then I can tend to show up late.
I can tend to, you know, because I wasn't in charge of this, I wasn't asked to lead this, and so if I feel like, man, that must make me less than then I can tend to act like a child, which is embarrassing, but it's. That's the idol that can sit on the throne of my heart if I'm not careful. For other people underneath, power can be a control idol.
So many of us as guys I think struggle with the idol of control. I gotta be in control of everything all the time. And I think because modern culture allows us to be in control of so much that it's sometimes I think I. When we worship control, I think it's actually, a lot of times it's applauded in our society, but God obviously considers it to be a problem.
Hey guys, hope you're enjoying this episode so far. Just wanna take a quick minute to say we have lots of resources here at Dad's Tire to try to help you lead your family well. But by far, one of the most helpful things that we offer is what's called our Family Leadership program. We have had hundreds and hundreds of guys go through this program.
And it has been life changing. You will jump into a cohort with like-minded guys. You'll start memorizing scripture, studying scripture together and going through practical things every day to figure out what does it look like for you to have the gospel change you as a man, to change you in your marriage, to change the way that you parent your kids and the way that you see yourself at work.
Again, it's very practical and it's very deep. So if you're serious about trying to become the leader of your home, if you're serious about. Trying to grow closer to Jesus. This is by far the most helpful resource that I we have. You can go to dad tire.com, click the Family Leadership program, and you can jump into the next cohort.
So when I have a control idol, I tend to feel insecure when I'm controlled or I'm subject to circumstances outside of my control. So if I have a control idol, I just can't deal with it. When there's something happening that I can't get in under control, I, I really do think, and this is kind of an interesting take, I maybe a hot take is I think a lot of the new age movement is people who have a control idol who don't know how to deal with it.
It's people who re recognize that life just kind of happens to you and there's things that are very much outside of your control and not being able to cope with that reality. We go, well, maybe if the star I can read what's gonna happen today in my horoscope, and it's gonna tell me. So we want to gain control.
Like if my chakra's right and I touch these crystals and I lick this lamp and I do whatever. Then all of a sudden, I'm not going to get this disease or I'm not going to, right. It's you're trying to get control of something that you clearly have zero control over. Sometimes the way that we cope with a control idle, what you'll find in yourself is you can be anxious, you can be overthinking.
To the point of, of worrying, this is what control idle people are our favorite warriors. They're the ones who are always concerned about what's gonna happen next because they're not in control of it. And so that's the power ethic because that's the power idol. So authority and control. I think the third part of a power idol is like dominance, and that's the idea that I always need to be seen as.
A force. So I'm, when I feel insecure is when I'm seen as weak. If I'm ever seen as weak or someone suggests that I'm not as strong as I possibly could be, I, I tend to cope by showing this is our overcompensate, right? I gotta get the bigger truck. I gotta lash out irrationally, I gotta get really angry. I gotta be at the top of my voice because I don't want you to ever see me as weak.
Right? That's like the way you can find your idol sometimes is what sets you off the most when someone suggests it about you. My wife who passed away, it was it her. If someone suggested that she was lazy, it was basically like the worst word you could possibly call her because she had an idol of busyness and an idol of work.
And so you can find to go, like for me, if you called me certain names, it wouldn't even, right. It wouldn't bother me whatsoever. If you made fun of the car that I drive, I would go, I don't care what you think, but there's other places that would just absolutely rock me to my core. Maybe I'm asking you that question right now.
What is something that someone could suggest about you that you would think would make you fly off the handle more than anything else? What would be the thing that if someone said you're. Is it lazy? Is it weak? Is it you're arrogant? Is it you're unloving? Is it you're not respectable? What is it? Because oftentimes in that we find our idol there.
That's the power. I think that's the power idol. That's one of the three categories, and those are the subcategories are authority, control, and dominance. The comfort idol is the one that kind of aligns with the. The money, right, that he said it's either sucks money or power, and I think money is bigger than that.
Again, money doesn't do much, right? Like in a post-apocalyptic world, we wouldn't really care about having dollars because they'd be pointless. You know, they're just the stuff of kindling of fires. But really what money demonstrates is this. This idea that if I have enough, I'll be comfortable. So that's why I use that.
We have a comfort idol. This is what we pursue more than anything else. Some of us, this is, this is our main idol. I just wanna be comfortable in life. So one of the key ways that that can show itself is through money. So if you've got a comfort idol, it might be that that subcategories, you've got money underneath it.
I tend to feel insecure when I'm seen as a bad provider or when I tell myself I'll be trapped in a state of perpetual want and need. So how do I cope with this? I pursue money. Like you wouldn't believe. I think of money. I love money. I do it unethically. I can do it at someone else's expense. I can use phrases like, it's not personal, it's just business over and over again.
I feel like the pursuit of money is ultimate in my life and, and ultimately I, I, I don't really care about having money in the bank as much as what money in the bank can provide, which is, this is gonna make my life easier. It's, we've told ourselves that cash is going to do what only God can. Your money won't make you safe.
