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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.
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If you go to Israel, you get to go to this cool place at the mouth of the Jordan River Right now, as this podcast is being recorded, Israel's not the safest place in the world to go, but uh, if you ever get a chance to, there's a really cool part of the tour that you'll go on inevitably called Caesarea Philippi, and it essentially was the mouth of the Jordan River and.
Think about like ancient Las Vegas, like this place would've made Las Vegas look kosher. You know, like look at homeschool ville, USA. That's how crazy this place was. It was essentially what happened is they believed every year that the way that they made the rains come back. And the way that they made that the Jordan River flow, that was in a growing society.
It was their life force. We need. The water to flow from the Jordan was to bring back to life or bring back from, hell bring back from Hades, the goat God pan. And so in order to do so, they would have these long festivals of ritualistic, like sexual weird sacrifice and everything. There's actually a pit inside of a a hole there in Caesar Philippi where they've dug up bones and full skeletal bodies of whole bunch of different kind of people and animals and babies and everything.
Just a horrible place of sacrifice. So the goat God pan, actually, it's called the Gate to Hell or the Gate of Hades. And then there's like the temple, the Diana, the temple, the Artemis Temple to all these foreign gods. And the belief was that they didn't really understand underground springs or anything.
So these people just worshiped by trying to bring back these fake gods or try to wake them up from their slumber or from their visit down to. Hell itself. And so they had these festivals and so Jesus is standing in the mouth of the Jordan River here at Caesar, Philip I, where he asks a very bold question, and it makes more sense when you think about the fact that he was surrounded by all these foreign gods that had these dignitaries and thoughts of what does Pan do and how, what does he produce and what does Diana give us?
And the beauty of all these other things, and. All these things say being said about foreign gods. Jesus asked this question in Matthew chapter 16. It says this, verse 13. When Jesus came to the region of Caia Philippi, he asked his disciples, who do people say that I am? They say, some say John the Baptist.
Others say, Elijah still. Jeremiah one of the prophets. Then he goes, okay, I got, I get it, but what about you? Who do you say I am? Then Peter says, you're the Messiah, the son of the living God. And he ends up, this is kind of a cool tie in, Jesus replied, blessed are you Simon, son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my father in heaven.
And I tell you that you are Peter and on the rock. The rock that is spoken. Here is the, the truth of this declaration. Jesus being the Messiah will be the foundation of the Church of Christ for all of time. That there will be other churches that come and go, but the true churches will be the ones who recognize that Jesus Christ is the Messiah.
Which is true. Every cult in all of the world, every Christian cult does one thing. It it rejects the unique person of Jesus or the deity of Jesus. And so recognizing this one phrase that Jesus is the Christ, the son of living God is literally the core to the Christian faith. And then here's what it says.
I tell you that on this rock, I'll build my church and then it says this, and the gates of hell will not overcome it. I will give you the key to the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you buy on earth will be bound in heaven. Whatever you loose on earth will be loose in heaven. Then he orders his disciples not to tell anyone that he was the Messiah.
So it makes sense that right here, when Jesus says the gates of hell, he's actually standing at the gates of Hades, which is this hole in the side of rock in Caesar Philippi. So it's both. Literal but also allegorical. It's a really cool thing that Jesus does here by choosing his settings wisely to make this declaration.
But I really wanna focus on this question that he asks here. That is a very bold que it's, it's a scary question. Could you imagine like gathering all your best friends around? And you recognize something, the Bible recognizes this. We recognize that people is, people are kind of inherently gossipers. They talk about us when we're not in the room.
They talk about us behind our back. We do the same thing. And the Old Testament is a king named David and the, the king, David's getting all these insults thrown at him and everything. And everyone's is Temple guard basically says, do you want us to go murder those guys who are talking bad about you behind your back?
And David says, nah, you wanna know why? Because David said, 'cause I do it too. And you do it too. And we all do it too. Yeah. We shouldn't do it. But it's not worthy of that. Just 'cause I heard about it doesn't mean I don't do it myself. So you kinda had this understanding, and I think we all kinda get that, that sometimes people's favorite subjects is to talk about other people.
And this is a really harrowing question because of that, it's, it's a question that as leaders, you know about. As a senior pastor, I wanna know the answer to this question, but I'm typically not secure enough for myself to ask it. I think as. If you're a leader of your household, if you're a leader of an organization, if you're a stay-at-home dad, if you're a stay at home, whatever, it might be a stay-at-home mom.
