The Next Founding Fathers

The Next Founding Fathers

The Torch in Our Hands

Last night I attended the birthday celebration of a friend.

He is well known as an industry leader, a ministry founder, a pioneer, and an astonishingly generous supporter of countless Kingdom endeavors.

He is also a devoted family man and tremendous father whose sons are now following in his footsteps, carrying forth his legacy, and helping lead what he built.

I wasn’t planning on saying anything during the celebration because so many there had known him decades longer than I had. But as one person after another stood to honor him, I noticed something deeper than his accomplishments.

Again and again, people spoke of him not merely as a successful businessman or ministry leader, but as a father. A father in the faith.

One testimony came from the leader of a ministry he founded decades ago that equips CEOs and business leaders to bring Christ into the workplace. Others spoke of his encouragement, wisdom, investment in them, and example.

The common thread was unmistakable.

He had fathered far more people than his own children.

As I listened to testimony after testimony, I found myself not only amazed by what he had accomplished but even more moved by who he was as a man of God.

His accomplishments are significant and worthy of celebration. He has helped build successful businesses, thriving ministries, and organizations that continue to bear fruit today.

The same hands that built successful businesses and thriving ministries did so by building up people.

The evidence is everywhere.

• His sons are carrying his legacy forward.

• Leaders in the ministries he founded are carrying his legacy forward.

• Business leaders he discipled are carrying his legacy forward.

As I listened, I remembered how I first encountered him.

For years, friends kept telling me, “You need to meet him.”

Then one morning after our Wednesday Warriors gathering, I looked across the hallway of the new church where we were meeting and saw a sign for a class on the Christian foundations of America. His name was listed as the presenter.

A short time later I met him, began spending time with him in a weekly Bible study, and came to appreciate not only his knowledge of America’s founding, but his belief that faith should govern our family life, leadership, work, service, and civic responsibility.

And as America celebrates 250 years since the birth of our nation, I couldn’t help but think that my friend was a kind of Founding Father for the next 250 years. I realized he embodied many of the same qualities we admire in America’s Founding Fathers.”

In the Declaration of Independence they pledged their “lives, fortunes, and sacred honor” to establish a nation where people could live and worship freely.

They were willing to sacrifice so future generations could inherit liberty.

That inheritance has now been handed to us.

And that raises an important question.

What are we founding for the next 250 years?

The battles are different, but the need is the same.

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We are not fighting with muskets and cannons.

“We do not wage war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power…” (2 Corinthians 10:3-4).

Our struggle is for the hearts of men and women.

For truth.

For faith.

For the freedom to know and follow Christ.

For the next generation.

That kind of legacy is what spiritual fatherhood is all about.

Not simply producing children. Producing disciples.

And perhaps there has never been a greater need.

Across our nation, we are witnessing a spiritual awakening among young men. They are searching for purpose, truth, identity, and something worth giving their lives to. But awakening without discipleship leaves people vulnerable.

Young men don’t simply need teachers. They need fathers.

Men who will walk beside them. Men who will model integrity. 

Men who will show them how to pray, how to serve, how to lead, and how to follow Jesus.

The American founders didn’t merely establish documents, governments, and institutions. They also shaped culture, vision, generations, and a new nation.

Likewise, spiritual fathers don’t merely build churches, ministries, businesses, or organizations. They build people who will carry those things forward long after they are gone.

Buildings age. Organizations change. Businesses rise and fall.

But people carry a legacy from one generation to the next.

For years, I’ve said that we should “pass the baton” to the next generation. But I’ve come to prefer a different picture.

We light the torch.

In a relay race, when you pass the baton, your part in the race is finished. But when one torch lights another, both continue to burn. The light doesn’t diminish; it multiplies.

That is the calling of spiritual fathers.

The psalmist expressed this heart beautifully:

“Even when I am old and gray, do not forsake me, my God, till I declare Your power to the next generation, Your mighty acts to all who are to come.” (Psalm 71:18)

The Apostle Paul understood this when he wrote:

“For though you have countless guides in Christ, you do not have many fathers. For I became your father in Christ Jesus through the gospel.” (1 Corinthians 4:15)

Teachers impart information. Fathers impart life.

As we honor fathers today, let’s thank God for the biological fathers, adoptive fathers, spiritual fathers, mentors, pastors, and leaders who invested in us.

But let’s also embrace our own calling.

If Jesus tarries another 250 years, future generations will live in the world we help build.

May we be found faithful.

May we give our lives, our sacred honor, and our time, talents, and treasures to the cause of Christ.

May we light the torch of faith in the next generation.

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For a torch is not diminished when it lights another torch. The light only grows brighter.

And may we become the spiritual founding fathers of the next 250 years.