"What’s the difference between being a father and being a daddy?"

Click here to listen to Dr. Joey tell his story!

You know, there’s a difference between being a father and being a daddy.

Being a father is about biology. Being a daddy is about being there when you learn to ride your bike or hit a baseball or score a soccer goal.

Being a father is about buying a house. Being a daddy is about creating a home, a place and space where you know you can go no matter where you’ve been or what you’ve done.

Being a father is about not sparing the rod. Being a daddy is about teaching you how to measure up to your full potential as a person, about having integrity and playing fair and treating others the way you want them to treat you.

Being a father is about ruling your household. Being a daddy is about respecting your wife and children, and earning their respect by doing the right thing by them.

Being a father is about making a living. Being a daddy is about listening and making a life, and taking time to hear about your wows and your woes.

This Sunday, be a daddy so your child can wish you “Happy Daddy’s Day!”

Discover more great stories like this one!

"What do you wish?"

Click here to listen to Dr. Joey tell his story!

A father was telling his little girl what his own childhood was like. He said, “We used to skate outside on a frozen pond for hours and hours until way after dark. And I had a swing made from a tire and it hung from a tree in our front yard and I’d swing and sing in my loudest voice. And we rode our pony that was named Silver all around the farm and down to the pond. And in the summertime, we picked wild raspberries and ate them until we thought we would pop.”

The little girl was so wide-eyed, taking in all of these fun times her father had as a little boy. At last she said, “I sure wish I’d gotten to know you sooner!”

Do you ever wish you’d known someone sooner? Or, talked with a friend more often? Or, taken time out to enjoy life more?

Do you ever wish you’d had more fun with your children? Or, taken life less seriously and played more often?

Get to know the people around you sooner—like today. Go visit your father like you’ve been meaning to. Call that school teacher who meant so much to you and thank her. As you do, you listen to life and make a life, not just a living.

Discover more great stories like this one!

"Do you play or just work?"

Click here to listen to Dr. Joey tell his story!

I can still remember when our older daughter was a preschooler. She had a lot of her toys scattered on the floor. I asked her to please pick them up.

“I don’t want to, Daddy,” she said. “I’m too tired.”

I looked at her with my “You don’t really expect me to believe that” look. And she looked back at me with her “Please fall for that line” look.

So I said, “Well, you will pick up your toys, but what if we play a game first?”

“O-kay,” she said.

“What about ‘Ride the horsey?’” I asked. That was her favorite game with me at the time, you know, the one where you put the child on your leg and “Ride the horsey down to town, better watch out cuz you might fall down” and then lower the child to floor.

She climbed up in my lap and rode the horsey a couple of times. Then I said, “Now clean up your toys and we’ll ride the horsey one more time.”

She put her toys away in about 90 seconds. And she wasn’t too tired to ride the horsey again, either.

Today when you face something you’d rather not do, take a couple of minutes and play, then do the work. God didn’t create you for all work and no play.

Discover more great stories like this one!

"Where's your nest?"

Click here to listen to Dr. Joey tell his story

You may have heard me talk before about a bird’s nest on top of a column on the front porch of our home. I noticed some years ago that a bird built a nest on top of the column, laid eggs, hatched them, and we enjoyed watching her feed the baby birds, seeing them grow, test their wings and fly away. We had that privilege again this year with the hatchlings flying away on Mother’s Day. And again this year, that was just the first batch.

You see each year—and again this year—within a week of that first batch hatching and flying away, another mother bird comes in, customizes the nest to her specifications, and lays her eggs. She hatches them, and raises them up until they fly away. We average three clutches of eggs hatched in that one nest each spring.

Rather than tear that nest down after the third hatching, I leave it up each year, providing the mother bird with a ready-made nest that needs just a little fixing up. It seems to me that’s how God treats us—giving us everything we need to be successful as we listen to life and make a life.

Discover more great stories like this one!

"Who's your hero?"

Click here to listen to Dr. Joey tell his story!

Our younger daughter, who enters high school this fall, was in third grade when her teacher gave an assignment to read a biography and write a book report. Our daughter searched for just the right book and discovered the biography of Amelia Earhart.

She finished the book and came downstairs to tell me about it. She told me all about lots of wonderful events from Amelia Earhart’s life and then said, “She was really brave, too, Daddy. Women in her time didn’t do all of these things. She’s my hero.”

Later that year, I found a large reproduction of the photo taken of Amelia Earhart in flight from Oakland to Honolulu. I bought it and we hung it on our daughter’s bedroom wall to remind her that just like Amelia Earhart her hero, she can be brave and do heroic acts, too. And it’s still hanging there today.

Who’s your hero? Who’s someone that excelled and soared above the horizons everyone else saw?

Let God inspire you to be brave like your hero as you make a life and not just a living.

Discover more great stories like this one!