It doesn't matter. This is one of the scariest questions you can ask, which is, who do people say that I am when I'm not around? And no one's there to listen, and I'm not there to defend myself? Who do people say that I am? And it got me thinking about this. I was challenged recently with this question of, as dads, there's a lot of times in scripture where God uses certain tests to test people who follow him, and, and one of those tests that we find is really this test of truth throughout scripture.
I think about Abraham being asked to sacrifice his son, Isaac or Moses being asked to go and talk to Pharaoh and, and really these moments of trust that recognize that. Sometimes our greatest seasons of growing also are accompanied by some of our deepest seasons of pain. And so it seems like Jesus and his love for us is very willing to introduce us to seasons of difficulty or hardship or just kind of evaluation.
And so what I wanted to do today as I was thinking about this topic, is to challenge you as a father. And I'd like to take this challenge with you and I wonder if we could do this together because it. I would say in a lot of other seasons in my life. If you said, what's the scariest thing for you to do?
I think that when you're like young, I think like being like a bachelor, you know, like 18 and 19 years old, or being in high school, the scariest thing that you could do would probably be the idea of, you know, unrequited love or being caught in some crazy dark forest or whatever it is. And I think. What's funny is as we get older and as we progress and as our titles change from like friend to boyfriend to like fiance to husband, to father, to whatever it is, like all those titles carry with it a lot deeper fears, a lot deeper insecurities, a lot deeper challenges.
And so here's one that I wanna challenge you with that I'm challenging myself with, which is maybe the deepest fear that I have at this season in my life is, is just that moment of feeling kinda laid, bare, or. I even think about the people who can hurt me at this point in my life. You know, like when, when you're a kid, it's like your parents, when you get into high school, you're worried about your friends hurting you, or you know, a teacher holding you back or a principal expelling you.
Those are the fears that you haven't, and it really feels, at this point in my life, there's a lot of people who could say a lot of weird stuff about me, and it wouldn't really affect me too much because they either. Don't know me really well, or maybe they know a past version of me, but they don't really recognize who I am now.
And so now it feels like for me, I've got, uh, five kids and my wife Carolyn. And that is really for all intents and purposes, that's kind of the beginning and the end of the people who are the scariest. To have say something negative about me or to say something difficult about me because I really, really care how good of a husband I am.
I really, really care how involved and how careful I am as a parent. And so sometimes I think what I find in myself is those are the people I'm least likely to ask such a bold question to. Like, who do you say that I am? You know, like, what do you think about me? Because I think what I found in myself is maybe I don't wanna know the answer to that question sometimes, or maybe I struggle with what the answer would be.
Or maybe I'm afraid to ask it now because maybe I'd get a good response now. But I know thes and flows of my life, and I'm afraid that if I ask the same question in a few months, it would be a different result. But. Regardless of what it is, I, I'd love it for us to be willing to ask these questions. I, I made a series of questions and I'm going to ask my kids this.
I wonder if you'd be willing to do the same thing. And it really speaks to the idea of values, right? Every, every family has values, every person has values, every community has values. And so I really wanted to get to the heart of this idea of what. Is what I truly value. The same thing as what my kids think that I value.
Try to process this with me like is what I think is most important. The same thing that my family would say is most important, would the things that I. Claim to be of import be the same things that my family would say, yeah, we can see that, how important that is for you. And so I, I came up with a list of questions and they all speak to values.
I'm gonna ask my kids these questions. And each of them, it kind of speaks about a different aspect of values that someone could hold and. I just wonder if you'd be willing to ask your kids these questions? I, I, I can think of maybe it's a, is it a dinner table setting? Is it a one by one? If you have multiple kids where you sit at the edge of their bed, certainly there's an age where they're too young to answer these questions, but I would guess probably anyone over the age of two or three at least could fumble through some of these as you're asking your kids these questions.
But, well, I don't know. Would you be willing to do this with me? Would you be willing to ask these questions? 'cause I really think for me. As a communicator, I get to teach at my church every weekend and whenever I'm up, our church is called College Ave. It's here in San Diego. And as such as I'm teaching, we, we always learn like homiletics classes, that there's, you know, there's three or four different levels of communication.
