A Few Thoughts From Dad

Book excerpt: As a normal overcommitted father of an active, intelligent, and beautiful daughter, I, too, often didn't get around to saying many of the things that really needed to be said or the many things that I really didn't know how to say. Even those things that were important to talk about but I just could never find the right time to talk about them. Then there are those things that I really tried to talk about but for some reason I realize I didn't communicate it well enough. So I hope this book will help to pick up those pieces or make up for those deficits and give you some insight into the heart of your father and why we do the things we do. I pray this will end up being a treasure for you as you get to know a side of your father that maybe you didn't know before. I hope it will be an encouragement for you to know just how much I really have always loved you even when I didn't know how to say it or didn't do a good enough job at showing it. I hope it will become a practical resource or a reference manual for you as you live your life and if you need to know what to do in certain circumstances or what we as a family believe or have done in the past. I hope it might even be a means of finally answering that number one question you and your siblings always had as you were growing up, WHY! It might even give you an opportunity to stop and have an occasion for a good thought or memory. Then, too, if this ends up having a bigger value than just me taking time to talk with my daughter and it lives beyond to my grandchildren or if it turns out to be a help to other fathers to share those important points of love and concern for their daughters, that will just be amazing. That would then go on to prove that we fathers have more in common than we might have first thought. All of us struggle with knowing what and how to say what needs to be said to that little girl who, since the first moment we saw her, has had her little fingers wrapped so tightly around our heart--the one we would so quickly give our life for but have such a hard time trying to communicate that with. To my daughter, please read this one section at a time, as if you and I were sitting down and I just said, "By the way, I've been wanting to talk to you about..." Then read one section at a time, and please hear my heart and how much I love you in each thought. Then using the margin on each page or you might want to use a journal to write down questions, thoughts, memories, or any song that that section might bring to mind. That way you can go back and think about it later or pray about or maybe we can discuss them further when we go through each section together. If this was to be helpful for another father out there, I could see you using it as a devotional to go through with your teenage daughter (on through adulthood), and then you could personalize those memories I have into one that would be meaningful for you and your daughter, or you could read it together over the phone or rewrite a section at a time in a letter, changing it to be what you would say to your daughter. As you are going through this, read the passages; laugh at the funny stories; read the quotes, the antics, the poems; and listen to the songs that are mentioned. It's all part of trying to communicate the "What, How, and Why" we do what we do, as well as "the way we believe." So take whatever time you need to go through all my thoughts and feelings, page by page, point by point; and I hope and pray that my heart will be heard clearly through all that is said. If you were to ask me what this was all about or how I would summarize this book, I would have to say it is a father's attempt to communicate to my grown daughter how much I Love you, I Believe in you, and I want you to be safe. It's also a means of sharing my heart and soul with you and trying to explain why I do and believe the way I do. All of this is in the hopes that you will not just understand but also take to heart the beliefs, whys, and hows that make our family, I believe in many ways, unique; that by having a real living and growing relationship with Jesus Christ as the center of everything; and just knowing that He loves you so much too. I love you, Dad 5