FamilyLife Today®

Dave Wilson: Today we are talking about Dad Tired.

Ann Wilson: Is that a thing?

Dave Wilson: I just wanted to know, do moms get tired?

Ann Wilson: Are you kidding? Every woman's listening. Of course women are tired. Moms are tired. Are dads tired?

Dave Wilson: All the time. 100 times more than moms, because we do so much more than the moms.

Ann Wilson: Welcome to *FamilyLife Today*, where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I'm Ann Wilson.

Dave Wilson: And I'm Dave Wilson. You can find us at familylifetoday.com. This is *FamilyLife Today*.

Literally, it's the opposite. I watched you and most moms. They never stop. I'm not saying dads don't either, but you talk about tired and exhausted and worn out. Moms are worn out.

Ann Wilson: So are dads, and sometimes we as women don't give them space to even admit it because we feel our lives as moms can be so much harder. I think this is a real thing, and I think it's good to talk about it.

Dave Wilson: We've got Mr. Dad Tired himself, Jerrad Lopes, in the studio. He started a ministry years ago called Dad Tired. Jerrad's been on here before, but it's been a few years. Welcome back.

Jerrad Lopes: It's good to be back with you guys. This feels right. I'll just say every time I tell somebody Dad Tired, I do feel a little bit silly because I know my wife's Mom Tired is very much a real thing. Everyone keeps saying you should start a ministry called Mom Tired, which we should, because moms are absolutely tired.

Ann Wilson: I have to tell you guys, even coming into the studio today, I was excited. I was thinking, "Why am I excited as a woman that we're going to talk about dads being tired and men?" I felt this, Dave, every time you would preach on this at church. Women are anticipating this message, and I'm not sure why. Why do we like that?

Dave Wilson: What do you mean anticipating what message?

Ann Wilson: We like it when you talk to dads and men about the gospel, about Jesus. I think it's because we see the greatness in our men, we see the potential. I think maybe I'm feeling it more because we're living in a culture that downgrades men. I love that we're lifting up women, but in the midst of that, it feels like men are dumb or overlooked.

Jerrad Lopes: There's the masculine toxicity, which is a real thing. But I feel sometimes men are thinking, "Who are we supposed to be now?"

Dave Wilson: Jerrad, where did you come up with even the title "Dad Tired"?

Jerrad Lopes: Somebody just asked me that. I wish I could say I was clever enough to sit down and put a bunch of names together that was going to be a hit. It was none of that. It actually started in a season of my own marriage that we thought we were on the brink of divorce. We were in a very rough spot. To this day, we bring up this season of life and it still brings Leila to tears. It was so hard.

My son was three, which was the age that I was when my dad bailed on me. It was an emotionally hard season. Leila had been waking up in the middle of the night. She had been setting her alarm at 2:00 in the morning to go into the living room and she was praying, begging God that He would capture my heart again because I was so hard-hearted. I had pushed her away and I had pushed the kids away.

She'd been a pastor for twelve years. So she thought, "What do I say to him? He knows all the answers." She just needed God to do what she couldn't do. I didn't know she had been getting up in the middle of the night to do this. She told me in the middle of a fight, which was a terrible time. I was ready to fight. I wasn't ready to hear that my wife's praying for me.

She tells me this, and that was what God used to soften my heart. The Bible says it's God's kindness that leads us to repentance. It was the kindness of God through my wife. God just started changing my heart. I happened to write this blog that said, "I feel like I'm failing as a husband and dad, but I don't want to. I don't want to do to my son and to my kids what my dad did to me."

That blog—I wasn't a blogger. I just wrote this blog, but it went viral because all these mommy blogs picked it up and started sharing it. These guys started reaching out and saying, "Jerrad, I feel the same way. I feel like I'm not the man I want to be or who I thought I would be."

I felt like these guys need to talk to each other. We need to encourage each other. So I created a little Facebook page and they asked what I wanted to call it. I just said "Dad Tired" almost tongue-in-cheek. It was the smartest unintentional thing I've ever done because guys resonate with that.

