We started the evening with a game. The fathers blindfolded their daughters and then had to use only their voice to direct them through an obstacle course. Dads couldn't touch their daughters or move obstacles out of the way.
As the girls walked through the course, there were various distractions of extra noise & the voices of other fathers. Girls had to discern which voice was her father's so she knew the right way to go.
Besides being a fun game, the goal was to encourage the girls that they can trust their fathers. Sometimes our dads can see obstacles that we are not aware of & it's important that we learn to heed their advice. Just like the dads weren't going to purposefully run their daughters into a wall, our dads have our best interest in mind and we can trust them when we need advice about various situations in our lives.
The topic for the evening was on boy/girl relationships and encouraging young ladies to make commitments in this area now, before temptation comes. I challenged the girls to desire the best marriage, joyfully submit to the protection and guidance of their fathers, save their hearts for marriage & learn to delight fully in the Lord while they are single.
I used an illustration with paper hearts to explain the dangers of dating and giving your heart away to various young men before you're married.
After the lesson, the dads and daughters split up into two groups. My dad led a discussion time with the other fathers about what it looks like to guard your daughter's heart and other related topics. Although I wasn't there to hear the discussion, from what I heard, everything went well and the dads are hoping to plan another time to gather, pray & fellowship.
While the dads had their time of discussion, I talked to the girls about a couple more things and then they broke up into little groups and prayed for each other.
Eventually, everyone came back together and my dad & I encouraged each of the fathers to take their daughters on a special date to discuss what we talked about during the meeting.
We also shared a few of our favorite resources on the topic.
We ended the meeting with a time of fellowship over hot chocolate, apple cider & other yummy snacks.
Thank you to all the fathers who took time out of their evening to come be a part of this special meeting! It was a joy to have you all there with your daughters! I look forward to seeing all the girls for our last meeting of the semester on December 6th!
This was our funny picture of the evening.. haha. Enjoy. ;)
