Father's Day Talk

One of the great stories of the Book of Mormon is from the drama of the family of the prophet Lehi.  He had six sons and they did not all get along but father Lehi loved them all.  The great tragedy of Lehi’s death was how he knew that when he was gone the family would break apart.  Lehi’s last words are a father pleading to his sons about what kind of men he wanted each of his sons to be.

This Father’s Day I want to talk about some of the traits that are needed by men and for anyone hoping to support a civilization populated by great people.


Joshua Chamberlain was an American college professor from the State of Maine, who volunteered during the American Civil War and joined the Union Army as an officer.  He was a colonel, and found himself at the Battle of Gettysburg defending the southern slope of a hill called Little Round Top at the far end of the entire Union line.

Colonel Chamberlain quickly understood the importance of the small hill because it was a perfect position for the Confederacy to place artillery and attack the entire Union line. Chamberlain and the 20th Maine had to hold this hill at all costs. Time and time again the Confederate infantry attacked, until Chamberlain’s regiment was almost lost. With many casualties, Col. Chamberlain recognized their dire circumstances because he was nearly out of bullets and another charge was imminent.

At this point he decided to literally bring a knife to a gun fight and ordered his left wing to initiate a bayonet charge—against guns.  Battlefield conditions made it unlikely that very many men actually heard Chamberlain's order. Instead, most historians believe that Chamberlain himself initiated the charge.

His Maine regiment charged down the hill and ended up capturing 101 of the Confederate soldiers and successfully saved the line.  This may have saved Gettysburg, and it earned Joshua Chamberlain the Medal of Honor, the highest military award of the United States.  This award is usually give posthumously, but Joshua Chamberlain survived and went on to serve his country well into the 20th century.

On this Fathers Day I am telling you about this great man because Colonel Joshua Chamberlain was demonstrating, in part, the kind of men we need to be and the kind of father we need to be.  He did what was right, knowing that his actions could save others through his willing sacrifice.


The kind of men and fathers our God needs is easily exemplified by one of my favorite stories from the Old Testament.  Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were ordered to worship the golden image of King Nebuchadnezzar in Daniel chapter 3. We’ve all heard this story before.  The trumpet sounds and everyone is supposed to bow down to the king’s blasphemous statue or risk getting burned in a literal furnace.  O, but not these three men.

The trumpet sounded and they instead issue possibly the most mature and testosterone laden response of the Old Testament:


Our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thine hand, O king.

But if not, we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image thou hast set up.

They are saying “We know what is right and we will not be moved by you or anything else to a place where we are not right.”  They were doing what is right simply because it is right and not because they were demanding that God or anyone else save them.

I would like to think that this story might have influenced American poet Charles Bukowski who was thinking about personal adversity that each of us faces.  Bukowski said:

“What matters most is how you walk through the fire”

Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego knew the difference between obedience and morality.  Because obedience is simply doing what you are told no matter what is right. Morality is doing what is actually right, no matter what you are told to do.


So much of doctrine in this church and virtually every other church is to convince and reassure us that God has a reward for us in heaven for keeping the commandments.  But I’m here to tell you that becoming the kind of man and the kind of father that God needs us to be has very real purpose here in mortality.

Brethren, the Savior Jesus Christ, has asked all of us “What manner of men ought ye to be? Verily I say unto you, even as I am.”

When Jesus was teaching the Nephites to be MEN even as he is, he was answering a question that has been asked many times throughout the history of civilization.  This is the real answer to the question “how shall we live?”

The Greek philosopher Plato explores the question “how shall we live” in his famous book, the “Republic”.  It concerns the order and character of the just city-state and the just man.  Plato knew that the civilization we want must be filled with men and women who will do great things.

Similarly, the prophet Nephi eloquently stated “And it came to pass that we lived after the manner of happiness.” (2 Nephi 5:27)  He and his family were new on this land and were just starting build up civilization.  Their survival depended on pushing back the edges of wild and dangerous places so that they could survive.  This was not some wimpy “safe space”.  This was literally the difference between life and death for himself and his family.

Good husbands and good fathers thrive on creating and supporting homes for their families.  This is absolutely the bulwark of civilization.

