Grandpa’s Voice Still Matters

When the world shouts for our kids’ attention, one quiet, steady presence can still change everything: a grandfather who speaks life. We dive into why grandkids still need grandpa’s voice and how a few simple practices—blessing, storytelling, prayer, and practical mentorship—can anchor a child’s identity in a culture of noise.

If this resonates, share it with a grandfather you admire, subscribe for more weekly conversations, and leave a review with one lesson your grandparent taught you. Your story might spark another family’s turning point.

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Transcript

Framing The Mission: Grandpa’s Voice

Culture, Identity, And Competing Voices

Words Of Blessing Over Grandchildren

Modeling Scripture Through Your Story

Lessons From A Naval Grandfather

Struggle, Grit, And True Wins

Stories That Form A Roadmap

Adoption And Identity In Christ

Introduce Grandkids To Your Circle

Confidence, Mentors, And Real Skills

SPEAKER_01 2:23

Hey, welcome, man. This is your I'm your host, Ed Danny McLassan, and welcome to the Father Difference. We're also a podcast. Uh, we do this live every week uh on Tuesday nights, and we the we replay it on all of our social media channels. And today we're going to talk about why granddads still need why grandkids still need grandpa's voice. And boy, isn't that the truth? Especially in our culture today, with so many kids struggling with their own core identity. And much of the problems with young people today is that they're not quite sure who they are. And I'd love to hear from you. If you can let me know where you're coming from, I'll check the comments right here. I'll just kind of say if you have a question anytime during our feed, I would love to do my best. I'll give you my best in answering those. But I'm really grateful to be here. And you know, it's it's it's it's a miracle that yours truly is able to do these kind of shows because it's what's got is is done in my own story. Let me just check something out here. Something's not quite uh right here, and we will boom. Here we go. Now we're gonna get on the right camera. Here we go. Oh, yes. So I thought I was looking like the orange man, not to be confused with the guy in the whitehouse, but I was definitely looking a little orange. So anyway, now I got back to to have a better view of who we are. I have been out in the sun. My wife and I had a little time away at the beach in Newport Beach and really refreshing. I even broadcast last week from you. We started this series that we're kind of in with fathers and grandpas this fall. And uh today I want to speak. If you're a dad, this is perfect for you. If you are a grandpa, well, welcome. There is an incredible difference that you can play in the life of your grandkids because they need you more than probably any time. I the culture when I was growing up as a young man was a lot different than the one we have today. And so, grandfather's voices and smiles and stories and those things that God has taught you in your own life are pivotal. And when I welcome you, we're we're broadcasting live from my studio here. Here's uh Mount Sinai, one of my paintings here. It's called His Glory Beckons. And so I also get to do art. Can you imagine that these big football fingers, you know, that could actually paint anything that represents anything? Anyway, that's a joy in my life, but I am so grateful to be with you and share. We're gonna get right into this lesson and want to share with you some things that have really transformed my relationship with my grandkids and my own children. And so let's get right into it. Number one, this is it seems like an obvious one. Affirm them with your words and blessings. And let me tell you why that's so important. Think about you know, if you think about your grandkids right now and your own children, if your dad listened to this, what voice do they hear? Where do they discover who they are? Who's the voice, who's the influence that's grabbing your your your grandkids' heart the most? Is it neighbors, friends? Is it their dad, which we want that to be so? Working with a lot of grandfathers in our fatherhood academy right now, who actually hire me to help them kind of reestablish connection with their grandchildren and to help them also learn to be the best grandpa they can be. Because they realize that their own sons and daughters have dropped the ball in a lot of ways. They're busy, they're working maybe, and the discipler of their grandkids is this little device called an iPhone. They're getting your identity from these things, and what is more powerful than this? Well, let me tell you, you are in Christ, Grandpa. Let me tell you, there's nobody more important in the life of your grandchildren than you. So that's why the very first point is affirm them with your words and your blessing. What do I mean by that? Well, when you speak life into them, and with when you're speaking life, that you know that one of the things that I've learned is if I go to my grandkids and try to get them to follow scripture so they can have a better life by pointing out what's broken in them, that's one way. Very ineffective. But when I tell the stories of the Bible on how those stories have changed grandpa, that's altogether amazingly powerful for my grandkids. So you want to firm them. And they're constantly wondering, what does my grandpa think about me? You ever notice that your grandsons come over and they