Highlight: The importance of fathers

 “My parents divorced when I was ten and not having a dad in the home led me to really be at a deficit. I realized that I had to try to figure out this whole manhood thing and I was kind of on my own as so many guys are.”

Pete Alwinson shares his personal experience about how knowing God as Father changes men. When Pete was 8 years old, his mother led him to Christ. However, it wasn’t until later on that he started to understand how the Gospel was about to reshape his entire existence.

“The Gospel was real but it was so few years later that I understood how God was my father and what a difference that was making in my own life. God the Father build sons who come to grips with their core identity as his sons and develops his character in them to thrive in their various roles in life. When men thrive and flourish they become the sons, husbands, fathers, brothers, and friends that encourage others to grow and flourish.”

What are the challenges that most men face living in today’s culture?   

 “Deep down, of course we want to be men, it’s in our D.N.A. Dads are supposed to have that role of modeling what a boy is to become and so many men today have wounds simply because of the father’s absence.”

Sometimes having a father who misbehaves is just as negative as not having a father at all.

 “The anger, they’re being out of control, the performance orientation that they put on their sons and daughters.”

One of the main issues Pete sees is that many men are still trying to find out how to be a father without having discovered their true identity.

“So many men today are out there trying to figure it out, they don’t know who they are they don’t know that they’re unconditionally loved, and so they’re out there trying to find their identity rather than working from their identity. In Christ we finally have the father that we’ve always been looking for and the identity that we desperately need.”

When men have that strong foundation of unconditional love from knowing God as Father it allows them to love those around them.

“Then I can then go out into the world and make a contribution rather than go out into the world trying to find my identity. That makes all the difference in the world for a man when he starts out knowing who he is and that he’s loved.”


Pete Alwinson is a pastor, author and speaker. He is the author of . He previously served as a church planter and lead pastor for over thirty-five years and now focuses his time primarily in speaking to and developing men in a weekly city men’s gathering, as well as in men’s events nationally.

Featured songs: Good, Good Father by Chris Tomlin; Oxygen by Lincoln Brewster; More Than Conquerors by Steven Curtis Chapman

Key Scripture: Psalm 73:23

Like father, like son