Your money won't, won't bring you food if it's the Lord's will to be outside of it. It can feed you 100%, but ultimately nothing happens. That doesn't happen, that doesn't cross God's desk first. And so, um, this notion, right, it's, it's Steve Jobs on his deathbed with all the money in the world and can't slow down the cancer cells moving in.
So we, we've incorrectly worshiped something that was meant to be used. The money is supposed to be a useful tool. Help our family, help ourselves, help our communities, help our churches, help our neighborhoods, help our children. But if money becomes the thing to be worshiped, then what do we do? We can use our kids, use our families, use our wives to accomplish our worship.
What are my kids? Well, they're just, they're, they're an annoyance that gets in the way of me making more money. If we've ever switched those around, you can feel the weight of that. For some of us, the comfort. Idle. The first one is money, but sometimes a way that comfort idle shows up is in success. I tend to feel insecure when I'm not achieving something impressive.
Right? That's like our, our goal is, I always wanna be seen as impressive. I cope with my lack of value by accomplishing, and I wanna broadcast my accomplishments. I boast, I bang my chest like a silverback gorilla about what I've done. 'cause I need the admiration from others. And that's what, that's what people are gonna cope.
They see my coping. They're gonna need to constantly affirm me because I need you to tell me that I'm successful. And if you possibly insinuate that I'm not a success or I I'm not full of achievement, I'm gonna have a big issue with you. For some of us, the comfort shows up in not money or success, but in our perfection culture do of you guys have a perfection, ethic or perfection idol.
Everything's gotta be always perfectly in line. Your hair's gotta be done correctly. Your new bag has gotta be, there can't be a crease in your shoes. You, you have to have the newest, nicest thing because you want everyone to see you as perfect all the time. We tend to feel insecure when someone thinks we're not put together, when we're sloppy or lazy.
But then how do we cope? We cope by projecting that my world is flawless. It's the Instagram culture. If I want you to think that my parenting is always going well, I'm only gonna show you the benefits and the, the highlights of it and never the true brokenness of, of what we can be as, as parents, sometimes I'm offended at the insin insinuation that my life is not perfectly held together.
So if we have a power idol, then we might need authority, need control, or need to be dominant. If we've got a comfort idol, we might need money, need success, or need to be perfect. Third is the, is what he said. It's money, power, and sex. The third one is, but sex is really, it's the idea of like hedonism. It's just chasing desire all the time, right?
It's this false narrative. If I give me what I want. I will be satisfied if I indulge myself. If I just allow myself the trimmings and trappings and trinkets of this world, then I'm gonna go, man, this is what life's all about. Which ultimately, when are we supposed to say that this is what life's all about is when we're firmly fixed in our identity in Christ.
This is what John 10 tends is that what's real life? Real life is John 17, knowing God and the one who he has sent. It's John 10 10. It's when we are in the arms of the shepherd. And in the care of the shepherd and underneath the leadership of the shepherd, then we will know what life is for. The thief has come to steal, kill, and destroy, but Jesus has come that we may have life and have abundant eternal life, but for some of us, we think if I just indulge my desires, then and only then will I experience what Christ can't give me.
Right? He can't give me true satisfaction or true meaning. So we chase something else. This is the idol of desire for some of us. The idol of the desire does look like sex. It looks like we have a sex ethic. Everything we do that's gotta be king opportunities that we take. We're chatting up old girlfriends, we're.
We're liking things on Instagram just to try to get someone's attention. We, we might simultaneously say out of our mouths, we don't really care if other people think that we're attractive, but we'll take any opportunity we can to show off something or to, to demonstrate our attractiveness or whatever it is.
We. It's, it's like we have this core desire for someone to call us beautiful or call us wanted. It's this insecurity that my body and my pleasure needs to be given what it wants at all times. So I grade my value on how others desire me, not even how the people who are important desire me, not just how my wife desires me.
I need everyone to desire, not just how my husband to desire me. I want everyone to desire me, not just that God knows and loves me and calls me beautiful, but I need the world to do the same thing. So how do I cope? You'll notice that you are someone who struggles with this idol because you're gonna cope by phishing for compliments, seeking attention from potential partners.
Uh, pornography is another way that this shows up. This is the, this is one of the three ways it's power, sex, and money. This is that, that desire, ethic right there. Also, another way we can experience or that some of us have dealt with. This idol is, is materialism. It's, I I tend to feel insecure when I don't have the stuff.
I don't have the stuff of those who are safe and happy. So I, I cope by seeking an endless supply of new and better things. Right? It's like the, you get online at night and onto Amazon and you just start ordering stuff, and then when it shows up, it's like that two minute joy of like the new upgraded thing and then it goes away.
But you just, it's like an insatiable need to have more things. That tells us if I have enough, then one day I'll be safe and happy. And ultimately, again, this is, it's exactly what idolatry is. It's the misguided belief that if I am able to fill myself with comforts, trimmings, and trappings and tools, that I'll actually be able to replace a firm fixed identity in Christ.