look at you, and and maybe they've been hiding, or you know, they, you know, one of the things my grandkids love to do is play hide and seek in my house. I know all the noops and crannies everywhere. But they want me to come find them. And when I find them, you know, I, you know, tickle them, scare them, and it's just it's just awesome. They want me to play with them, they want me to be around, but they want to know what does grandpa think about me. That's why your words and blessing is so powerful for your kids. You know, part of the, you know, we we see this model in the Bible. I mentioned this last week, but we sort of have some technical issues, so I wanted to share this with you again. Is that you know, when Paul blesses his spiritual son Timothy in the Bible, who writes the book of Timothy, Timothy includes this, you know, this word from Paul, a spiritual father, into the life of his own life. And, you know, Paul writes this this really this prophetic word, this prophetic blessing into Timothy because he was struggling with things, being a pastor of a of a of a huge church. And uh and Paul writes, I'm reminded of your sincere faith. You see how he's just speaking that into a faith that first dwelt at first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice, and now I'm sure dwells in you as well. And see, your words of blessing are incredibly powerful in the life of your grandchildren. Especially when you you grab a scripture that means something to you, the something you see in them. And so what you're doing is you're you're calling out that incredible thing that you see in your grandchildren that you love about them. Not necessarily doing what we're really good at doing, probably a little bit easier for us as dads and grandpas, to give them scripture of the things they're not doing well. But I don't know about you, all the times that the Lord comes, and there are times when God speaks scripture into me that rebukes me and calls me to repent and do things. But most of the time, you know, when God highlights a scripture and shows me something, he's offering me a brand new capacity of what his word and the Holy Spirit can do in my life. Have you found that to be true? How many times have you heard a sermon at your church and your your pastor nails something and you go, oh man, that's good. You know, that those moments of of interaction that we have. And and when that happens, it's like, oh, I'll even say that's mine. I I grab that, you know, because it's the way God speaks to the church through pastors and leaders. He speaks to us through his word every day. And get so how did your grandchildren hear from God like that? Well, one of the one of the perfect people, not to negate grandma, because grandmas are amazing. They they got all the they got all the extra toys from from Walmart, get everything hidden in their closet. Is your wife like my wife? I mean, she's always shopping, and my grandkids come running in, wondering what new thing grandma got for them. So she's absolutely a hero to them. Grandpa, they're kind they're wondering, what does he think about me? Because they already know what grandma thinks. The cuddles and hugs, and grandpa is a little bit more about performance and identity, but that's how we're wired. And so when you answer those questions inside of your grandchildren, that that can anchor them, anchor them in their core identity for the rest of their life. And I gotta tell you, that's you know, that's what happened in me in my own life. When my grand grandpa, you know, he ends up blessing me. It was a question, and I shared this last week. I'll share it again because some of you weren't able to be with me last week. But my grandfather would sit out on his porch. He's a, you know, he's a very highly decorated naval officer, and I just loved spending time with him. He he had a porch in Annapolis, Maryland, right outside his home, on the side of his house, which is almost across from the entrance to the Naval Academy on on the gate that he was closest to. And not only did he go to school there, my father went to school there, Ed Tandy McLassan, Ed Tandy, and was killed in action. He was a Navy test pilot. And so my grandfather was a really important person in my life because I I not only lived in his house for the first year, which I do not remember, but I couldn't wait to go to grandpa's house because he was always telling me stories. He was telling me stories about, you know, being in the military, being an admiral. He was telling me stories about his things that he had to learn. He told me stories about, you know, struggle that he had. I mean, remember, you know, he became an incredible tennis player, so much so that he was invited in really because he was like a champion in the all of the Navy in tennis and was invited to Wimbledon, unfortunately, just before Wimbledon Pearl Harbor was attacked. And so my grandfather never got to go and and play in that tournament representing the Navy. He was a great tennis player, but he he learned to play tennis. He came from a really poor family. And uh my grandfather told me that his his father couldn't really afford a racket, and so he found an old one in a in a garbage somewhere and strung it himself. Imagine stringing your own racket yourself, and he didn't have any tennis balls, and so he made one up with a bunch of put a whole bunch of rubber bands around in a ball, and then and had his mom make a you know a canvas, you know, cover, and he she sewed