Participants: Xavier Morales (Host), Gordon Fraser, Denry White
Series Code: AFH
Program Code: AFH000005A
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00:01 A good father takes time to play
00:04 He has strong integrity 00:07 He is someone that is truly dedicated 00:12 He's not afraid to show his love 00:15 He is a caring provider 00:20 And, he is a kind spiritual leader 00:22 These are just a few ways to describe a father's heart 00:30 Hi, welcome to A Father's Heart. My name is Xavier 00:32 Today we'll be talking about baby momma. 00:35 She's going to be in your life forever and it's okay. 00:38 Every father is in different situations, different instances 00:41 a lot of times nowadays, unfortunately, we do have a lot 00:45 of baby mommas and we do have a lot of baby daddies. 00:48 But a lot of times the daddies are not okay with baby mommas 00:52 So today to talk about this with me today is Gordon and Denry 00:56 How you guys doing? Pretty good man, really good 00:59 Good. Baby mommas. I know a little bit about you guys 01:04 And I know you don't have baby mommas. I mean you do, 01:07 but you're married to them. hahahaha, yeah 01:11 You know me myself, I do have a four year old 01:13 from a previous marriage and baby mommas we know can be 01:19 difficult because there's a friction, a break 01:23 the bond is gone. Some people don't even have the marriage 01:27 to look back on. They just have a baby momma 01:31 And I want to talk a little bit about the interaction because 01:34 for me, it took me a while. It took a lot of prayer 01:38 and not because the person, the mother of my child is bad 01:41 but because I chose the wrong person. However, I still have to 01:46 show respect to her as the mother of my child 01:48 In that time too you have the element of child exhibiting 01:54 traits from the mother which initially frustrated you in the 01:56 first place. So you know those elements come into play for me 02:00 I know it took a lot of prayer, it took counseling, it took 02:03 you know I had a big system of support to be able to overcome 02:08 and respect her because either way she's going to be in my 02:11 child's life forever. And either I step in to be a father 02:16 or I step out all the way and that's not an option 02:18 So what do you guys think about that? 02:21 You know one thing I'm learnin is words. I have a difficult 02:24 time with words. Sometimes from my background, how I interpret 02:29 words and I see how words have so much meaning. 02:33 And even when we look at the history of the words baby mother 02:39 it comes with a negative connotation. 02:42 You know it's usually baby mother drama, comes from our 02:46 urban societies where it's one of those words that you take 02:51 it's a negative words but you try to put a positive light 02:55 to it. And so rather than referring to the mother of our 03:00 children as baby mothers because it has that negativity 03:04 refer to them as they are, the mother of my child 03:08 What's wrong with that. And that also gives us psychologically 03:13 hey, there's a reverence and respect that she gets. 03:18 Even if she's problematic there's reverence and respect 03:25 she gets because she's the mother of my child 03:29 Even if she's problematic as you say that isn't the child's fault 03:38 And we should keep the children out of the, I think you 03:46 at one point in time you were in love, whatever it is that 03:51 you call it. At one point in time you felt some kind of way 03:54 you chose to have this child together or maybe you didn't but 04:00 it just happened or whatever the situation is 04:03 but the fact of the matter is if you're having difficulties 04:07 or drama whatever you want to call it, yes that mother is 04:10 going to be in the child's life. 04:12 Forever. So that father and that mother need to get along 04:21 together for the benefit of the child and I think that is where 04:25 we adults, you've grown, you're grown already, done your thing 04:32 give your child a chance to have some semblance of wholeness 04:37 where the mother and father even if you're not in the same home 04:42 together I think that child needs to have some semblance 04:45 of wholeness - to be whole. Yes it's true. I think my wife 04:48 now, she told me to pray for her to pray for my ex-wife. Listen 04:54 I'm not gonna lie, it was hard It was hard. Jesus you know 04:59 says love your enemies. I was like God you know I can love 05:03 these enemies, but not this one. You know it's because of that 05:08 emotion, that friction, that anger and God kept reminding me 05:14 it's not about you, it's about your little one. 05:17 And when I thought about what God revealed to me, 05:19 just the fact that I had to man up, I had to man up 05:24 just like he told Paul, my grace is sufficient for you 05:27 man up. You know a lot of times we find these excuses not to be 05:30 part of the child's life because we can't get along with mother 05:34 and we lead this child astray. We are cannibal, we are cannibal 05:39 so for me it was like you had to man up, I had to man up 05:43 and be in the life of my child and find a way to have what they 05:47 call co-parental relationship with the baby's mother. 