There's what I intend to say, there's what I say. There's what I think they heard and then there's what they actually heard. And really lining those up is so central to what it means to be a good communicator. And what's funny is as we live our lives as dads and as we interact with our families, interact with our kids, we're also communicating value.
We're communicating value in what we do. We're communicating value in what we prioritize. We're communicating value in what we spend money on. We're communicating value in what we affirm. We're communicating value in what we discipline. We're communicating value in what we push back against. We're communicating value in who we let around us.
We communicate value in everything we do. And so just like I might have what I intend, I might have what I actually say. I might have what they, I want them to hear and what they actually hear. I wonder if in our lives, this is my question I'm asking myself as a dad, are the things that I value the most, the same as what my family thinks I value the most.
Are the things that I love the most about my kids. The same thing that my kids think that I love the most about them are the ways that I interact and the ways that I wanna be perceived, the same as the ways that I'm actually perceived. And this is gonna take a lot of gumption and a lot of, I think for some of us, if you're built like me, maybe you know, like just 30 seconds of bravery to be able to ask some of these questions.
But I made a list of questions. I wonder if you'd be willing to write 'em down and process these with your kids. And I'm gonna process them with my kids and. I bet there's probably a lot of value, not, not. I bet there's certainly a lot of value in asking these same questions to our spouses if we're in that situation, or if you're single, maybe in a mentor or a, a figure in your life that you respect highly.
But can I tell you the questions that I'm gonna ask my kids? And again, each of these has to do with the different part of value. So the first one speaks to, there's a series of questions. I'm not sure how many there are. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 7 questions. That's a holy number. And the first one speaks to projected values.
So again, these all revolve around the orbit of values. The first one is projected values. Here's the question, son or daughter, what do you think is most important to me? I. It is vague. It's generalized, but it speaks to projected values, is what I project the same as what I intend to project. So son or daughter, what do you think is most important to me?
And I'd be really curious as to hear what my kids' response would be. They, they'd probably start to process from what I, they see me spend my time doing to what they see me spending my money on to see how I speak, how I talk, how they interact with me. I, I wonder, this is a question of projected value.
What do you think is most important to me? This will speak to the projected value that we give out. Here's number two. If I could only wish one thing for your life, what do you think I would wish for? If I could only wish one thing for your life, what do you think I would wish for? This speaks to intended value.
This is I want my son or daughter to know what I actually intend for the value of their life to be. If I could only wish for one thing for your life, what do you think I would wish for? Maybe if you've got a, a younger kid, that might be a little bit too open-ended of a question. So maybe you can ask him this son or daughter.
I'm just gonna keep saying son, because I'm thinking of my son Peyton when I'm talking about this, so I'm gonna use that word. But clearly it applies to whomever you're asking this to, son. If I had a wish and you could only be one of these things. Which one do you think I would choose for you? If you could only be one of these things and daddy was able to choose for you, what do you think I would choose for you?
Successful millionaire world famous entertainer, champion athlete, powerful politician, or humble servant of Jesus Christ. I think those all are kind of cool things, right? But which one do you think? If I could only choose one, would it be more important to Daddy? That you were a champion athlete than that you were a follower of Jesus.
Would you think it's more important that you're a millionaire than an entertainer? Like when you hear me talk to you, bud, what do you think I would choose for you? That's number two, and it speaks to intended value. So the first one is projected value. The second one is intended value. The third one is perceived value is a hard question, but maybe a little bit more fun than the first two might be heavy.
The third one is this. What do you think that I love the most about you? What do you think I love most about you? This speaks to perceived value that they're now, they're gonna start processing Well, when does Daddy affirm me? When does dad play with me? When does dad stop what he's doing and interact with me?
When does dad, when does dad spend time with me? When does dad show up for things? What do you think I love the most about you? This speaks to perceived value. Number four, what are ways that I show you I love you that mean the most to you? Or what are moments that you go, I know Dad loves me right now.
This speaks to interpreted values. This is maybe where we want to demonstrate love to our kids, but maybe we speak a different love language or we have a different timescale than they do. Or maybe, maybe there's something that you do that is of no consequent to you or no time spent or energy or money spent.
But your kid's interpreting it as love and you go, man, I could really pour into that. Or maybe you've got a kid who doesn't give a rip about baseball and you keep taking them to baseball games. And what you find out is when you ask, what are ways that I show you that I love you that mean most to you? Um, you've been spending $3,000 on season tickets because you love it, but that actually doesn't come across as love to your kid.