Dave Wilson: Something happened around the country and the world when you put that blog out. The title is perfect. I know it was just a thought, but when you read that "Dad Tired", you're like, "That's me. I want to be a winner, I want to be the best man and husband and dad. We all have it in us, and yet we feel so tired and we feel like we're failing." Something connected with men.

Jerrad Lopes: I think that's it because most guys—there's not a lot of men's ministry out there. There's some stuff out there, but there's not a ton when you think comparatively to women's ministry. There's especially not as much for dads. The stuff that I was coming across was like, "Dude, you need to figure it out, man up, get it together." Well, I know I need to do all that, but I just can't seem to do it. I need God to do in me what I can't do in myself.

The way God's used it is you're starting off by saying, "I'm not perfect at this." That name gives the indication I'm not perfect at this, but I'm willing. We used to say "Dad Tired and Loving It." That's the name of the first book. I'm totally exhausted, but I love this and I'm willing to keep going.

Ann Wilson: Jerrad, when you talked about your wife praying for you, Leila, one of the things of what she asked you about you being a Christian just got stuck on that.

Jerrad Lopes: That's a different conversation. That was a different time than that prayer at night. She asked me that when we first started meeting and I was getting to know her. She was fairly new to the faith.

Leila gave her life to Christ in college. So she came in with a real hot fire for the Lord. This is all new and God has saved me, and she was passionate for the Lord. That was attractive to me.

She sees me just going through the rhythms of ministry. I remember one time she said to me, "Jerrad, are you a Christian because you really love Jesus or because you get paid to be?" I was like, "Who are you to say? I teach people about Jesus." She was asking sincerely. She wasn't being sarcastic. She was really curious. It seems like you're just going through the motions. She has a way of hitting you across the face with truth and somehow you still feel loved.

I honestly was mad. I remember I took her home back to her apartment and I was like, "I guess maybe I'll call you some other time." But I got back to my apartment and that question, those words, just kept going through my brain over and over again. "Am I really committed to this or am I just going through the motions?"

The Bible says in Genesis, "It's not good for man to be alone, so let us create for him a helper." Leila has helped me really figure out what it means to live a life for the Lord. I think that's a key point for a lot of guys, our spouses in general. Do you view your spouse as somebody that is helping you become the person God wants you to be versus "This person is just going to make me happy all the time?" That question didn't make me happy, but it did make me more holy.

Dave Wilson: It's interesting that you have the conversation after you're married that she's getting up at 2:00 a.m. and praying for God to get your heart. You had a conversation years before before you're even married, and it's still the same request and prayer. Ann and I spoke at a chapel at a seminary a few years back and they said, "Tell the students something they need to know."

Our first point was—and I've been in ministry 30 years as a church leader, pastor—I said, "You can have a really successful ministry with a really lousy walk with God." You can figure out, "Here's what you do, here's how you pull off a good service." I'm not saying that's what you should do, but I never thought that was possible. I thought it had to be an overflow of your thing. That's what she was getting at.

As a man and as a husband and as a dad, what would you say to guys? I think a lot of us need to hear that from our wife or somebody to say, "Are you the real deal? Is this walk with God—is it on fire?" Even the spiritual leader part, what is that? I think men feel overwhelmed with that.

Jerrad Lopes: A couple thoughts on that. First is you could probably say the same thing about appearing to have a successful marriage and family but be far from God. I can post pictures on social media and I can show up in public and even to church and it looks like we got our lives together. Behind closed doors, our marriage is falling apart, my heart is far from the Lord. I think there are a lot of people in that situation.

What we really want you to understand at Dad Tired is the gospel. God should have bailed on you because of your brokenness, because of your sin that you're already well aware of. Instead of bailing on you, God has pursued you with His great love. If a guy meditated on that, studied that, focused on that day in and day out, it's impossible to not love your wife more when you recognize how much God loves you. It's impossible to not be more patient with your kids when you realize how patient God has been with you. The gospel is actually what's changing us as men, not just behavior modification.