it up like the size of a real tennis ball. Because they were way too expensive for this young boy, and he he told me that he really he would, you know, watch the you know, people playing tennis across a track, because he was on the side of the track of a very poor in Buffalo, New York. And uh he would see them playing this game, and he just fell in love with it, and he would go to the firehouse wall, which was right around the corner from his house, with his uh racket that he strung himself and his ball and hit it for hours against that wall. I heard stories about how hard it was for my grandpa to break through in his own life. He studied hard, he he worked hard, and ended up being at the top of his class in high school and and uh played tennis and got an an appointment to the Naval Academy and wanted to serve our country in the military, and then all that he did, he he built his life not out of the richness of a wealthy dad. Because it seems like a lot of kids today, their their plan in their life is they want to have a wealthy dad who's gonna take care of them and give them all the opportunities. And here's the one thing that a lot of our children don't get because of how easy things are in the West, is they don't get that struggle in working hard and really learning to do something because you don't have resources is an incredible thing altogether. And hold on, I have one hi I see. You have something to say to me? I'm live online. Is that you, I see? Okay. Well, anyway, I got a call from my team. I didn't know that if something was going wrong. So back to my story of my grandson. One of the things that children today, they don't, if they have any struggle at all, they feel persecuted. If they don't have all the money they want, they feel persecuted. They don't get an iPhone right away, they feel less than. Because this entitlement culture has been has grown around our children, even into our universities, from people. Now, hear me when I say this, more often than not were never fathered the right way. They were just given everything. And and many of them not grandfathered. And so they they've they've sort of been raised. You probably heard that term, they were raised with a silver spoon in their mouth. Well, that's not my granddad. Matter of fact, that wasn't even my own story. And in that I had to do a paper route before school every day to save up enough money, which wasn't a lot, to buy my gloves for baseball, buy football, buy athletic gear and running shoes. And something happened to me when I had to go work for something. And in not that my my stepdad didn't couldn't just go buy me everything. But he he wanted me to to get a win. And so your your grandchildren, they they want wins in their life. In their mind, a win, you know, is getting something where they don't work for it. But in the kingdom of God and the diligence of following through and trusting God, I mean the the whole Christian life is that our win comes when we learn how to receive from the Lord, and we're not doing it in our own strength, we're tapping into God's supernatural presence and power that enables us to be who He's called us to be and to do what He's called us to do. That's the definition of grace. Is that God's empowering presence that enables us to be what God's called us to be and do what God's called us to do? And you know, I I think your grandchildren right now, I know mine are, and uh all that they're gone through, even my sons and the way they're raising their my grandchildren. You notice I said they're mine, they're mine, they're also chills, is they're raising them to just value even the struggle of having to go and do something in their life to where they pay a price. We have kids today that they you know they did they put they play basketball with their thumbs on their PS2, PS3 controllers or used to be Nintendo, they probably still have all that. We got rid of all those things in our house. I didn't want my children shooting baskets or playing football or playing golf with their thumb. Where's the celebration of that? You might get instant gratification, you know, through a game like that, but when you learn how to apply yourself and work hard and struggle, it's kind of like the picture of, you know, great great wine is made from they say, from uh vines that got a struggle in the ground, that have to find water. That you know, the the finest wine is those ones that have got roots that are really deep. Matter of fact, our our family, my cousins have a vineyard up in Napa. And when I went to the edge of the vineyard, I said, I noticed the streams over here. And he said, Yeah, well, we we water from it, you know, into the vineyard. But the healthiest vines that we have have all grown their roots. Into the stream. That's in the Bible. That's what I told my cousin, you know. Anybody that plants their their roots by you know streams of living water will never dry out. That's what it says in Psalms. You know, their leaves will never wither and they'll be fruitful in every season. So when you think about the way you're being a grandfather, you need to kind of build that life for your grandchildren to where they can learn things themselves so you can celebrate them and they can get wins because they know they've paid a price for something. Those things are invaluable to your grandkids. And who's teaching them that? Who's teaching them that today? My grandpa was one of those guys. He was one of those guys who called me out. And the the