05:50 With my child's mother. So how do we, I mean what about 05:53 have you guys anything, I know you work in the church, have you 05:56 seen anybody like that, you know in a relationship, how do you 05:59 how do they even begin to have a relationship with the mother 06:03 where it's just a co-parental relationship? 06:06 You're saying the word man up. And I think society has 06:12 misunderstood what that term means. Man up means we think 06:17 don't cry, that's not manly like No, no. Man up means take 06:22 responsibility. Own up to your responsibility. This is your 06:28 child. Invest in your child's life. And there's a word 06:33 that we hear a lot and I think the word breaks down the psyche 06:38 of our children. You were a mistake. Or even if we don't 06:44 necessarily say it but because how the father and the mother 06:50 act towards each other, they can't stand each other, the 06:54 argument constantly, the drama. It says to the child, man 06:59 maybe if I wasn't here, mom and dad would've been better. 07:03 And especially if the child hears before you were here 07:07 he used to take me out, he used to do these things for me 07:12 So in the child's mind, it's oh I was a mistake 07:18 I wasn't meant to be. 07:21 See the crazy but wonderful thing about God is He takes 07:24 what we consider mistakes 07:29 He takes our mess and brings a messiah out of it. 07:33 So all of us now have a message. Now you look at Solomon, you 07:36 could say Solomon was a mistake. David and Bathsheba were not 07:40 supposed to be together. So Solomon if you want to say 07:44 is a mistake but look at Solomon the wisest man and look at his 07:47 lineage. Who comes on the scene? 07:49 The Messiah. And now we have a message to all the fathers and 07:53 everyone, yes you may think you made a mistake 07:57 but God takes our mess and when you put it in His hand 08:04 No child is a mistake. No child. Absolutely not. 08:08 Even is the parents are not getting along that child should 08:12 never feel that they're in the middle of it and they're 08:17 the problem. The child should never be made to feel that way. 08:21 That's why the parents need to work on their issues and leave 08:25 the child out of it because this becomes even more complicated 08:29 because you're married, you divorce and there's a child 08:34 and now that woman gets married to someone else, so here's a 08:42 you get married to someone else and if that mother don't want 08:46 you to see your child that gets even more complicated 08:50 how do you keep the child out of all of that? 08:54 And still be able to make that child feel secure and to be able 09:00 to go on with life. I think that's how difficult it is 09:03 and we need to be able to manage that and one of the things 09:05 I think that we can do is be respectful of each other 09:09 as parents, we have to respect the fact that we have a child 09:14 let's deal with the issue. A lot of times we don't deal 09:17 with the issue, we want to deal with everything else, we want to 09:21 put the children in the middle. But if the issue is 09:25 spending time, child support whatever it is, 09:27 deal with that issue and not argue about all kinds of 09:32 other things. Put your emotions away, put your feelings aside 09:35 and just do what's right for the benefit of the child 09:38 That's what gets me. It gets me because children always 09:43 get the short end of it and we adults, you know you've 09:47 already made a mess of your life, give the children a chance 09:51 It's important because I know as a parent for me that was 09:55 really tough when I was in seminary and my daughter 10:00 I was really depressed at home and really depressed 10:03 like I didn't want to live any more even though I had Christ 10:06 in my life, even though I'm walking with Him 10:08 just I hit a pitfall, I was at the bottom of the well 10:13 my well was dry and I contemplated taking my life 10:18 and you know what God did. I had a picture of my daughter 10:22 on the wall and I looked at her and He said if you don't want to 10:25 live for me or for yourself, at least live for her. 10:28 I was like, Wow, wow! 10:32 It was quick. I just get emotional just thinking about it 10:35 it's like sometimes we are so selfish, we wanna be right, 10:40 we want to battle against the other parent, we wanna be 10:42 you're wrong, no you're wrong who cares? who cares? 