Ann Wilson: I just want to remind our listeners that our vision at FamilyLife is every home a godly home. We need your help to get there. When you become a FamilyLife partner, your monthly support makes that vision actually possible.

Dave Wilson: Will you come alongside us and alongside families in need? You can go to familylifetoday.com and read more about it and become a partner. Just click the donate button at the top. Again, you can go to familylifetoday.com.

It's interesting as I read your book this week, the *Dad Tired Q&A Mixtape*, which by the way has a cassette tape on the front. Some of our listeners are like, "What's that?" I grew up with an 8-track, then a cassette tape. "Jesus said and answers the questions about faith and family." You answer all kinds of different topics and questions, but the more I read it, the more you keep coming back to what you just said.

If you want to love your wife, be the husband, be the dad your wife and your family longs for, it all comes back to this walk with God. Over and over because in the Q&A Mixtape, it's all kinds of questions, but I kept getting that's the theme, right?

Jerrad Lopes: I was thinking about that two nights ago as I was falling asleep. This is usually where God speaks to us in the silence. Our lives just have so much noise in it. It's just so busy.

Dave Wilson: Especially your life with four kids.

Jerrad Lopes: Literal noise all the time. But I was laying in bed and I was falling asleep. It was quiet and I just was feeling that. It starts with, "What am I doing? Am I actually doing a good job as a dad?" I was feeling that through the day. I haven't had a good conversation with my kids or haven't been intentional with my kids this week.

I was coming up with all the strategies I needed to do. "Maybe if I do these three things, I'll be a better dad this week." I literally came back to that thought that you just said. What I really need to do is fall more in love with Jesus. Come back to Jesus because if I'm in the presence of the Lord and I'm reminded of that gospel truth, I will be a better dad.

I've seen that play out. I'm not just saying that because it makes a good book title or chapter. I've seen it play out in my life. The closer I am to Jesus, naturally the better husband and father I am.

Dave Wilson: You know what I'm thinking as Jerrad says that? You represent all the women listening right now in some ways, wives.

Ann Wilson: I'm still stuck back on when Jerrad said guys know what they're supposed to do. As a wife, as moms, I think we think, "Do they? I didn't know that." That's why we as women keep reminding—

Dave Wilson: I think she's saying that because she's married to me. "My husband didn't know what to do."

Ann Wilson: No, I'm serious because I talk to a lot of wives. I think that our impression is guys probably never think about this stuff. Guys are thinking about how they can be a better dad and a better husband when they go to sleep at night? Because some men aren't always verbal in saying, "Man, I want to be a better husband or dad." So even that fact that guys know—you think they do?

Jerrad Lopes: I think intrinsically guys want to do well in their role as a man. Most don't know how, and so they find other things to be good at. Work. The feedback loop at work is faster. I go to work, you tell me my job description and I do it and I get a raise or I get a pat on the back or you acknowledge I closed the sale or whatever it is.

I want to be good, but I don't know how to be good at home. I can be a good dad for five years and my kids never say, "Dad, you're a good dad." I try to go home and be a good husband, but my wife never says, "You're doing a really good job. Thank you." So I'll just go play video games because I can beat all the levels at that. Or I can go to work and have my boss tell me I did a good job or get on the fantasy football team and beat all my friends at that. Guys want to succeed.

How can a wife help? I think that women underestimate the power that their voice has to build up their husband. It is so powerful. I'll speak for myself. I didn't grow up with a dad, so I longed for somebody to tell me, "You're doing a good job and I'm really proud of you." We look for places where we'll hear those words. Some places it's not even necessarily sinful. It's just work or the sports field.

But for a wife to look at her husband and say—even if she doesn't see it all—but to say, "I know you have what it takes to lead our family well. God has given you the skills." And if you can be specific like, "God's given you these three skills that I see and you do such a good job at them and I can't wait to see the man that God is calling you to be and I'm here with you." You will put so much wind in your husband's sails by speaking those kind of life-giving words to him.

Ann Wilson: I did it wrong so many years and I had no idea the power and influence I had as a woman to use those words in that kind of way.

