"I grew up going to church. And I hated it." That's not the testimony most dads share with their kids. But the sanitized version—the one that skips the doubt, the boredom, the moments you thought everyone around you was crazy—leaves your children alone when they hit their own wall of unbelief.

Here's the problem: you've got a 90-minute documentary's worth of spiritual formation crammed into a 22-second elevator pitch. And you're delivering that same thin version to your five-year-old, your fifteen-year-old, and the skeptic at work.

Your story has layers. Some belong to a kindergartner. Others wait until your kid is old enough to carry them. Get the timing wrong and you either miss the window entirely or dump weight on shoulders too young to bear it.

The goal isn't eliciting sympathy — that's manipulation. It's creating a place where your child knows you've walked through darkness and found Christ there.

Visit sethtroutt.com for more insights on authentic masculinity that shares faith through earned vulnerability, not rehearsed performance.