10:46 It's your child, an innocent human being who's caught in the 10:50 middle, who needs to be loved and cherished, and you know 10:55 let's go beyond that. What about I know a lot of parents that are 10:59 never gotten married and they you know they commercialize 11:03 these things into entertainment hey let's entertain the fact 11:09 you're not there, let me go get DNA tested and everything 11:11 because you're not the baby's father, you're not the baby's 11:13 blah blah blah. But what about those that do know that they are 11:16 the baby's father but they use the excuse I'm not married 11:19 to her, I've never been and I pay my child support on time 11:25 How do we tell them as ministers how do we tell them how to cope 11:31 with the mother of the child because you know she's gonna be 11:34 tch tch tch a lot of times, or he might be tch tch tch 11:38 a lot of times. How do we tell them, you know, to just be quiet 11:41 and focus on your child and respect the mother of your child 11:45 as the mother. How do we? That father needs to have a 11:49 connection with the Heavenly Father and understand the 11:52 Heavenly Father's heart. Once they have that kinda connection 11:56 then they can relate, no matter what darts come their way. 12:01 they can deflect it to Jesus and deal with their child 12:10 see because when we, we are emotional beings and when we're 12:14 attacked we want to retaliate but the father needs to say no 12:18 for the benefit of my child I can't retaliate. This is about 12:25 the child, it's not about me. 12:29 Throw all the darts you want at me but leave the children 12:34 out of it. I think that's what that father needs to do. 12:38 Be able to, throw those darts at me but when it comes your way 12:42 say Jesus, here it's yours. I'm going to be there for my child 12:47 It's more than just child support. It's more than that. 12:52 10, 20 dollars whatever it is it's not going to make a 12:55 difference to that child's life. What makes the difference is 12:57 you being there for the child, spending time, as much time as 13:02 you can with the child. Now it becomes difficult when the 13:07 mother or father whoever has custody don't want you to spend 13:11 time with the child. It becomes very difficult. But if you don't 13:15 have that problem then spend as much time as you can 13:18 with the child, I think that helps. 13:21 Now Ephesians talks about how the Father's love and if you 13:26 notice it's talking about, the last 4 chapters your know 13:29 husbands love your wives, then it says fathers, you know, 13:35 raise your children in a loving Christ's way, it's speaking to 13:39 fathers and when you look at God's relationship with us 13:46 now I'm not trying to be theological here, but let's look 13:50 for a second at God created the world, perfect. Perfect world 13:56 There was nothing wrong with it. No sin, no pollution no bad word 14:00 no nothing. We chose. We always say if I was there, come on man 14:08 let's be honest. Some of us would've made pies out of that 14:11 fruit, whatever fruit that was on the tree, sell it, market it 14:15 whatever. But we made the mistake but look what God did. 14:20 He steps in, He takes full responsibility. 14:27 He takes full responsibility. I think we forget John 3:16 14:31 We look at the part where He sent His son, but God So Loved 14:36 the world, the Father loved the world so much that He gave 14:44 His Son and that word means dispose of, to our disposal 14:50 because He loved us so much He gave His Son 14:53 so that we can live. God took, you talked about man up, God 14:57 manned up, or God up, whatever in this case and took full 15:02 responsibility for our actions. And so fathers whatever you may 15:10 think about the lady, you can even save her life her salvation 15:17 by how you demonstrate the love of God towards your child. 15:20 That love is unconditional. No strings attached. 15:24 No strings attached. That's the type of love I think fathers 15:27 we need to have, testify. Yeah man that's unconditional. So 15:31 no matter you throw this at me, you throw that at me 15:34 you can talk about me as much as you want, I'm still gonna 15:39 gonna love that child and guess what I'm still gonna love you. 15:43 Yes. Just lookin at the Bible itself because a lot of people 15:46 take the Bible and discard it as a fairy tale or stories and I 15:52 found comfort in the story of Jesus not because of His life 15:57 itself. If most people don't read the Bible they don't 16:01 understand the fact that Jesus had older brothers which goes 16:04 to show that Joseph had a previous marriage 16:06 whether he was divorced, whether she passed away, nobody knows 16:09 that's fine, that's not the point. Point is that Jesus 16:12 Himself did not come from a perfect background. 16:14 Now if I place myself in Joseph's shoes, you know 16:19 hey, by the way, this is the Holy Spirit, I got your girl 16:22 pregnant and you gotta raise this child, you guys. 16:26 Raise Him right, He's gonna be the Savior of the world 16:30 Now I know you guys are going to get married you aint married yet 16:32 but just to let you know she's pregnant. And Joseph, I mean 16:35 I'd be freakin out, like what's going on? Yeah, what? huh? 16:39 And I understand he wanted to put her away you know 16:43 out of his righteousness he wanted to put her away and 16:45 but instead the angel came and told him, hey don't do that. 16:49 He's the Savior of the world and He's going to be named Jesus 16:52 And to me, I'm like, even Jesus did not come from a perfect 16:56 ideal family and what if Jesus didn't even look like Joseph? 