A lot can go wrong. You and your spouse could split up. You could get cancer and die before your kids grow up. They could join a cult. They could move far away. They could be the victim of injustices or experience serious adversity.

We have no idea what life has in store for our kids. So what should we do now? What should we focus on? The answer is simple: On teaching them as much as we can, while we can. The future is unknown but the present is ours. How will we use it?

When the civil rights pioneer John Lewis was a boy, growing up in a terrible time of segregation and racism, his mother faced the same dilemma. When she would drop him off for school each day, however, she reminded him, “Once you learn something, once you get something inside your head, no one can take it away from you.”

Whatever happens tomorrow, your kids will have what you taught them today. What you put in their brain, what you show them, what you expose them to, what you review with them—this is a way of arming them. Of preparing them. Of serving them long after you’re gone. Of giving them something that can never be taken away. 

So do it. 

P.S. This was originally sent on December 3, 2020. Sign up today for the Daily Dad’s email and get our popular 11 page eBook, “20 Things Great Dads Do Everyday.”