I
am confident that every dad who’s ever had a daughter can relate to at least some
of what I’ve been feeling lately. Pardon the cliché, but it feels like just
yesterday that my wife and I were bringing our first child, a daughter, home
from the hospital in Austin, Texas. Now suddenly that daughter has her first Stake
Young Women’s camp under her belt, she’s starting middle school later this
fall, and she will be a teenager next
spring. I don’t mind admitting I am in denial that my little girl is not so
little any more. With a mixture of anxiety and awe, I realize that before I
know it, six more years will fly by, and she’ll be heading off to college. (We
have a private agreement about where she’s going.)
My
daughter is intelligent, beautiful, kind, talented, and faithful. She loves
tennis and volleyball, and she is phenomenal on the piano. If she gets to write
her life script, it will include a full-time mission and a temple marriage. In
short, hers will be a life defined by her Christian discipleship. I know that I
can barely comprehend her potential, and I remind her often that I believe she
can do anything she sets her mind to. In so many ways, she is a carbon copy of
her mother, and I burst with pride when I see the person my daughter is becoming.
Incidentally, I could say all of the same things about her younger sister, who
is just four years behind her but measures up to her in every way. My daughters
are a gift from God.
Watching
my girls grow up before my eyes, I can’t help wondering about their future
spouses. I remember a local priesthood leader once describing how he had begun to
pray for the boys who would one day marry his daughters. It’s a rough world out
there, and there are some battle scars I hope my future sons-in-law will be
able to avoid. How could I not keep them in my prayers? If I could meet them
now, shake hands, and look into their eyes, I would share a few things my
prayers for them include:
1- I pray that your father is teaching
you to respect women by how he treats your mom.
Few things
will influence the way you treat my daughters more than the way you see your dad
treat your mom inside your own home. I pray that your dad is teaching you by his
example to respect your wife always.
In that regard, your dad is in my prayers, too.
2- I pray that your full-time mission
will mean as much to you as mine did to me.
You will
soon have a decision to make about serving a two-year, full-time mission for the
Lord. But truthfully, I hope you make that decision long before you turn 18 and
graduate from high school. My full-time mission meant everything to me. I have
never met anyone who had a better mission experience than I did—it was everything
I ever wanted it to be. So much of what I know about how to be a husband and a
father comes from lessons I learned as a missionary. I pray your heart is set
on giving the Lord all you’ve got during those two consecrated years of your
life.
3- I pray that you honor the priesthood
and respect its sacred power.
Of all the
elements of your personal identity, I pray that you will recognize the importance
of being an honorable priesthood holder. You and I and all of us who hold the
priesthood are supposed to be different men because of it. We’re supposed to
act like God actually did something when He conferred that sacred power on us.
I pray that the way you live your life now and throughout your marriage will
reflect the high regard in which you hold the power and authority of the
priesthood of God.
4- I pray that you have stayed free
from immorality and pornography.
You are
growing up in a world that, in many ways, is more challenging than the world in
which I grew up. Although there is so much good in the world, immorality is increasing,
too. I am especially worried about the availability of pornography and the
corrosive, degrading effect it has on the way men—including young men—think
about women, love, and physical intimacy. I pray earnestly for you to stay morally
clean. One of the greatest gifts you can give my daughter on your wedding day
is to be free from any entanglement with pornography and then to stay free from
it forever.
5- I pray that your faith is settled.
I
do not doubt that in the years and decades ahead of you, you will see friends
and loved ones whose fire of faith may dim or go out entirely. My prayer is
that your faith will be settled in
your heart, that your faith will not be “tossed to and fro, and carried about
with every wind of doctrine” (Ephesians 4:14). I pray that you have already had experiences that have taught you
the spiritual safety that accompanies a determination to sustain the leaders of
the Church through whatever challenges come.
6- I pray that you love the scriptures.
The
foundation of my personal testimony of the gospel of Jesus Christ is the
witness I have that the holy scriptures are true. Each time I open their pages,
I feel a power and strength that fortifies and renews my testimony. I pray that
you have learned to love the scriptures and that they will be an “anchor” to
your faith throughout your life (Ether 12:4).
7- I pray that you've felt deeply your
dependence on the Atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ.
In your
struggle to be the person you know God wants you to be, I pray you’ve felt the sweet
peace that comes from the healing and strengthening powers of the Atonement of
Jesus Christ. Latter-day Saints who have truly experienced the power of the
Atonement in their lives are faithful and steady in their commitment to keep their
covenants. I pray you will rely on the Atonement to empower you, protect you,
and guide you in all your moments of need.
8- I pray that you will cherish my daughter and
show her the pure love of Christ.
Lastly, I
pray that you will extend to my daughter the same love that Christ extends to
each of us. “Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church,
and gave himself for it” (Ephesians 5:25). If you let the pure love of Christ
(Moroni 7:47) be the defining virtue of your marriage, I know you will cherish
my daughter; and your relationship with her will be the fulfillment of what I
have hoped and prayed for since that day we first brought her home.
Nate Sharp is an associate professor in the Mays Business School at Texas A&M University and currently serves as bishop of the College Station 3rd ward of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He grew up in Holladay, Utah, served a full-time mission for the Church in the Korea Seoul West mission from 1996-1998, and later graduated from Brigham Young University and the University of Texas at Austin. He married Holly Carroll in 2003, and they are the proud parents of five beautiful children.
