It's not easy being a father these days. Many pressures compete for our time and try to pull us away from that crucial responsibility. Ken Canfield, president of the National Center for Fathering, cites a telling story in his book The Heart of a Father:

"When Don called home from the road one evening, he spoke briefly to his nine-year-old daughter: 'Honey, could you get your mommy on the phone?' He then heard Tasha blurt out, as she set the receiver down on the counter: 'Hey mom, the invisible man is on the phone!'

"In that moment, even before his wife got on the phone, Don went through a transformation. He couldn't laugh it off. He had to face the fact: There's something more important than achieving success at work. It's being a dad" (1996, inside front cover).

Increasingly, more families are struggling to make a go of it without a father present. Being fatherless doesn't necessarily mean losing a father through death or divorce. "In a 1994 survey of more than 1,600 adult men, more than 50 percent said their fathers were emotionally absent for them growing up. That may help explain why in another survey only 34 percent of adult males could say that they considered their fathers to be a role model" (p. 18).

Children want to feel safe and secure in their family. Ideally, children with both parents feel safe as they watch positive interactions between their parents. If children don't hear voices raised in anger, or sarcastic insults between their parents, they inherit the blessings of calmness and security and will likely pass these values to their children.

Parents are role models for their children. Children do what they see their parents do. Thoughtful parents take care to not cripple their children's futures by being immature, selfish role models.

Being an ideal parental role model doesn't come about naturally. Becoming a good father or mother takes attentive work, sensitivity, selflessness and hands-on involvement with children. There are no elevators to parental success; all parents must take the stairs.

The Father Knows Best era on TV

The popular 1950s-60s family TV show Father Knows Best showed the ideal American family in those heady days after World War II. American families had separated during the war, and not by personal choice. For many families, Dad went to war and Mom went to work in a factory.

The family would never be the same again. Although the role models of the Father Knows Best TV series were a good thing, the show depicted perfect people. This, some believe, set the bar too high and seemed unrealistic for the average family. The show's father and mother offered sage advice to their children. Father never raised his voice, lost patience or did stupid things to embarrass himself or his family. The show's mother helped reconcile problems, a credit to the media of that day.

What a contrast to today. "Ward and June Cleaver [of the similar TV series Leave It to Beaver] and their ideal neighborhood of the fifties seem to be a nostalgic relic. Dramatic changes in lifestyle and culture have revolutionized the structure of the traditional American family. According to one expert, more than 40 percent of American adults have no weekly contact with children" (ibid., p. 18).

The American family was changed enormously by the demands of World War II. Families were subjected to life-changing forces beyond their control: shortage of housing, a lack of good schools and child-care facilities, and, perhaps most importantly, a wearing and prolonged separation from loved ones.

Many "war widows" ran their homes and reared their children alone. Older married women went to work in a variety of war industries; the country needed them. The divorce rate suddenly surged upward. Juvenile delinquency, unwed pregnancy and truancy all rose and many children became the first generation of "latchkey kids."

There's no doubt that the unnatural forces of World War II deeply affected the family unit. Those forces helped set the stage for more debilitating changes to come.

Times have changed the family

In the 1970s and 80s some liberal thinkers argued that the traditional family, meaning a married biological father and mother and their children, was archaic. Feminists and social liberals led a campaign to experiment with other family structures.

They disguised those freewheeling experiments as freedom of choice, self-fulfillment and showing equal respect for all family types. They went as far as claiming that women and children don't need men and might be better off without them.

The new language said that the family structure wasn't breaking down, it was simply changing. According to this new thinking, the most important thing for children was their parents' happiness and self-fulfillment. After all, the children were resilient and would likely not suffer the effects of divorce. They derided the idea of parents staying together for the children's sake.

As this notion took hold, more breakups occurred, placing an unbearable load on social and legal supports. The bottom line was that some mothers and children were simply abandoned and fathers forgotten.

Can history help change a family's future for good, or will history repeat itself?

Future of the family

Modern media entices the weaker side of human nature, and in so doing erodes the family unit with such TV shows as Desperate Housewives, Two and a Half Men and Wife Swap (all airing during prime family viewing time in much of the United States ). Media executives and producers say they are simply showing society in a more realistic manner. But this compels the question: Is it better to join human depravity to prove reality, or is it better to lift others up to follow higher standards and good values?

