While studying for my Mothers’ Day article, I found this information about fathers from 2000. I know that is almost 25 years ago, but I think these facts are probably about the same or maybe even worse!

1. In America, an estimated 24.7 million children live absent from their biological fathers.
2. There are about 1.25 million living with their single mothers. That is 25 percent!
3. About 1.25 million of all babies are out of wedlock. That is 37 percent!
4. Today nearly 40 percent of all first marriages end in divorce; and more than 1 million children each year experience the divorce of parents.
5. One out of every six children is a stepchild.
6. There are nearly 1.9 million single fathers with children under 18.
7. Four of every ten cohabiting couples have children in the home. Of children born to cohabiting couples, only 40 percent will see their parents every marry. Cohabiting couples who marry have a 95 percent divorce rate during the first five years of marriage.
8. Over 26 percent of absent fathers live in a different state from their children.
9. Over 40 percent of children who live in fatherless households have not seen their fathers in at least one year, while 50 percent have never stepped foot in their father’s home.
10. Children who live absent from their biological fathers, on average, are more likely to be poor, experience educational, health, emotional, and psychological problems, be victims of child abuse, and engage in criminal behavior than their peers who live with their married biological parents.

If these facts are true and I believe they are this bad or worse, it is time for men to “get a grip” on manhood and begin living like real men!

1. We need to “get a grip” on truth! Most men are not honest. I meet very few men who possess genuine integrity. Once a man told me about another man. “He had rather climb a tree to tell a lie than stand on the ground and he truthful!” Real men are willing to stand up and take the full consequences of their actions, especially when they are wrong. One man told me he liked the teaching of the Koran for it allowed him to lie in any of these situations. (1) when it would give him an advantage over his enemies; (2) when it would get him out of trouble; and/or (3) when it involved his wife! I continue believing real men stand tall and tell the truth 100 percent of the time!

2. We need men to “get a grip” on right. Not the popular, not what everyone else is doing, but men should seek to know the right and have the backbone to do right even when wrong would feel better! True men are self-disciplined. It is the immature boys who are always needing someone to keep them on the right pathways. Men, let boys be boys, but let us be men who stand for the right!

3. We need men to “get a grip” or becoming teachable. No man knows it all! A man’s man will always listen to instructions and/or advice. He will gather as much information on the subject as possible before he makes any decision. He will weigh a matter until he understands the ramifications of that matter before he acts. And men are people of action, not reaction!

4. We need men to “get a grip” on perseverance. Almost anyone can start a project, but a man will stick with the life problem until it is solved. Often, a man of perseverance will have to be a man of compassion, because men do not steam roll over those who are weaker than they are. There are man tests in life after school is over, and men will always strive to excel to maturity.

5. We need men to “get a grip” on eternity. Every child we “seed” comes with an “unexpirable” tag on its toe! Your child will live FOREVER! You have started them on a journey that will never truly end! One day, every father’s child will face a Righteous Judge Who will pronounce their just reward. As Dads, we need to understand that forever our child will curse us for the ungodly influences we had upon their natural lives or they will thank us for the external blessings an love to us for helping them make the right choice, which resulted in them knowing Christ as their personal Savior!

Happy Fathers’ Day, and may we strive to be men in a world filled with boys who have never grown up – who have never gotten a “grip” on truth, right; becoming teachable. perseverance or eternity! Only men can change the “facts” I found during my studies – together let’s become the Godly Men we have been created to be!