The Superpower Every Dad Possesses

We explore the profound impact that fathers and grandfathers have on their children's lives and how to harness this "superpower" to create lasting positive influence.

• Fathers matter more than they realize – there's something intrinsically powerful about a father's presence
• Children carry a fundamental question for their fathers: "What do you really think about me?"
• For sons, this manifests as "Dad, do I have what it takes to be a man?"
• For daughters, the question often is "Dad, am I beautiful?"
• The biblical story of Jacob renaming Benjamin illustrates how fathers can transform their children's identities
• No father is perfect – dads help start our stories, but God the Father completes them
• Receiving God's fathering enables us to father our children better
• Forgiving our own fathers for their imperfections is key to breaking generational cycles
• It's never too late to reconcile with family and transform bitterness into a blessing

Visit www.thefatherdifference.com/links for a free book download and information about personal coaching.

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome to The Father Difference
• 4:05 You Matter More Than You Know
• 8:20 When God Fathers You
• 16:37 The Question Every Child Asks
• 22:40 Being Fathered by God
• 30:50 Free Resources and Community
• 35:29 Closing Thoughts and Invitation

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:02

Well, welcome. I'm your host, Ed Tanney-McGlasson, and I'm so looking forward to sharing with you about the superpower of all dads, or superpower of dads and granddads. We did an event to pass Father's Day. I know a number of you wanted to be there and you couldn't be there, and so I'm giving you, because you're so special, I'm giving you the highlights of our event, which was the three-hour event, to give you some things to think about and to make the biggest difference you can do as a dad or a granddad or maybe you're a grandma and you're watching this or a mom. This will apply to you too. I'm so grateful that you're here. We've got a number of friends that are showing up here. Welcome. Let me know where you're coming from and what's going on. I'm your host, ed Tanney-McGlasson, and this is the Father Difference, and we come to you every week with insights on this live show to help you become the best father you can be and also the best husband, and we also have a special that we do every Thursdays at 12 o'clock. We also have a special that we do every Thursdays at 12 o'clock, and it's a father difference for moms. If you're a mom out there and you want to make a difference. I'm just really excited about you showing up and on Thursdays, and we've had a grand time there. As a matter of fact, they're going to put up a brand slide, I think, of what we're working on with moms, and it's all about how to bless and unlock the father of your children. Whether you're still with him or not, he's still their father and there's some powerful things that you can do. So let's get right into the material, and I'm so grateful. Let us know where you're coming from. Maybe any questions. If you see me drinking this, I'm doing a big gulp. Yours truly is on carnivore and I've just about lost 48 pounds in the last 80 some days, and I'm you know, I'm getting so skinny that I have to turn my air conditioning on medium so it doesn't blow me out the window. No, I'm planning on breaking 300 by my birthday July 11th coming up, and it's also going to be our 43rd wedding anniversary.

Speaker 1: 2:49

Been married to Jill all those years and what an incredible gift that God gave me in the wife I have Now. If you're a married guy and you've got a great wife, why don't you give her a little shout-out right now or do something that is really powerful for her and that is when you get off the show, grab a card or send a text or an email and just tell her what you love about her. Something is really, really powerful. Something is really really powerful when we as fathers and husbands, you know, write notes and bless the mother of our children. Maybe you're an ex and once you shock her you might even be leaving. In Texas, if you've been in California, the big exodus is happening to Texas and Tennessee and Boise and everywhere else, and no wonder because of Crazyville, but yours truly is here in California. I love it. It's the home of my father and I'm really looking forward to sharing with you.

Speaker 1: 4:01

Well, I'm coming here today right from Tandy Studios that we have. You can see, I have a painting right here of Mount Sinai. If you've never seen this, this is the painting I did a number of years ago and yours truly, by the way, sierras to do some painting, to get some R&R and to do what I love to do, which is plein air painting. And, matter of fact, just got a new painting box, alip Rashad painting box that I want to tell you. I'll talk about it, probably next week a little bit, because I'll have pain all over me at some point. So be praying for us in the family, get some of the needed R&R that we need just to kind of refresh, focus on this season. I've been so grateful to do these shows. Matter of fact, we're going to do next week's show right from the mountains, so if you see a grizzly bear walking across the frame, don't worry, he won't eat me. There's plenty of food for him because of the big rains. So, anyway, let's get into the material.