Dave Wilson: I felt like what you said earlier. I was pretty good outside the home because people told me. And then when I came home, I'm doing my best, but I would hear, "You're not as good a dad as you think." I didn't even know I did that. I found myself navigating my life toward outside rather than inside. And then when Ann, decades ago, started flipping the switch and started speaking like, "You're a good man." At first I didn't believe it, but she started to speak and it changed me to be a better man. I think that's what happens, isn't it?

Jerrad Lopes: I'll just say as a man, even hearing the story of her telling you, "You're a good man," made me emotional. That's the DNA and the soul of a man. That's how powerful it is. To hear a wife tell her husband, "You're a good man." Because I think most men will have the same response you did. "Well, no, I'm not, I'm failing in this area." But for a wife to just keep speaking those words, "I know who God's called you to be. I'm with you. I'm going to partner with you. I'm going to partner with God to see you become that man. I know you have what it takes." A lot of men will rise up and start to hear those words.

Dave Wilson: It's like you have a superpower. It really is something God gives. And again, we're not saying there aren't times when you as a wife need to speak truth, something hard, as your wife has. It's interesting too is many times when she's spoken truth to you, she has posed it as a question. And then you're just thinking about that. I like the way she's done that.

Jerrad Lopes: She's smarter than me; that frustrates me. She's playing chess, I'm playing checkers.

Dave Wilson: I mean what Jerrad said earlier about—and like I said, it's all through this book, the *Dad Tired Mixtape* book—that the best way to love your wife is to be a spiritual man, basically. As a wife, do you feel like that? That that is what we long for as women, our man to just walk with God?

Ann Wilson: Yeah, I think so, and I think so many women are feeling weary of carrying that alone. They feel like they're pulling that part of the relationship. "Hey, let's go to church. Hey kids, let's go to church." And the dad just kind of tagging along and women don't know what to do. So we hear like, "Oh, the man's supposed to be the spiritual leader."

Everyone has a different picture of what that should be and look like. I think that men hear that and they can feel overwhelmed by that. What does that mean to be the spiritual leader? Do you guys feel overwhelmed by that task?

Jerrad Lopes: Most guys don't want to lead. And then you throw the word "spiritual" in front of it and it's like, "No way. I don't want to lead in that way." I always tell guys spiritual leadership is just first to take initiative. So, not the first one to know all the answers, not the first one to be able to quote scripture and know all the theology and all the things. Just the first one take initiative.

I'm going to get up first, make sure our kids get to church this Sunday. I'm going to be the first one say, "Let's crack open the Bible and let's just study it together." I've been doing that with my kids. We don't have any planned Bible studies. I didn't go to seminary. I don't know all the answers. I just literally open the Bible, the book of Mark, sit my older kids down and we just read one chapter a day. There are a lot of times where my kids are like, "What does that mean?" and I say, "I have no idea." But we took initiative and I think that's spiritual leadership. So it's just initiative. That's what spiritual leadership means.

I was going to say too, when you said wives want their men to lead, I would imagine it's hard for a wife to trust her husband in leadership if he's always being selfish and just doing his own thing. But if a man's actually chasing after God, he's repenting of sin, he's humble, he's serving—I just can't imagine a wife not saying, "Well, I don't totally know what you mean by that or I don't totally know what direction, but I do know your heart is with the Lord. I do know you want best for us. I do know you want to make the heart of the Lord happy."

Wives would be much more willing to submit to that kind of leadership if she could trust the heart of her husband.

Ann Wilson: That's so true. That's good. And I think as women, we just want to partner. I think men can feel overwhelmed by it, but we're thinking—I love that word "initiate". If you initiate sometimes, if you're our partner in it, that we're a team, that feels really good.

Dave Wilson: For us men, sometimes we think leaders or leadership is this big, huge jump that I can't make. But when you say initiate, as a guy I'm like, "Oh, I can do that." I mean it could be I'm at the dinner table and I say, "Hey, before we eat, let's pray." It's not some big holy prayer. It's just that's accessible to a guy. Is that what you're saying?

