Characteristics of a Godly Man Devotional
This devotional was never intended to be a book.
When our three sons, (Trevor, Dylan, and Coulter) were growing up, I tried to be intentional about spending time with each of them and using that time to pass along the lessons I had learned about faith, life, family, and what it means to follow Christ.
During their early teenage years, each of our boys and I spent a particularly intentional season together that we came to call his “Vision Quest” year. Inspired in part by the writings of John Eldredge, it included time together, study, challenges, conversations, and experiences centered around a question I believed was important for each of my sons to begin wrestling with:
What does it mean to be a godly man?
As I prepared for Coulter’s Vision Quest year, I went looking for a simple devotional we could work through together, something that identified the characteristics we see in Christ and explored what those qualities should look like in our own lives.
I couldn’t find quite what I was looking for.
So I began writing one for him.
What started as something for Coulter became an attempt to gather what I had learned through decades of sermons, books, Bible studies, devotionals, mentors, and my own successes and failures in trying to follow Christ. I later shared it with Trevor and Dylan as well.
It was written by a father for his sons. It was never intended for publication or public consumption.
Over the years, however, my wife Lanikai encouraged me to consider whether what I had written for our boys might also be useful to someone else. I was reluctant. It was personal, imperfect, and written for a very specific audience.
Then we lost Coulter.
After his death, I began to look at these pages differently. They are still something I wrote for my sons, and in a very particular way, something I wrote for Coulter during an important season of his life. I don't want to change that. But I have also wondered whether something created to help guide a son I loved might now help another father, another son, another family, or simply another person trying to understand what it looks like to reflect the character of our Heavenly Father.
So, with some hesitation and with that hope, I am sharing it here.
A Note to Women
Because this was originally written from a father to his sons, much of the language speaks directly to men. I hope the women who read it will extend some grace for that perspective rather than conclude that its message isn't for them.
When I began writing, I expected that I might discover one set of godly characteristics for men and another for women. Instead, I came to a different conclusion.
God's character is consistent and eternal, and the characteristics we see in Him are characteristics all of His children should seek to reflect.
They may sometimes be expressed differently in the life of a man than in the life of a woman, but whether male or female, we are all called to reflect our Heavenly Father.
For women reading this, I hope you will consider these characteristics both in your own walk with Christ and in the character you should expect from the men who love you. You are a daughter of the King and Creator God, and that truth has implications not only for how you live, but also for how you should be loved.
My Hope
This remains an imperfect collection assembled by a father trying to help his sons become godly men. I share it now in much the same spirit in which it was originally written—not because I have mastered these characteristics, but because I believe they are worth pursuing.
If something that was written for Coulter, Trevor, and Dylan helps another person draw closer to the Father, understand His character more clearly, or become a little more like Him, then I am grateful that something so personal to our family can now serve someone else.
I hope and pray that it draws our children—and all of us—closer to Him and to one another.
The Question
You might ask, “Why would I want to read a devotional from a man to his son that eventually committed suicide, years after having worked through the devotional with his father?” To be honest, I don’t have a good answer for you. I have asked myself the same question and more specifically, “Why would anyone ever want to listen to me?” The only thing I can offer is this. Don’t listen to me. Listen only to the Heavenly Father. And as much as it breaks my heart to say it, if Coulter had listened to his Heavenly Father and remembered the lessons in this devotional, he would still be here with us.