And we wanna try to speak their language as much as we can. So what are the ways that I show you I love you, that mean the most to you? This speaks to interpreted values. Here's number five. What are some ways that I could do that better? What are some ways that I could show you that I love you better?
What are some ways that you would feel love that I don't do right now? Or what's a way that I intend to show that I love you, but, but what's a way that I could do it better? What are some ways that I could do that better? What, what are some ways that I could show you that I love you better? This speaks to expected values, expected values.
Ask what are some ways I could do that better? Number six. This one's really hard. This is probably the hardest one. This is one that I'm bulking when I'm talking about it 'cause I'm afraid to actually ask this question out loud, but here we go. What's one thing that you may choose to do differently with your kids when you're a parent?
What's one thing? Hey, bud. With. The way that I parent. What's one thing that you see that you've told yourself? I think I'm gonna do this differently when I'm a parent. My hope is that my kid's gonna say, you know, dad, you are too intentional with us, you know? Dad too many backyard baseball games. I'm afraid that's probably not what they're gonna say.
But this speaks to rejected values. These are the things that we show them that they have rejected and they've said, Hmm, I'm going to do better in this department. This one stings. There's no reason to have shame in this department. I don't think I, I, I think sometimes God actually speaks to us through the mouth of little kids.
You know, sometimes we, we think of them as just these like stupid, like snot nose brats, and. When we get in angry moments, but in reality, they're processing the world and they're, in a lot of cases, like I don't think that my kids are old enough to sugarcoat things, and I probably need that in my life. I probably need someone who's not afraid to ruffle my feathers and, and my prayer for you on this one is that you're able to hear it and think to yourself, I'll bet that was a difficult thing to say, and I don't really think that they're here just to hurt my feelings.
And so maybe I should take this thing to heart, which is those are the self-talk moments that we need before we walk into any of these situations. But that's a good question right here. What's one thing that you may choose to do differently with your kids when you're a parent than I've done with you?
This speaks to rejected values. And then to end on a more positive note, we're gonna speak to respected values, which is the opposite of the question before. This is number seven. What's one thing you've learned from me that you wanna do with your kids someday too? What's one thing done with you? What's one?
Thing that you've learned from me, what's one thing that I value that you want to have high value for you? Two? What's a pattern that I participate in? What's a tradition that we've done? What's one thing that I've done right, is really what you're asking. What's one thing that you've done that I've done right, that you really said?
I'm, I'm taking that one. That's a good one. I wanna do that. I would end with, I, I, uh, have this, uh. Little THAI. It's like Thai. Thai food's my favorite. So anyway, but when they're done, I would go with, don't forget to Thai, THAI thank them for the time, honor their honesty. That's H. Thank you so much for your time.
I'm sure some of those questions weren't super fun to answer, so I appreciate you being honest with me and I want you to know that you can always be honest with me and. While some things that you say might even be painful to listen to, I, I believe that you love me and you're telling me things because it's important to hear, so thank you.
Honor the honesty, apologize for the areas that you recognize. Hey man, I I, I hear you on that one, and I'm sorry that maybe I've let you down. I'd love to do better at that, or I appreciate all the affirmation and you know what, man, I'm, I'm sorry for even moments where I. Do something that that messes with you or messes you up, or, or, I just don't give you the affirmation that you deserve.
So I'm sorry about that. And then finally, intention to go like, and I think I, I wanna do better on that. I wanna do better on this, that, or the other thing I, I'd really love to demonstrate to you, or, Hey, would you forgive me for that? And would, would you gimme the time? Would you gimme a reset on that? I, I'd love to show you what's really valuable to me, and I'm sorry that those things haven't been in alignment with what I truly value.
And maybe begin to make it a pattern, a dialogue, a you know, maybe once a quarter or once a semester or even once a year to sit down and go, Hey, you know, you, it's hard 'cause you're kind of laying yourself bare in front of like a kid that you're raising. And, but I, I feel like sometimes the solution in my heart that I've felt is I'll be my own judge.