Jerrad Lopes: That's Dad Tired in a heartbeat, man. Stumble your way forward. That's it. Stumble your way forward. Spiritual leadership is as many ten-to-fifteen-second moments throughout a day you can point your family's eyes back to Jesus. That's it.

Ann Wilson: What else have you done, Jerrad? You've mentioned, "Hey, we're reading the book of Mark." What are some other steps dads can take?

Jerrad Lopes: The one thing I just said there was trying to find ten-to-fifteen-second moments. Most of the time we think spiritual leadership is, "Okay, I need to do a devotional. Got to go on Amazon, got to find a devotional to pick through, and then I got to sit down and find the time." I'm tired at night, so I don't want to. It feels big.

I would just say pick as many moments throughout the day where you're trying to have the Kingdom of Heaven invade the Kingdom of Earth here in your child's life or in your wife's life. I was coaching my son at soccer and we were out on the field and the sun was going down. The sunset was insane. I just literally whispered in his ear, "Man, look how creative God is. Just stop real quick and look at that."

He said, "Whoa, that's cool." Ten or fifteen seconds. All I'm trying to do is just keep in my son that there's a God bigger than us and you're part of a story that's bigger than you. One time we were in the grocery store. This didn't turn out to go as planned, but we were in the grocery store and there was a couple fighting in the aisle next to us.

The wife said to the husband, "I'll never forgive you for this." I thought, "Ten-to-fifteen-second moment. I can point my eyes." So I get down on my son's level and I say, "Son, I will always forgive you because God always forgives us." He had tears in his eyes and I thought, "This is working. I'm doing a good job."

He looked at me with tears in his eyes and he said, "Daddy, I have to go potty so bad. It's an emergency." He did not hear a word I just said, but stumbling your way forward, you just try to use every opportunity you can to point your kids to Jesus.

Dave Wilson: That is actually a beautiful way to think about Dad Tired. Whatever you want to call it, just being a man. Obviously, any mom or wife could do the same thing. But it's just bringing it down to simple. I like the ten-to-fifteen-second. That, I can grab.

Jerrad Lopes: It's Deuteronomy 6.

We all know the difference between a good leader versus a boss. Bosses just tell us what to do and we're in trouble if we don't do it. A good leader looks at the people that they're leading and says, "What skills do you offer to this team to make us all better?"

A boss would say to his wife, "You do what I say because I'm the man." A leader says, "What skills do you have that I don't have?" I'm going to delegate. God has given you, as my wife, wisdom in ways that I do not have. You can look at things differently. My wife is sharp. She's sharper than me.

Leadership is not doing this all by myself. Leadership is saying, "Let me point out the skills that you have in this marriage and you lead us in this direction." Again, I'm just taking initiative to get the whole team involved so that we can become the family that God wants us to be.

Ann Wilson: See, I get teary even as you talk about a husband telling a wife, "These are the gifts that I see you have and I need you." That melts a wife's heart. We long to hear those words. That's so good. And I think for the wives as we hear this, this is encouraging me and a good reminder to me to say thank you to my husband, to point out the things my husband's doing right. So as a woman, as a wife, as you're listening, even asking, "God, show me the things that my husband's doing well and help me to say them."

Dave Wilson: What a great day with Jerrad. Always value added.

Ann Wilson: I really love him.

Dave Wilson: Yeah, and you've got to get his book. It's called *Dad Tired and Loving It*, and the subtitle: *Stumbling Your Way to Spiritual Leadership*. That is exactly how it happens. We stumble our way there. Again, you can get it at familylifetoday.com; just click on the link in the show notes.

Ann Wilson: We want to hear from you. You can leave us a voicemail with your questions, concerns, praise reports, or whatever. All you have to do is go to speakpipe.com/familylifetoday. Again, that's speakpipe.com/familylifetoday or get the link in the show notes.

Dave Wilson: *FamilyLife Today* is a donor-supported production of FamilyLife, a Crew ministry, celebrating 50 years of God's faithfulness as marriages grow stronger and families flourish in Him.