Speaker 1: 5:18

The superpower of dads, and what does that mean? And grandpas? Well, here's the first picture, and slides might be a little off today, but you'll get the gist. And here's the first slide. You matter as a father and grandfather more than you know. And what do I mean by that? Is that there's something intrinsically powerful about your life as a father, and it's not to say that moms aren't powerful. But I want to tell you there has been a bullseye in the world on the forehead of every guy that's a father for years, of every guy that's a father for years, because the devil knows that if he can knock out the dads, that moms are going to have triple duty, trying to raise kids and be the best mom they can be, but it takes a mother and a father to raise an incredible son. And so God is—no matter how you feel about God even you really do matter as a father and a grandfather. And here's a scripture—you've never seen this—it's a powerful picture of this guy who had lived 65 years and the Bible says that he fathered Methuselah and it says that he walked with God after he fathered Methuselah 300 years. Powerful, powerful picture. And he had other sons and daughters. That's all. The days of Enoch were 365 days.

Speaker 1: 7:08

Something profound happens inside of us when we really embrace fatherhood and understand that to be a great dad, you need God in your life, because without him, we'll make parenting about us, won't we? We'll make everything about us. And I got to tell you I'm a guy here that when I started having kids and being part of the story of my kid's story, I really struggled. And I didn't struggle because I didn't love them. Of course I loved them, but I struggled because I was still trying to arrive myself. I was a football player, I was playing in a national football league and, by the way you get to, without realizing it, as a professional athlete, you get really selfish about your food, about your workouts, about everything. And then you're working out and you're coming home and you're sleeping. And then you're waking up and you're working out again and you come home and you eat and go to sleep and your kids are there. Basically, what about me? And because and you all know my story because of the loss of my dad in my own story and then the gaining of an amazing stepdad yeah, I was missing something. I was missing something and Enoch discovered it.

Speaker 1: 8:45

You know, and you know there's an incredible story that I wanted to key you into as well, and that's a story about this guy named Jacob, and Jacob was, you know, out and his wife was in labor. You know out and his wife was in labor. He didn't know at the time and he encounters God. He thinks it's an angel, it's the pre-incarnate Christ, and you know Jesus actually says to him let me go, for the day is broken, and Jacob says I won't let you go till you bless me. See, jacob, his name actually means watch out, hold your wallet.

Speaker 1: 9:28

He was the dealmaker. You ever met somebody who's the dealmaker and you know you're going to come at the short end of the stick? Well, that was Jacob, and yet he was missing something in his life. He was, you know, getting ready to be a father again, and yet you know he was missing something and God blessed him. And it says that he said to him what's your name? And of course God knows Jacob's name and he says I'm Jacob. Names mean something and you know him saying that I'm Jacob. And then, and here, the pre-incarnate Christ says I love this. Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, which means father of many nations, for you have striven with God and with men and have prevailed and blessed them. So something changes.

Speaker 1: 10:37

When God blesses your life, you can have all the money in the world that might increase your pocketbook. You can have all the money in the world that might increase your pocketbook. But something incredibly powerful happens when God himself fathers you. He blesses you, he gives you pieces that maybe your dad wasn't really good at giving you in your life. It doesn't diminish your father. It doesn't diminish your father because the truth of the matter is that our dads are there to start our story, but there's no dad perfect enough to finish our story and we, as sons, we want to find those great things with our dad. I've coached a number of men that had crazy military-like fathers who were pretty aggressive and brutal with them, but they would try to find any nugget they could of saying, well, I know my dad loved me. He just never said it. Well, it doesn't replace it.

Speaker 1: 11:43

And the truth of the matter is that our dads and our grandfathers, they help start our stories. They don't actually end our stories. God the Father wants to be that guy and here's a picture of what God the Father can do inside of a young father. So here, jacob, after being blessed, he comes back up on the wagon train and notice that his beloved wife has died in childbirth and in her last moments she doesn't have the father there to name that child and names him Ben-Oni, which in Hebrew means son of my sorrow. And I can't tell you how many times I've met boys and girls who are raised by a single mom who didn't have a father present to bless them, to name them, to be in their story. Because we're made for that.