17:02 you know questions and murmuring but the point is that Jesus 17:05 came from an imperfect family as a perfect Savior. 17:11 Did you ever think about, just going with you, Joseph 17:15 whatever kind of diapers they had back then 17:18 Joseph changed God's diapers? 17:21 Did you ever think about that? Remember how the context 17:24 at first when he heard Mary was pregnant, first of all who would 17:28 believe this? And then to say on top of it's from the Holy Spirit 17:32 Whatever interpretation of how you view it but it just doesn't 17:36 make sense in human nature. How is this possible in human nature 17:40 whether he did we don't know but because he heard it was 17:46 from God he said ok. But look even before when he found she 17:52 was pregnant it says, in respect for her he was going to do it 17:56 quietly. He was going to divorce her quietly 17:58 He still had respect for her. 18:02 We can learn a lot from Joseph. Then when Jesus comes he takes 18:08 Jesus as his son, think about it When Jesus took His first steps 18:13 when God took His first steps on earth as human, Joseph was there 18:20 When God fell for the first time he fell, whatever, Joseph was 18:26 probably I can imagine Joseph being a father, come here son 18:30 when the older ones were bullyin him or whatever, come here son 18:34 so even if this was outside of Joseph's box, Joseph took the 18:40 responsibility. You know we hear a lot about Mary but we don't 18:44 really realize that Joseph took care of God when He was a baby 18:51 And taught Him how to be a man 18:53 Wow! That is such a good picture of what a father should be like 19:00 But let's talk about what prevents us from being like that 19:05 I think what we're dealing with is when there's that separation 19:10 there's anger in both parties 19:15 so you have to get over that anger first. 19:17 Before you can relate to the child. And I love the thing 19:22 I love the text the Bible says Heap coals of fire on the head 19:26 by love, do kind things. If you are in that type of relationship 19:32 when God is working with you and you're dealing with God 19:34 and God is telling, you've got to love this person you have 19:39 to love this person. So you do nice things. You do kind things 19:43 that person will give you the right to be in your child's life 19:51 because you will have no friction. It takes 2 to fight. 19:55 You gonna fight but I'm not gonna fight with you. 19:57 I'm not going to retaliate. I'm just going to love you. 20:01 I think that makes a difference. That's unconditional love 20:04 that we talked about in the whole context of baby momma 20:08 situation. It would make a huge difference in life. 20:12 But we just don't love. We're all so tied up with ourselves 20:15 and you know we all want to fight, we just want to fight 20:19 with each other instead of loving each other. 20:21 And love will conquer a multitude of stuff. 20:24 At times you know people get divorced. 20:28 Fathers think if they divorce the wife, they divorce the 20:30 the children. You don't divorce your children. 20:32 And even the ones we hate to talk about it what is reality 20:36 even the ones that never got married but had children 20:39 they just kind of fade away, you know it's not right. You wanna 20:42 be sure you do things according you're married and then you 20:44 have kids but the reality is we don't see that today. 20:47 And even though we try to be politically correct the reality 20:52 is it happens and they still need to step up. 20:54 They still need to step up even if ideally it should be 20:58 that they marry the mother. 21:00 But even if that never happens at least have the dignity 21:04 and self-respect to be there for your child 21:08 At the end of it all is an innocent life at stake 21:13 and we are literally, as men of God, we are literally held 21:18 accountable as priests in the home, as the ones that take 21:21 like the Old Testament, we take the sacrificial lamb. We are 21:25 held accountable for our family for our children 21:28 for their wellbeing. We need to start stepping up regardless 21:32 of whether we get along with the mother or not. 21:35 You know we like to say we're Christians and we follow Christ 21:41 but sometimes are you willing to do everything Christ did? 21:44 What did Christ refer to Himself what kinda food did Christ refer 21:47 to Himself as? The Bread of Life 21:50 And what happens to bread? It becomes consumed. 