thing that he did, and I'll share this a little bit later, but he told me these incredible stories of struggle and how God came through. Even in the midst of being on a destroyer, kind of in the Solomon Islands, when the Japanese were going to attack Midway, if you ever saw that movie, my grandfather was out there on one of those destroyers and in the Solomon Islands, and they were used as a decoy to draw in all those naval so the Japanese wouldn't know that the three carriers were on the other side of Midway, which really turned the war and ended up ending the war. And and I was just fascinated by my grandfather telling me that of what they had to endure and the hardships. And many of our children and our grandchildren, they don't know much about even how our country was formed. They don't know much about the Constitution or what people have gone through. If you want to teach your children about all that, so they can think and they can they can process. It's real. And that's why it's so important for you as a grandpa to be there, to tell stories, to tell them the truth about how life really is, so they can learn. And and I'm going to share this more later, but not only so they can learn, but they can learn this. Number one, you got their back as a grandpa. Oh man, your kids can do amazing things when they know they got grandpas, grandpas there. They need to be able to call you at any time, even in their worst moments. They need to be able to call you and give you advice and tell you what they think about you. It's a powerful, powerful thing. When you're in that place as a grandfather and as a grandma, not in the gay grandmas here, but when you're when you're in the story of your children, and you know, if you ever thought about the goal, what's the difference in the goal of most dads versus most grandfathers? You shoot it right there in the comments. What do you think their goals are? Well, when I was a dad, my goal was number one, I wanted my sons to make it the old life, but they're always breaking something or getting hurt or you know, all that kind of stuff. And so a lot of my goals for my children when I was a young father was performance. All about performance. Performance to even, you know, highlight me as a dad, you know, and and made a lot of fathering about me as a young dad. How about you? And what's the role of grandpa? Relationship. Relationship. Well, my grandkids just came over, they spent the whole day with us and spent the night with us, and they come running in. She's got a lot of toys for them. They just got new backpacks getting ready for school. And she's just amazing like that. And so if you, you know, if if you're complaining that grandma's buying too much stuff for grandkids, you got to know that's that's her payback of being a grandma. She gets so don't, you know, make some extra dough. My wife does all of her shopping at the the the Goodwill Boutique stores. I don't know if you have them in your area. There's actually stores that are called boutique stores. And you can only bring, they put all the good stuff that people that buy too much buy that still have the tag on them. The little thing, and so they go there and shop, and and it's about, you know, three cents on a dollar. You can get all kinds of great deals. And so, anyway, I'm I'm so grateful for those boutique stores. But, you know, and then they look for grandpa, and they're looking at me to see if I'm noticing them, playing with them. And my grandsons wanted to do trains with me today, because I have a train track thing I put in my garage for them. And and so they're looking, and when I'm smiling at them, man, they're running up to me and tackling me, and I have to actually turn sideways because if I don't, I'll be ruptured. As they put their head down and run right into me. That's happened to me before. I I had to learn to do that because it's it could be it could be devastating. Oh they're just amazing. And so they they want to know is grandpa happy today? Is he grumpy? Is he working? You know, what's going on? But ultimately, at the end of the day, deep inside of their amazing hearts, is grandpa, what do you think about me? Answer that question. Powerful, powerful question for your grandkids. So the second thing is think about hanging out with stories. One of the things I love about my grandpa was he told me stories, breakthroughs, and failures in his life. And and what it did is it gave me a roadmap in my own story. And to this day, I live out of those lessons I learned from my grandfather. How about you? How how you know what what are those stories that your grandfather told you? And maybe maybe you're you're sitting here thinking, well, I my my granddad wasn't in my life much. Well, guess what? You get to be in the life of your grandchildren. See, one of the great great things about the ministry we do at the Father Difference is that you're no longer limited by how good or bad your dad was. If you learn this incredible lesson that I learned in my own life, having lost my dad and my father, was that you know, God the Father promised right in 2 Corinthians 6, 18, and I'll be a father to you, and you will be my sons and daughters, says the Lord God Almighty. That God the Father Himself wants to be the father of your story, too. And when you learn to receive Him as the father of your story, the identity you need, the resources you need, the spiritual gifts you need, the supernatural power you need to do things, the vision, the