Speaker 1: 12:43

No matter, you know, mom, if you're watching, no matter how you know deadbeat that dad is, he still carries something that he can help start this story with your children, because we have this question in us as sons and daughters. And that is Dad, what do you really think about me? And I mean at the core level. You know we can bless our kids with our words and Scripture, and that's all powerful, but at the end of the day they want to know. And that's all powerful, but at the end of the day they want to know what does my dad think about me? To a boy, you know, written so by numbers of different men, that that question is, dad, do I have what it takes to be a man? And that response from us means the world to that son, who is watching imitating You've probably seen that, mom, if you've watched or Dad, the things you do, your son copies you, by the way. Has he ever copied things that you wish that he wouldn't copy?

Speaker 1: 14:05

But the point that we're going to kind of talk about tonight, there's something intrinsically powerful in the words you use, the man you are, the way you bless your children. That superpower that I was talking about is when you learn how to receive from God, just the way Jacob did. Because notice what happened with Jacob he not only came upon this wagon train, but he steps in and he renames his son. Look what he calls him Benjamin, which in Hebrew means son of my right hand, and so here's a father who was blessed, who received that blessing from God in turn. Now, just after he had this name changed by God and when God blesses you and changes your name, he grows your capacity as a man or as a woman he changed his name to Benjamin, which means son of my right hand, and right then the tribe of Benjamin was born. The Benjamites were fierce warriors. Nobody actually messed with the Benjamites, and it started with the dad who had been fathered by God and blessed, and he in turn takes that blessing that he received and uses it to bless his son, who could have lived a whole life of sorrow. That's a powerful picture, and thank you, kevin, good night. You know, it's just that is so important. You know that we encourage and challenge men right now to seek the Lord first in fatherhood, because no dad is perfect, and just imagine for a moment being able to let your dad off the hook for not being perfect, and so he's responsible to everything you become. He can only begin our story.

Speaker 1: 16:32

Let me tell you a little story about me and my grandpa. I had an amazing grandfather. When my dad was killed in action, my mother moved back home for the first year of my life before she met Dan McLaughlin, hence my name, ed Tandy, my birth father's name McLaughlin, my uh, a step in father better. I like him better than stepfather. He stepped in to take that role and my grandfather is pointing to a memorial and he's pointing in my father's name, edward H Tandy. You can see that on the screen and he sent that to me and it wasn't long after that that I was sitting in the alcove in his home outside the Naval Academy. You know he was an amazing military man, a brilliant guy. The military even was in the oil business and Sitco Oil Company. He was responsible for helping the premier of India discover oil and for India to become, move from being a to really becoming a world power with the finances of handling so many people, of handling so many people. And so I'm sitting out there. He's reading his paper. He's reading the Washington Post. That actually used to be in a newspaper 40 years ago, wasn't an opinion piece. And he's, you know, like my grandfather, he'd comment about what's going on. My grandfather also was the first chief exec of the CIA from the Navy. Just an incredible job he had in World War II. He was outside of Pearl Harbor when Pearl Harbor was attacked with his destroyer group, three-star admiral, and was also in the theater in Europe during World War II against the Nazis and all that Boy did. He have stories to tell.

Speaker 1: 18:59

But what I wanted more than anything and it's one of the things that's probably the most important thing that you kind of download into your children's life is that place inside of you that you let them know what you really think about them. There's nothing that means more to them. They, you know they appreciate you coming to their game and seeing them. They appreciate all that. You come into their game and seeing them. They appreciate all that. But at the core of their hearts, your son's question is what do you really think about me, dad? Your daughter's questions as she's discovering her beauty Dad, am I beautiful? What do you think about me? It's amazing how powerful and for a later show we'll talk about the difference you can really make as a father with your daughters yes, so your son wants to know what you think. He appreciates the great grades and I think they appreciate when you're showing them off with your friends, but at the end of the day he wants to know what does my dad think about me or what does my grandpa? So I asked him and he looks at me with a twinkle in his eye and says you remind me of somebody, ed? And I said who? And he said when I was working at the Naval Academy after the CIA and came back to Annapolis and was part of helping the Naval Academy go to the next level.

Speaker 1: 20:57

And this young, bushy-haired guy comes into my office and he looks at me and says Admiral Ford. He introduces himself, he said if you'll make an order to have all the midshipmen come to the chapel, I'd like the privilege of sharing Jesus with them and lead them to Christ. And my grandfather smiled to me and he goes Ed, you are just like him, gosh, what a compliment. And that's what he thought about me. And then he looks at me and he goes. And it's a matter of fact, before I die I'm going to give one final order that I want you to do my memorial service, and, like Billy Graham, I want you to give Midshipman an opportunity to stand up and receive Jesus. And I was just wow, years later, my grandfather goes to heaven and I got a call from a chaplain and the chaplain said Ed, I would. Admiral Ford has asked me. I've given an order to have you be part of the memorial and so we're going to give you a few minutes to share your thoughts. And I said no, that's not what my grandfather said. If you read the order, he wants me to do the whole memorial service. He was squirming man, he was squirming in his seats and he said he wants me to preach Jesus to him.