In taking advantage of the basest human desires to milk consumers for money, media actually corrupts reality and is on the wrong side of family values.

Famous TV psychologist Dr. Phil McGraw believes there's hope for families if we stand up to the pressures allied against them:

"It's time that as parents we say, 'Hey, I don't surrender, I do not give up. I will not be intimidated by all the forces tugging on my children and family. I do not accept the epidemics of oral sex, drugs and alcohol in the middle and upper schools. I do not accept a child that appears deaf when I say 'Pick up your toys and don't hit your sister in the head anymore.'

"I will not continue to parent out of fear that my kids won't like me if I require more from them behaviorally, academically and spiritually as I teach them that relationship-building is important in life. I will not feel guilty and go into debt trying to keep them in designer clothes and toys from preschool on up!

"I am not charged with being their friend, I am charged with being their leader. I will not let the television or Internet baby sit them as I communicate only through e-mails, pagers and cell phones. I will instead plug in the old-fashioned way and prepare them to deal with the distractions that assault them and blur their vision of self. I will create the pride, unity and loyalty and team spirit that is so critical to a phenomenal family" ( Family First, 2004, p. xv).

God and family

What's in store for the family unit in the future? Where can parents turn to get the help they want and need?

The Creator God made us male and female so we could have children and families (Genesis 1:27-28; 2:24). God designed the human family to reflect and prepare us for an eventual role in His divine, immortal family (compare Hebrews 2:10-13; 2 Corinthians 6:18; Revelation 19:7). And He has provided an instruction manual for humankind, which shows parents how to have a happy and secure family. That manual is the Holy Bible.

The key to a happy family begins with a good foundation. That foundation is God and His Word.

God instructs a father and mother to look to Him for guidance in rearing their family: "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength. And these words which I command you today shall be in your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up" (Deuteronomy 6:5-7). Most truly happy families have learned to honor God.

The apostle Paul gave fundamental advice to all family members on how to have happy, healthy relationships with one another: "Wives, submit to your own husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives and do not be bitter toward them. Children, obey your parents in all things, for this is well pleasing to the Lord. Fathers, do not provoke your children, lest they become discouraged" (Colossians 3:18-21).

These fundamental instructions run pretty much opposite to modern media's portrayals of reality. Which do you think is better in the long run?

Applying basic values

You can have a happier, more secure family by applying some basic values.

Let's consider some good values we as parents can apply. Dr. Canfield gives a three-part blueprint for being a good father in his 1996 book The Heart of a Father:

• First, if need be, a father should resolve his relationship with his own father.

• Next, Dad should make his house a home through involvement, awareness, consistency and nurture.

• Finally, a good dad will plan his future. One day he will be a grandfather, so he should anticipate and prepare for changing situations throughout life.

These are helpful points that deserve our attention. And there are others you can use almost immediately—and when you do, you'll begin to see a healthy change in your family. Here are a few that apply equally well to both fathers and mothers:

• Parents should tell their children they love them. One father and mother established a loving environment in their home by randomly calling out to their children and each other, "I love you with all of my heart!" To this day, family members always greet each other with "I love you and want you to know that I do."

• Parents should apologize to their children if they hurt them. If they don't apologize, they can create a cold-hearted child. Apologizing teaches a child that a mature person should recognize his mistakes and promotes the values of mercy and forgiveness.

• Parents should not show favoritism to one child. If they do, the other children can become resentful and lash out at their sibling.

• Parents should avoid living their lives vicariously through their children. Allow your children to develop their own strengths and they will become more confident.

• Parents should listen attentively to their children. This promotes a healthy relationship, and children come to better respect their parents.

• Parents are the primary models for their children for all types of behavior. If parents are replicating their parents' bad habits, they should try to break the cycle by doing what is right.

Parents should teach and love their children while training them to be good future parents. In a larger sense, the investments we make in our families today help determine the welfare of our society tomorrow.

God is developing happy, secure families today. Perhaps your family is that way already. If it isn't, take heart; your family can become one of the happiest and most secure possible. Why not start today?