life, the security, the identity that nobody can take away from you will be yours. And when you teach that to your children, it completely transforms how they see themselves. Because the truth is, these grandkids, you know, the Bible says they're a crown of the aged. And the glory of children is their fathers. I mean, it's it's it's an amazing thing the way God built family this way for grandfathers and fathers to work in unison, to speak life into this next generation. So tell them stories, the good ones and the bad ones, and use wisdom and in how you share the ones where you failed. So you don't have to, you know, be incredibly graphic, but you share it with them in ways where they they understand the struggle that you had to come up with, and how pain and rejection, or you know, the practice of sin in your life, or the places of brokenness, don't have to transfer into your adult life. That God the Father wants to change that story by his grace. Remember, I told you that grace last week is the empowering presence of God, enabling you to be who he's called you to be and to do what God has called you to do. And when we have God's grace, it changes everything so we can transcend our fathers, our grandfathers. Oh, there's one of my coaches in the Fatherhood Academy, Justin. Good to see amen to you too, brother. He is amazing, Dad. Amazing dad. Love him so much. So invest time hanging out with stories. They love your stories. And tell them. And you know, get used to embellishing it a little bit and creating the mood. You know, tell the story that you wish your dad maybe would have told you, or your grandpa maybe told you. Let them feel it, see it. Your grandkids' eyes just my grandkids' eyes just get huge. Granted, you did what? And so my my grandpa. She goes, tell the story about how your dad died at a thousand dollars an hour. I said, Well, it wasn't quite a thousand. I think it was like around three to four hundred. And so, you're just gonna tell this story. And the thing about the story about how my dad died is just before he died, he wrote a scripture. He read a scripture in the Bible about Peter walking on the sea. I mean, seeing Jesus walking on the sea, going up and down the waves and walking toward disciples during a storm while they were on the boat. And Peter saw that in little Anicus. And tell tell that part, Grandpa, where Jesus spoke to your dad. And it happened. The last word my dad heard was the word come. The Lord kind of showed that to me years later after I read his Bible and saw the word that he circled and read in that story, the very last scripture he read before his Fury 3 plane hit the Pacific Ocean southwest of Monterey, right across from Pebble Beach, California. And so tell me a story. And and then she said, She's so cute today. She said, and and grandpa. And so because you didn't have your dad, God became your father. I go, that's right. God became my papa. Tell me about how God's a father. Tell me. So I tell her about the things he's shown me and the way he's been in my life. And her eyes just lit up. Just lit up. And guess what? You got a good daddy now, too, but you get to have two daddies. Two daddies? Yeah, God wants to be your daddy too. Oh, she hugs me. I mean, one of the most powerful things you can you put in your grandchildren is to teach them that God not only is God called you as a grandpa to receive your own adoption as a son, but that God wants your grandchildren to receive their adoption as sons of daughters. And just imagine how bulletproof against the devil's schemes your grandchildren can be if they learn that the core of who they are is not being a scientist or an astronaut or this or that or a golfer or a football player or soccer player or whatever it's out there. Those are all roles. But imagine the difference you can make for them if you not only embrace this and modeled it to them, that your core identity, no matter how old you are, is that you're a son. And if a son, Galatians says then an heir. And if an heir, you're no longer a slave to sin, but if an heir, you're a son. Such incredible scripture. And that God has made you and I for that adoption. And not only that, so that we would teach our children to be adopted and our grandchildren be adopted. Well, here's the truth about that. From the moment your children have been born, or your grandchildren have been born, the devil has done everything he can to name your children by sin. He wants to put that moniker on them to where their core identity is their brokenness. And the best way to break the power of that for your grandchildren is to be that voice and that model of what it looks like to be a son who's a grandpa. And I gotta tell you, that's one of the most important roles of men ever. Whether you're a father or you're just, you know, haven't had any children yet, or you're a grandpa, is modeling this core identity of being a beloved, adopted son of a father who sent his son to die in your place so that you could be added to his family as a son. And as a son, receive the inheritance he has for you in Christ. When I learned that, as easy as that was to say that, that became that changed my family. And that changed me. I had to grow, I had to learn a lot about living life as a son, versus living life as a retired NFL football player with two titanium knees and aches and pains. And I love that God let me play in the role of being a football player. And I used it because, you know, God is it's like a lure. It's not the meal, but