Speaker 1: 22:54

So the order went out and it was during the summer and so it wasn't all the midshipmen, it was those that were there during summer training and there was about 600 who filed into the just gigantic, beautiful chapel Chapel where my dad and mom got married, where my step-in father, he got married to my mom and they were filing it. I had my family on the first couple of rows and then in the back were midshipmen and I just it's like I could you know those moments where kind of heaven touches earth and I could see my grandpa smiling over me and I laid my head back and gave it all I had and said if you'd like to receive Christ today, I want you to stand to your feet and men, shipmen, all over the chapel stand up and begin receiving Christ. And I prayed for him. You know, I thought maybe I could wipe the chagrin off the face of the chaplain. He would go way to go. He said nothing to me, but it didn't matter, because Grandpa wanted that. But it didn't matter because grandpa wanted that and he was a part of helping me start my story. But, god, he's not the one that finishes us, because our granddads don't live forever.

Speaker 1: 24:38

And one other point I want to share with you in our time I want you to think about this until next week when we get together, because we're going to do part two as well and that is that God is committed to fathering you through His Son Jesus. Now, if you've been with me at all in our times, you know that I've talked about this, but he wants to father you in such a way that it takes the best of your dad and moves forward with it and adds so much value to you and even some of those things that are really negative and sideways with your father. God, the Father, is the only one, through His Son Jesus, to change that and the way that happens. You know, and I'll share this story next week, but it says here in 2 Corinthians 6, verse 18, and I will be a father to you and you will be my sons and daughters, says the Lord, god Almighty, and we're going to jump into this next week in our time together. But God's plan all along has been to be your father too. Jesus modeled it. Jesus lived in it himself.

Speaker 1: 26:01

When Thomas, one day, one of his disciples disciples wanted to see what the father looked like, jesus makes this statement that every dad would want their son to say. One day, he said if you've seen me, you've seen my father and I don't know about you. But the sweetest times for me as a dad is when I meet men, friends of mine, who've met my sons or my daughters, and find out that they've handed one of my books that we give the Difference a Father Makes, where it's in 124 countries right now digitally being downloaded. And if you've not gotten one, we'll give you an idea at the end of this show how to get it. But to hear back from them and I remember one recently he came to me, he's in my Bible study and he goes. You know, I I just had the most amazing meeting with your son, edward, and he's so much like you. But the character that he has, the life that he has the integrity, the focus. You must be the proudest dad in the world and I said I am. I know that I was there to help start his story, but the God, the Father's, promise is he is going to be the one who finishes the story. So you're not going to be perfect Dad, you've got to be the one who finishes the story. So you don't got to be perfect Dad, you got to be present and we're going to learn in these next couple of weeks, throughout the end of June and through the end of July, how to really enter into really being fathered by God.

Speaker 1: 28:08

Imagine being able to let your dad off the hook and completely forgive him for what he didn't have. I mean, if you think about it, most of our wounds that we have with our fathers come from the brokenness they had in their life. What would happen if you were able to completely forgive those wounds? Forgive them for not being the dad you really needed him to be or wanted him to be, and let him off the hook to reestablish relationship with them hook to reestablish relationship with them. I was just with one of the guys who's in our coaching program and he told me about an amazing reconciliation that he just had with his father, after just 20 years of no conversation and nothing but bitterness in the family. And it wasn't that he went first to make it all right with his brothers and sisters and all this stuff. It wasn't that they went first, it was that he did. And he decided that he was going to confront bitterness and change the family legacy of bitterness and turn it to blessing. It's never too late to do that and we have tools to help you do that.

Speaker 1: 29:41

I'm going to put up on the screen a couple of things for you to think about. If you're looking for some help to really maybe go to the next level, I have a coaching program online. We're calling it Men of Honor. We're actually transitioning it to the Father Difference. It's a men's training program and it's available right now. You can get the book on Amazon. If you're outside the country, it's much easier for you to get it on Amazon. They print them locally, right where you're at.

