but it is not the only root. There are many things that are done with no thought
of profit. In fact, pure old fashioned selfishness is also a root of all kinds
of evil. In a father selfishness can bring all kinds of problems. What state
would we be in if God had been selfish? Being a good father means making a life
of sacrifices for the good of the family.
It is easy to excuse ourselves from certain duties by claiming it is not our
responsibility or that we have other duties that are more important, when the
reality is that we don’t want to do it for some selfish reason. The dishes need
to be washed, but that is "woman’s work" and you would rather do just about
anything rather than that. Your daughter wants you to read her a story, but you
are watching the news or reading it. Your son wants you to help him with a
project, but some friends are getting together to watch the game. Your wife
wants your help around the house with some upkeep, but this may be your last
chance to go hunting until next season. Your wife is sick and needs you to watch
the kids, but you have some work to do. What will you do in these situations?
Now we all realize that we have to split our time between all of our
responsibilities and we can’t give everything to any one to the neglect of the
others, but we often do sacrifice the responsibilities to our own selfish
desires. We are happy to spend time with our wives as long as we are doing
something we enjoy. We love watching something that we like with our kids. We
are glad to have our son work on our project with us. It takes extra effort to
sacrifice time that we would rather spend doing something else. If we will make
those sacrifices willingly and look for the blessings in spending time with
them, then we will find that we can have more joy and pleasure than following
our selfish desires was producing. Try it and see.