it it opens up conversations with men all the time. And I they go, you play football? Well, I when their eyes light up, then I just begin to share my story. And next thing we know, I got a new friend or somebody who's met Christ. Because the world's number one issue, the it's not about the number one pan pandemic in the world, it's always been this, has never changed, is fatherlessness. And it's that people don't know that God wants to be their father too. And so they're raised trying to navigate their pain and their rejection, thinking that if I can become famous enough, rich enough, beautiful enough, then people are gonna like me. And Facebook and Instagram and TikTok and X and all this is about being seen. And when you're seen, maybe then you'll be loved, maybe you'll be celebrated. All the the issues with men and women who get stuck into this, you know, this uh sexual identity struggle of where they're thinking that they've been born one way. Well, maybe if I become the opposite way, I will be celebrated, I'll be loved, I'll be somebody. They're searching for identity, you know, kind of like a little chick coming out of an egg, trying to figure out who they are. And there's not a dad, there's not a mom to help them discover that identity. And as a result, they struggle and they want to go from one experience to another, to another, to another, to another, to another, and it never ever changes. It's devastating. God's answer I will be a father to you, and you will be my sons and daughters, says the Lord God Almighty. Incredible scripture. And 2 Corinthians 6, verse 18. I love that verse. It changed my life when it hit me. It hit me that I I'm never gonna get my dad back who's killed in action. I'm never gonna be able to make my stepfather the perfect dad that I need. So, how is that mclaton gonna grow as a man without a father? God wants to be that father. How about you? Okay, next thing. You know, one of the things about sharing stories, I found this first, I thought I'd share it with you, is Psalm 78, 4 through 6. We will tell the next generation the praiseworthy deeds of the Lord. See that that verbal history throughout, you know, all through the Old Testament, the way life was transferred and truth was transferred, is they told stories. And they told these stories over and over and over and over again to their children. So the next generation would know them, even their children yet to be born. So share your God's stories, share them. They're really, really powerful. All right, next is talk to them about what you're learning from God's word. Oh boy, I I've I broke in this one. How many of you find read scripture and go, this will be perfect for this guy? I meet people all the time. I remember preaching sermons at church and people go, I'm gonna get this tape. That's how we started with tapes. For those of you of you that are young, we actually recorded two magnetic tapes. I know it's like back when the dinosaurs were roamed the earth. Then we got CDs, right? We burn them on CDs. And now digital. But I would have people would say, thank you, Pastor. Oh, what a powerful word. This is perfect for my cousin. And I look at them and and sometimes I go, Well, what'd you learn? Oh, I I knew all this. Great. I I should have probably had you just preach, right? And see, part of that is you know, the the way to block your kids kind of out of reading God's word is that if they learn to hear it through you confronting them when they're blowing it in sin. And it's not that you never share those kind of scriptures, but the the idea is that your children, we need permission to really be that direct with them. And so what you do when they're not coming to you and and you You know they're struggling. How many know your grandkids are struggling? So how do you you help them? Well, you talk about what you're learning. You know, it says there in Deuteronomy, teach them to your children and to their children after them. See, your your voice and you talking about what God's doing in your life can go from generation to generation. And what's more powerful than that? What's more powerful than you learn and and to be able to say, you know, my grandfather taught me this from God's word. And it's like a it's it's like a cornerstone in the foundation. It just sets the house. It's really, really powerful. And so here's another one. I I started sharing this last week. We're running out of time and might have had even some technical difficulties. But this is a really powerful nuance that I started to learn as my my grandchildren got a little older. But it's celebrate your grandkids by introducing them to your friends. Your kids will know that you're in when you celebrate them in front of your best friend. And so you you you you introduce them. And you know, my granddad would take me to to meet men and leaders of great stature. I mean, I've met, you know, I've met all these, you know, brigadier generals, I've met the Marines, I've met, you know, you know, all these people, great admirals, great leaders. My grandfather even introduced me to Roger Stahlback. Now, if you're an old fart like me, you know exactly who Roger Stahlback is. And Dallas Cowboys, you know, end up going to the military, would throw the ball on, you know, such a great quarterback in college, he would throw the ball on ships and you know, he on aircraft carriers. It was reported that he would, you know, keep practicing throwing the ball. So when he was finished his military