Is Your Faith Contagious to Your Kids?
The significant connection between faith, work, and family

Male-bashing humor implying that the world would be better off without men may be funny for some but not children growing up without fathers. Research shows that children without a father’s influence are at a dramatically greater risk of drug and alcohol abuse, and are twice as likely to drop out of school, commit criminal acts, and engage in premarital sex.* But most Christian dads want more than simply to help their kids stay out of trouble. We want them to be devoted to Christ when they grow up and leave home.

A lot of people assume that mom is the biggest spiritual influence on the future faith of a child; however, statistics regarding a dad’s spiritual influence on his kids are compelling. When a mother trusts Christ apart from her husband, her family follows 17 percent of the time. When Dad becomes a Christian, the rest of the family follows 93 percent of the time.* Accounts in the Book of Acts give credence to this statistic. When the leader of the household came to Christ, the entire household followed.

Bringing the next generation into the faith is a serious priority to God. When dads leave their children’s spiritual development to mom (or a teacher or youth pastor), abdicating their role as spiritual leader of the family, kids grow up confused about how life works. That’s why Paul singles men out for their parenting responsibility.

Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord. (Ephesians 6:4)

A lot of dads think they’re fulfilling their spiritual leadership role by taking their children to church and youth group activities, or even enrolling them in a Christian school. But that’s not enough. Kids need to see their father living out his faith all day, every day.
Here’s the danger. If a man considers his work as unimportant to God, his children can’t help but notice. It’s simple math: If he spends 5 percent of his time on “spiritual” activities he deems important to God and spends the other 95 percent of his time on things he believes God doesn’t care about, why would he expect his children to grow up and be passionate about a God who occupied such a small part of his life?

When Moses instructed the Jews in God’s ways, he stressed the importance of living a 24/7 faith before the next generation:

Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. (Deuteronomy 6:5-7)

That means that God deserves our complete, whole-hearted devotion, and our faith should inform every aspect of our life—in public, in private, from the bedroom to the boardroom. That kind of passionate faith in a father inspires passionate faith in his children.

Since most guys can’t take their children to work and show them what it looks like to follow Christ in the workplace, how can they reveal their faith to their children? Here are three simple ideas.

1. Let your children know that you want to be the same person Monday through Saturday that you were on Sunday; that you live by the same values whether you’re at church or not; and that spiritual activities are not part of your leisure time, but are “no-matter-whats” considered essential to life.
2. Make sure everyone in your family understands that the work they do daily is God’s work and is important to Him. This includes your child’s schoolwork. Take time each day to let each family member, including you, report on his or her work, and pray for each other’s work.
3. Be alert for opportunities to be thankful for the work other people do. Thank God for the postal workers who deliver your mail. When you’re driving through a construction zone, ask God to protect the workers. When you say grace over a meal, thank God for the farmers, truckers, and grocers who worked so you could enjoy the food.

And remember, children don’t expect a perfect father, but they do expect one who loves them and shows—not just tells—them what’s important in life.

(Adapted from What God Does When Men Lead)

A Group Study Guide for What God Does When Men Lead is available for free download. Click here.

* Research cited in What God Does When Men Lead