I know that as a communicator, there's sometimes where I get up on a stage and I go, man, I said that really well, and everyone goes, that was the worst thing ever. And other times where I go, man, I biff that, and they go, that made so much sense to me. Again, when you're preaching the word of God, like the Holy Spirit is at work and all those things, I recognize there's a little bit of a difference in what I'm talking about, but.
I mean, I, I just think to myself, I, I wonder, it wouldn't be the first time in my life where I kinda get blindsided by something and someone going, Hey, did you know that this is the way that you come across? And I go, there's no way. That's the case. And you start to look around the room and I. If you're willing to be honest, go, wow, this is how I'm perceived.
I did not recognize that. And, and if we're guilty of doing that with people that we are really intentional with, be it our coworkers, be it our best friends, be it our, whatever it might be, think of how much more someone who lives with us and is with us on a daily basis might experience this in a way that we didn't intend or that.
Uh, they do experience how we intend, but there's so many counter examples that sometimes those can outweigh the normal ones. So. This is just another way for us as dads, I think, to lean into conversations like this and, and to, to, to be vulnerable and, and to kind of break that cycle I think that we maybe have experienced or we watch even in, in other people or other generations even that says it's kinda that don't ask, don't tell, but it comes from like, uh, personal growth and, and we don't wanna be that in our lives.
And, and what I promise, I think sometimes what I tell myself is if I do this. Then everyone's gonna always just keep giving me criticism and feedback. 'cause I've asked for it one time and what I found is that's not really the case. I think it's almost the opposite. People who are recognizing that you're open and that you're gonna be asking questions, it almost feels like they become less critical because they go, oh, don't worry, I'll have my chance at some point.
So they just feel much more free to, to live with you and live alongside of you and, but in all of these things I just. We look at the example that Jesus set in in such a powerfully vulnerable moment. Like, who do you say that I am? And he had every intent on letting them know that he was the Messiah in this moment.
But I feel like taking a page out of his book and being able to ask these really important questions about value, right? What value do I project, but what do I intend to project? What I perceive I'm projecting? What is my interpretation of values? What is my expected? What have they rejected and what have they respected?
If we talk about things in terms of values, we are the culture setters of our households, and if we are projecting a culture that is antithetical to what we want, or it's the opposite of what we intended, it would be good to, to do a midcourse correction. For some of us, we might be two degrees off. Some of us we might be 30 degrees off, but in all things, even if we're two degrees off, you know, I, there's this.
You know, that old saying, or I think it's a truism, like if you set out for New York and you're two degrees off course when you've been two degrees off course for however many thousands of miles you end up in like North Carolina or something like that. You know, it's, that's all it takes. If you're two degrees south from your mark, when you look at a, you know, in the grand scheme of things, it only looks a little bit off, but when you're a little bit off for a long time, you become a lot, a bit off.
So. Anytime that I think that we can recenter, reorient ourselves around these conversations and recognize what is helpful and, and how we can get back on track. And if we look at it as that and, and recognize that while it might feel like a vulnerable moment, Jesus has called us. To moments like this where we're able to see ourselves rightly so, I just want us to lean into things like that.
I'm gonna do it. I, I'd love to hear some of your stories. You can reach out to us here at the Dad Tired podcast, or you can message Jared, or, I'm on Instagram too, if you wanna let me know how these went. I'd love to follow some of these conversations. And did they go well? Did they go poorly? What, what's, what was a kind of life altering or paradigm shifting moment that you might have had with your kid?
I'd love to hear that, and I'd love to give you some of the things that I've experienced, so I'll post about it too, so you guys can hear how that went for me. But I'd love to challenge us with this. It, it kind of feels good to move forward as a community knowing that you're not gonna be the only dad doing this.
And so let us know how that goes and, uh, we'll be praying for you as you walk through that. But in all things just corporately for us to recognize as a group of dads that. Anything that brings us closer to the feet of Christ. Anything that brings us closer to what we actually intended, anything that that aligns our values more closely with what we want can't be a bad thing, even though it might be in the other side of the pain or the nervousness, or the embarrassment or the vulnerability of a difficult conversation.
So if you wanna take that, take it. If not, you can throw it away. But maybe a, a great way for us to. To get a really good pulse, a really good pulse on what kind of value am I projecting and setting, and what kind of culture am I creating as the, the head of a family unit. So share with us how that goes and, uh, in all things we're praying for you guys.
We're here to walk alongside you guys. We love you. We'll see you guys next time.