duty, he ended up going to the NFL. So he didn't go right from college to the NFL. He went to service first. Anyway, my grandfather got Roger at the Naval Academy to to help out with our with the Naval Academy Pee Wee football team that was part of the other Pee-Wee League out there. It wasn't a a Navy thing, but you know, kids and grandkids. So I was I was his team. He throwed me how to throw the football. And I'll never forget what he showed me, and which helped me as a center in the NFL. I ended up snapping for, you know, punts and you know, doing all kinds of things. I wanted to be a quarterback, but I ate my way to be an offensive lineman. And so I ended up blocking for quarterbacks, which was a great privilege. But so I was I my very first you know team, I got to play quarterback on the first play for the Pee-Wee football team for the Naval Academy. I mean, and here's Roger Stallback. Just I idolized this guy, such a great football player. He was my coach. And I was on a kickoff team, I got the ball, and I ran all the way back for Testdown. Yes, you're truly, you're going, no, that's impossible. No, it was, and I wasn't the same size I am now. I was pretty fat. And I go back to the sidelines, and Roger's got his arms crossed like this, and he looks down at me and he goes, Pretty impressive, they're Eddie Mac. That's what he called me. Call me Eddie Mac. And I said, Thanks, coach. And it was flag football. And he says, But on my team, son, we don't tie our flags in the knot on our belt loop so they can't pull them out. I cheated. He busted me. And he looked at me and he goes, Now go over to the referee and turn yourself in. What a lesson I learned. I walked over there and I said, I cheated. I tied my flag. 15-yard penalty. They brought my touchdown all the way back. What a moment. What a moment. Getting to meet him. Meeting him late years later. We reconnected after a strongman competition where I got to actually, you know, you know, get to set the NFL bench press record for a season of 605 pounds. I'll share about that some other time. But my grandpa let me in to his circles of great influence. Men that changed his life. Men that could change my life. And so what I did was I began to do that with my children. I began to open up doors for my kids so that they could they could have the same thing that I learned. Because nobody gets there by themselves. And you know, many, many kids today, my granddad would would take me out, and I'll just share this, to meet these men and leaders of great stature. And they were I met Halsey. I met all these amazing, you know, admirals and rough and tough Marine Corps people. And it was they were amazing. And he would look at me and I would introduce me, and he taught me to look them eye to eye, put out my hand, and give them a firm handshake, the best I could at a little kid, and shake their hands. And and yet today I see many kids. I meet them. Dads will be there, and oh, here's my son, you know. And I look at him and he's kind of hiding and he's listless. He doesn't look you in the eye. And so it could be really shy, and some kids are that way, but uh that usually happens now. Hear me when I say this, more with kids whose dads don't push them so they can get wins and get confidence. Your grandsons and your granddaughters, they you know, the confidence comes when they when they struggle and they end up breaking through. It's like you know there's two ways to get pearls, you know. Oysters you know, a grain of sand, they they they keep coating that irritant in them and it turns into a pearl. It's a struggle. And when we just when kids get everything, they never get a win. But you know, a little did I know that my my stepdad, you know, when he you know told me we couldn't afford it, he says, Why don't you go get a paper route? I used to have one someone I was your age. I ended up buying all my stuff. I went, really? That's awesome. Oh, one of my one of the best artists I know in the world. Jordan Christian Art is in the house. If if you've never seen his work, beautiful, contemporary, amazing, dad, you know, married a beauty, great artist, Jordan Christian Art. He's my buddy. We gotta connect, brother. I gotta show you some of my paintings. So, anyway, Jordan is amazing. So good to see you, Mark. Good to see uh Mr. Berg and John, and there's just uh too many to list on all the platforms, but I'm so grateful that you're here. And so when you help your children discover who God called them to be, but let them get a win so you can celebrate it. So important. I mean it I mean some some places and some little league teams get give sometimes they give every kid a trophy for participation. But that doesn't mean anything. Right? Right, Jordan? If you you got a a piece of art that you're doing and and somebody goes, oh, nice art, but they never buy it, there's no win there. But when you sell it and they you help them hang it on their wall, that's that's amazing. And the same with our children. So where are the places that your kids need went? Where you don't just make it happen for them, but you set them up with everything that they need to really help them. And and one of the things that I did I've done for my kids is taught them how to seek out great mentors. And when they seek out great, I go find people who you admire that are way ahead of you in something that they do and you want to learn from them. And go up to them and say, you know, would you be willing to meet with me and teach me some