I am aware that we are entering an especially contentious election cycle here in the United States.  I want to reassure you that whoever occupies the White House next year is only marginally relevant for the welfare of our families.  What is relevant will be what it has been for thousands of years: Good men and good women trying to be good parents to their children.  This is living after the manner of happiness.  This is the essence of defending and building civilization.


In 1965, David O. McKay was speaking to a group of Church employees and told them what will actually be asked on judgment day. President McKay said that everyone will have a personal interview with the Savior, Jesus Christ.

•	First, he will request an accountability report about your relationship with your wife. Have you been engaged in making her happy and ensuring that her needs have been met?

•	Second, he will want an accountability report about each of your children individually.

•	Third, he will want to know what you personally have done with the talents you were given.

•	Fourth, he will want a summary of your activity in your Church assignments. How you have been of service to your fellow man?

•	Fifth, he will have no interest in how you earned your living but if you were honest in all your dealings.

•	Sixth, he will ask for an account of what you have done to contribute in a positive manner to your community, state, country, and the world.

Notice what Brother McKay is not saying.  He isn’t asking you to simply follow lists of commandments that can be checked off one by one.  This is not a trivial account of simple obedience.  God wants to see how each of you have transformed into men that can lead others starting with your families.  God wants us to become men that have right living as an indelible part of our character.

Christopher Hitchens once commented:

If god really wanted people to be free of [wicked thoughts], he should have taken more care to invent a different species.

Hitchens is, perhaps, missing the point.  Maybe God could have created men free from wicked thoughts.  Instead, God is interested in men being free so that they can become great rather than using coercion and having a Pharisaical goodness forced upon them.


There is a personal question that every man must answer.  That question is “What do you want”.  I’m not talking about lunch although I am a big fan.  Every man needs a mission that provides a reason to get up in the morning, that provides a plan going forward, and that serves as the ultimate goal you are working towards.  It’s no secret that we often send young men and women on missions, but I’m talking about something of a much greater scope and duration.

A man needs a mission with a clear calling.  He needs a life work that he feels called to do, and have talents to provide that makes an impact, and builds civilization in this world. A man needs to know that his life counts, that he’s pursuing a mission that means something. A man on a mission is a happy man.

In the creation story in Genesis, God creates Adam and immediately gives him a mission. Adam was told to “replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion.”   He is to cultivate the resources of the garden and to guard it. God gave the first man on the planet a mission for his life.

Part of my mission is that I’m an engineer.  I just want to build things.  And one of the things I definitely want to build is the good family I have.  This is a great responsibility and it’s worth embracing.  Children will see the life of their father and mother as their first answer to the question, “how shall we live?”  So many forces of the modern world want to deprive us of this mission.

Chuck Palahniuk captured some the essence of the conflict when he wrote about civilization in his book, Fight Club:

“We don't have a great war in our generation, or a great depression, but we do, we have a great war of the spirit. We have a great revolution against the culture. The great depression is our lives. We have a spiritual depression.”

The purest nobility you will achieve is simply being a man pushing on day after day, following your opportunities, supporting a family, and being faithful to your wife.  It’s not glamorous, it doesn’t pay well, it’s not always fun.  But it’s one of the few things that actually matters.  Living this way is a vote for the future. It’s the only thing that will actually bring real, long term, sustainable fulfillment.

This is the man acting as the Alpha Male inside his own house who works to provide for a family and demonstrates “how shall we live” by doing good things.  Civilization literally depends on the men who do this day after day even though it will probably never thank them.  But a man has little regard for the thin praise of the world that simply views him as some economic unit.  Because he has a mission and he is going to do it.

Are there parts of your personal mission that are not working well?  Are there challenges and failures that you facing?  Again, as Charles Bukowski said, “What matters most is how you walk through the fire”.  It’s not that you found yourself in the fire in the first place or that perhaps you accidentally set the fire yourself. It matters that you keep pushing forward.

The Savior Jesus Christ was the perfect model of manliness.  He stood before his tormentors having been scourged, beaten, spat upon, and crowned with thorns. Pilate admitted, “I find no fault in him.” Then he pronounced those irrefutable and piercing words: “Behold the man!” (John 19:4–5)

On this Father’s Day, the last words of the prophet Lehi to his sons continue to be relevant.  Lehi wanted these sons to “become”. I leave those words to you also.  Because Lehi said, “Arise from the dust, my sons, and be men.” (2 Nephi 1:21)