And it's just, it's what Jesus tries to warn us about over and over and over again. And it's not 'cause he doesn't want us to have fun, it's just because he wants us to experience. Life on a deeper level. And so I think, again, when we talk about marriage and we talk about what color would you be if you were a color, I really think that when I'm kind of counseling people towards marriage, it's really heavy.
But this is kinda what I wanna know. I wanna know what do you worship when it's not God? I wanna know like what, where do you find your value when it's not in the right Things like, 'cause that's what we cope with. That that's what I have, I'm gonna have to deal with more than anything else. What's more?
That's what we deal. That's what our kids deal with. With us. That's what we deal with with our kids. Like, isn't that crazy? Your kid has an idol of their heart, your son, your daughter, all starting from a very, very, very young age, something tends to rule their heart. I don't think it's always the same. I think you can find a three-year-old who they are gonna constantly chase.
Comfort all the time, or someone who always wants to be in charge, the bossy one. And we think it's cute and everything, but sometimes I think there's something more going on there. It's like, why do you have to be in control and why? Why can you not cope with, well, here's the truth of it, is that our hearts, as Tim Keller says, are idol factories.
They're insatiably built to make idols. Henry Ford makes the assembly line and it spits out Model Ts. The human heart falls into sin and it spits out idols. We just make stuff that we wanna worship. So I, I wanna ask you this question first and foremost. When we talk through those things, power, comfort, and desire, the authority, control, dominance thing under power, what, which of these things do you tend to idolize?
Which of those things do you tend to find meaning in? Do you only find meaning when you're in charge? Only find meaning when you're in control. Only find meaning when you're seen as dominant and powerful. Or maybe it's more of a control idol, uh, sorry, a comfort idol. You, you, you really only find yourself feeling satisfied in those brief, fleeting moments of you've got enough money, the bank account is full.
I'm a successful person. I've got what it takes. I'm more achieving the person next to me. I'm, I'm competitively superior to those that are around me. I'm, or I'm perfect. Right. You, you can't see anything in me that isn't, that isn't on straight, that isn't perfectly groomed. I am, I'm gonna chase and indulge these things.
'cause when I get those compliments from people, I just feel, or is it more of a desire idol? Is it the, the idol of manna? I just feel like I chase whatever's gonna make me feel good today. And whatever's gonna feel good next. And I just gotta have that sexual encounter. I just have to feel good about someone wanting me, or I have to feel comfortable enough and give myself whatever I need.
I've gotta spend those shopping trips. I gotta make sure that I get, I want people to see that I have the newest, best and brightest and I can't be seen in some loaner vehicle or some less than a to BII can't just do an A to B vehicle. I, I need people to see that I actually have. Money and that I am successful in these things.
And the problem is we might notice these things. The real issue is that our family feels these things. It's not one man's game when we idolize something that isn't Jesus. Everyone in our family and friends group has to feel the weight of it. The reason that we want to eradicate idols is first and foremost because God should be the controller of our hearts, and he should be the desire of our lives.
And secondly, beyond that, not only is that important, but man, we can become abusive and neglectful and distracted when those idols get ahold of us. We can lose a sense of what is important and what is not important. We can surrender family and sacrifice kids on the altar of these different idols, and we gotta get those things back in order.
Maybe it'll be important for any of us to make a little chart in our head of man, what are the eight things most important to me? And if I really looked at it, if I really looked at it, what would I want to be the champion. But then maybe ask yourself a scarier question. What if your wife were to look at your heart?
Or look at your life, look at your bank account. Look at the way you treat the kids. Look at the what you spend your time on. Look at everything. What if you put your eight things that most important on a Elite eight chart, and you randomized them and then you handed 'em to your wife and you said, baby, I don't want to influence this, but if you just looked at me and you watched the way that I spend my time and my week, I want you to tell me who would win this championship if the first matchup was you and the kids.
What I actually, what would my life look like? You were more important than they were. And would God be the ultimate champion? And maybe that's a challenge I'm giving you. Maybe that's a challenge that I need to give myself. But I think where we're gonna find most of our problems is where we're gonna find our idols and where we're gonna find most of our pain in our marriage is when our idols aren't worshiped, and where we're gonna find the most amount of joy, success, and meaning is when God properly takes his throne as the.
Only proper position of worship in our heart. That's my encouragement for you, man. It's really just something that I need to hear, something that I've been working and wrestling through, and hopefully this can be helpful for all of us to try to navigate what it means to be a dad as a husband, and as a follower of Jesus.
Hey guys. Hope you enjoyed that episode. As a reminder, if you're not signed up for our Family Leadership Program, it is by far the most helpful thing that we have to help you become the spiritual leader of your home. Go to dad tire.com, click the family leadership program tab, and you can jump into the next cohort.
I love you guys. We'll see you next week.