21:57 When you're compassionate and God was driven by compassion 22:01 you make yourself available to be consumed 22:06 As a father it's not just paying child support 22:11 That's just beating the quotum, just the minimum 22:15 It's being consumed. Allowing yourself, especially if you are 22:20 a father where you and the wife are separate or whatever 22:23 or your ex is separate or the mother of your child is separate 22:28 especially in that case. 22:30 You are to be consumed more now because there is not the 22:36 Biblical foundation of the husband and the wife 22:40 so you're not 24 hours in the child's life. 22:44 whether it's every other weekend or every weekend 22:47 when you are with this child, you are to be consumed 22:52 by this child and even the baby mother 22:55 excuse me, the mother of the child. Mother of your child. 23:01 To be consumed, make yourself available and say here I am 23:05 how can I serve in a righteous way today? 23:08 How can I minister to you? If fathers see what they do 23:12 as ministry, cause that's the thing too, talking about 23:16 as pastors, we see pastoring as ministry 23:21 but as being parents we see what we do as labor, that's our labor 23:26 No, it's a ministry too. Their soul is in jeopardy without you 23:31 ministering to them. So ministering to our children 23:35 and to the mothers of our children 23:38 and the children, most of the time the children when they're 23:41 caught in the middle of the mess, most of the times 23:47 they end up being unproductive in society 23:53 and we have to be careful with that. We want our children 23:58 to be productive. We want them to be as whole as they can 24:03 because let's be real we live in a sinful world and because 24:07 all of us have sinned and come short of the glory of God 24:11 we need to make sure as best we can to keep our children 24:19 so that they will not become into pieces or just a mess 24:27 because of our situation. My question then to you 24:32 I'm just inquisitive, how did you deal with your situation 24:37 keeping your daughter out of it, how did you deal with it? 24:42 What are some of the things you did? 24:44 I exercised a lot to relieve that stress but honestly 24:48 I prayed. Like my wife now she says, pray for her and everythin 24:52 because in all honesty the child's mother also needs to 24:56 allow the child's father to interact with the child. Yes 24:59 So that's why prayer is important. To me it was 25:01 important not because out of self-righteousness 25:03 but because it was about me forgiving her. 25:07 And as far as her being able to be influenced by God to 25:11 let me see my child. And I fought for it, I went to court 25:14 and I fought for her. I fought for my daughter. 25:17 I cried, it was hard. I wanted to give up countless times 25:21 but because it was my child, nothing would stand between me 25:27 and my child. And that's the thing you ought to understand 25:30 praying about the other person is as much about you healing 25:34 as God healing the other person 25:36 and being able to have a co-parental relationship 25:39 in which you can see the child because right now there's a lot 25:42 of people that are going through this and are silent about it. 25:46 They have gone through this but are silent about it. 25:48 We need to remove the taboo label and talk about it. 25:51 Fix it, work on it and get parents to work together to 25:55 be there for the child. 25:57 So prayer is an important component is what you're saying? 25:59 Very much. We've got to as parents, husbands, wives pray 26:05 about every issue even when we're not together. 26:09 And not only pray but do some thing about because we can 26:14 pray but if we don't make some kind of positive move to show 26:19 love, what it is to fight for your child, I mean fight for 26:23 that relationship. I know a lot of folks that are going 26:27 through a similar situation but some of them have just given up 26:34 They've just given up, so the child suffers. 26:36 I just want to thank my biological dad 26:41 I just want to thank him. I wanted more, didn't get more 26:46 but I'll never forget, well they told me about it 26:50 and my mother shared it to me again recently 26:53 that there was a time when I was about 2-3 years old 26:57 I was about to die, she called on him and he rushed me to 27:03 emergency room. So just want to say Thank You dad. 27:07 from the bottom of my heart that you were there 27:12 even if it was just that, you were there. 27:15 And this is awesome. We can keep going on and on 27:20 but we ran out of time. So if you have any questions 27:24 and I know that you do, email us at AFH@3ABN.org 27:29 Again, AFH@3ABN.org 27:31 with your questions or comments and we'll address them as 27:34 we possibly can. Again, be there for your children 27:38 fight for your children. Yes, the mother of your child is 27:41 going to be there. Respect her as best you can, if you can't 27:44 get on your knees and respect your Maker. He will help you 27:47 respect her. Pray for your children, be there for your 27:50 children, fight like your life depends on it. Even if yours 27:54 doesn't theirs does. So man up. And be there for your child 27:59 Thank you for watching. |
Revised 2017-01-03