of the things that you've learned? I when young people come up to me and ask me that, I'm the answer is always yes. And I have friends who are like really busy, really successful businessmen who've had to struggle and learn things. And when a young person comes up to them and says, Teach me, they're all in. And when their grandkids come up to them and go, Grandpa, would you teach me how to do what you do? They are all in. And so you create that environment to where they know they can come to you and ask you anytime about the things that that you do, and it's and it's a powerful, powerful thing. And you know, I I I was with uh a family recently, you know, great family. I was watching the dad on the beach uh with his son, and he eventually played prayed uh played with him, but he couldn't throw the ball. And I I could tell that I think this dad was, you know, might not be full-time with his son, and this was a weekend that he had with his son, and that dad was quick to have another buddy there, and they're throwing the football and playing football, and the son was just there when he tried to throw the ball, it just went sideways. And I watched his dad, I was really proud of him. I watched him and he realized that he never taught his son how to throw football. So I went over to him and kept teaching him and was patient. Then that little boy started throwing the ball to the waves, and the waves would shoot it back when dad got tired and he did it over and over and over and over and over again. What are you teaching your kids? What are they getting away? Powerful stuff. Powerful stuff. Standing a gap in prayer. We I I my assumption is that you do this. But just what I've what I've learned about this is that I I pray, I try to pray out loud every week intently for my children and my grandchildren, my sons and daughters, spouses, my wife. There's something that happens when you get the worry out of you and you turn it into prayer. It's a powerful way to see the change in the life of your children and your grandchildren. Maybe your your kids are distant or they've cut you off and you're trying to reach it. We we do a lot of work in our academy to help restore grandparents with sons and daughters and grandchildren. A lot of hurt going on right now with families because some of the modern, you know, psychology has you know ached out in the church. Family, and there our kids are being taught to create boundaries around their parents and grandparents so that they don't feel confronted at all. Well, what kind of life is that? You don't make diamonds by having no pressure. Diamonds are made by great pressure. We just gotta be with them. So they they feel covered and loved and prayed for. And and I think this my last is it's here's the kind of the steps and uh easy way to just remember this is bless daily, you know, love them, call them out, listen actively, be present, share stories, tell them of God's faithfulness, that'll build their faith, pray together, cover them in prayer, get them to pray with you, teach them how to pray, and then step in finally when invited. When invited. And so it's really, really important that you do that. All that to say, it's time to I I actually got a whole other group in their Father Academy. I'm getting ready to start a live stream for, but before I go, I'm gonna pray with you. And so if you got a prayer request, I would love to hear about it. You can connect with me online if you're if you're needing to connect with me. I would love to you can go to my website at the Father Difference. There's a free book offer there, a difference the father makes. It's right now in 233 countries. There's a number of resources, there's a link to our fatherhood academy. We're re-releasing everything here this fall to make it the place where you can really learn how to be the best father and dad you can be, and grandpa and grandpa. If you want to want a free book, that's on the website as well. And we have a free daily devotional that goes out that you can sign up for if you go to my website. All that, so you got all that stuff, that's for you. So let's pray. Father, I thank you so much for my friends that have joined me. I pray you would bless them. I pray you would bless all these men and a few gals that have come in here as well and on all the platforms. I pray, Lord, that you would use them in powerful ways in the life of their children and if they have grandkids and the grandkids. And I pray for every dad who's been separated from his kids, I pray you would restore that as well in powerful ways. And ask you to bless them. It's a matchless in the mighty name of Jesus. And all God's men said, Amen. So good to be with you. We'll be back here next week. Check out this little video, this outro, and I got a bounce, I got another show to do, and I'm so grateful that you're here. I love you. I'm praying for you. Big Ed is breaking the huddle.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:34

Ready, break, dear friends. Imagine a world where every father feels equipped to lead with faith, love, and purpose. A world where families thrive and communities grow stronger because of devoted Christ-centered fathers.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:50

You know, beloved, that is the vision that God put in my heart for every single family. You know, he is on the middle of the idolity. Before the great incoming day, the Lord He's gonna do something for Father. He's gonna kind of heart and father killed.