Speaker 1: 30:18

But the digital part of access for the course of access for the course you need this code, or you go to my website, which is thefatherdifferencecom. Let me see there. It is right at the bottom. If you go to thefatherdifferencecom. You can sign up for this and right now it's still being offered for free. It's normally an $800, $900 program coaching program that we're gifting right now, but that window is closing and there'll be a subscription fee really very soon. So there's limited access to get this special training time and if you want that, or you have a son that maybe needs it, or you're a grandpa and you want to help one of your grandkids, you can send the book to them and really help them learn, and this book is all about learning how to receive from the Father so that you can become the man, the husband and father that God's called you to be, and it'd be my honor to send it to you. Also as another kind of bonus for you, we have a daily devotional that we send out the Father Difference Daily Devotional, and if you go to my—it's the same website thefatherdifferencecom, you can sign up there for that as well, and we send that out.

Speaker 1: 31:51

I am so grateful to the thousands of people every day who read it, and yours truly is part of the writing We've written. We've done a lot of them so for a number of years, and we're here for you. We're excited to have that for you. But before I get off I just have a moment to pray for you and wherever your sticking point is. Maybe you want to send me a text here and text me or send me an email. You can send it to edtandy at blessingofthefathercom and we'll have that available. That website name is going to change to thefatherdifferencecom, which you'll notice if you look for the blessing of the Father. We're making this transition to the Father differencecom, which you'll notice if you look for the blessing of the father. We're making this, this transition to the father difference, and have that for you. But I'd love to honor, to pray for you right now as we kind of wind up this show. Do you email me at Ed Tanya, the blessing of the father, with your prayer request? We'll send you another link for a, a check-in free coaching call with me where I would love the honor of helping you really hit the goals that God's put in your heart to achieve with your family and become that man, husband or father you need to be, and it's never too late.

Speaker 1: 33:21

Pray with me, father. I thank you for my friends that are watching. I pray you would bless them, holy Spirit. I pray you would touch them right now and fill them right now, use them right now in profound ways to make a difference in their family. Father, I pray, I ask you to bless them as sons and, if there's a mama there, to bless her as a daughter and equip them as a father so that they can be the fathers and mothers they really need to be. I pray you would bless them and use them. And, father, I pray you do a miracle with some of them that have been separated from their children and even grandchildren being separated. Lord, I pray that you would do such a profound work that you would reunite their family in the name of Jesus and all God's people said amen, so grateful to be with you.

Speaker 1: 34:19

One more little slide, if this has blessed you, we run on really, the generosity of men and women like you who sow into our ministry whether it's a one-time gift or it's a monthly gift that you say I want to help you reach more men, and your investment really in our ministry helps us get the word out and enables us to send out our free devotionals, send the book out digitally around the world, and that takes resources to keep all the Internet stuff going and you know how quickly that all changes. We had a great team here and it would be an honor if you would consider adding the Father Difference and the Blessing of the Father Ministries to your group that you support. It would be an honor for you to do that. Or just go to thefatherdifferencecom slash donation and you can send in a gift there and I would be honored. So anyway, it's great to be with you. Thank you, my friends. I'm here because of your support. You keep praying for yours truly.

Speaker 1: 35:45

I've actually lost 48 pounds on carnivore. I'll be sharing more about that. I'm eating meat and I love eating steak Any other steak eaters out there but I'll be sharing more about my weight loss. I'm trying to get into the 250s, which has been a long time. Trying to get into the 250s, which has been a long time.

Speaker 1: 36:11

And so here I am at Candy Studios here at the Mountain of God. I've got Moses over my shoulder there and so be praying for me. We're going to hike up into the mountains. By the way, just to let you know about hiking, they're just morning hikes and I go back to a nice soft bed. This old body doesn't do well on thin sleeping bags and rocks on the ground. So come back out and don't want a bear to confuse me with competition anyway. So I'm heading off to Mammoth. I'm looking forward to that time and preaching up there. If you're in the area in Mammoth, in Bishop or Mammoth in Crowley Lake, there's Church on a Mountain. We're going to be there next Sunday and looking forward to meeting with the men, women and churches in both Bishop and there and being in Mammoth and seeing all my friends up there. So remember, my friend, it's never too late for God to do a miracle in your story. The Lord bless you. In the name of Jesus. Have a great night.