Happy Sunday, friends! Hope you are having a most wonderful day wherever on the world you find yourselves at the moment. I very quickly will be transitioning into reading time here since I just realized it’s already past 5pm, but I wanted to write a few words first. Because besides being the height of summer (well, at least the longest day of the year and the point at which I realize that yes, summer is here), it is also Father’s Day! And so thought I’d write a few words about my dad – yes here in a public forum and all. I mean, I write enough about myself that I suppose it shouldn’t be surprising.
How do I start? I’m grateful to have a dad that I love talking to every day. I am now past my 39th birthday and headed to my 40th (which is strange to think on), yet still one of the highlights of my day is in the morning (almost always around 7am or so) when he calls or I call and we chat for a few minutes about life and sundry. It may be about sports or food or family or politics or Scripture or random life drama. It may be for only a minute or two or it may be ten. But nonetheless, it is always oh so much a joy just to get a few minutes chatting to Dad. I treasure these moments much. Because alas, we do not live nearby and it’s only a few times a year that we actually get time together in person, so of course our phone time is precious.
But that’s just current state. I look back at my life and while I could spend far too much time talking about various moments of my life and the people that impacted me, it would not be surprising for me to say that one of the people who’s impacted me the most throughout the course of my life has been my dad. I of course have memories of all the fun things we did together as I grew up – going to baseball games in Baltimore, playing football in the park, going to the beach for vacation and playing all kinds of random games, so many cards games! – but those aren’t the memories I hold the fondest. No indeed, I think on the life my dad lived and the example he has given me. I remember growing up how he prioritized his walk with the Lord – this walking being both literal and metaphorical! – and I remember how he talked about God in such a way that I had no doubt God was real. I remember the deliberate time he took to go outside and walk in the woods and pray to God almost every day when we were small. I remember how he made it a point of focus to lead my family in Bible-reading and singing and prayer almost every evening before we went to bed. At times I’m sure I wasn’t excited about it or didn’t truly understand all that was going on. Yet one thing I did get. It was important to spend time meditating on God’s word and worshipping him in spirit and truth. I had no doubt that my dad loved God mightily. I had no doubt that the faith of my dad was real.
But yes, even as I got older I made the realization all kids someday make. Wait…my dad isn’t actually perfect, is he? Yet even that was a lesson to me. I saw how Dad leaned on the Lord and cried out to him and made God his support and strength even in his very own weakness. I witnessed my Dad’s utter reliance on God in the valley of the shadow of death and his steadfastness even when life was ever so hard. I think of one word when I think of my dad – faithfulness. Throughout the travails of this life, he pressed on to know the Lord and be faithful in the day to day. Oh that has been an inspiration to me and even now it is something I often think on. I have no desire for great things in my own life. I simply want to be faithful to my God no matter what comes. My parents had many trials and tribulations they passed through (and are still passing through!) yet I witnessed my dad’s faithfulness to His Lord throughout. My dad spent the last twenty-six years of his ministry as a pastor of a small church and times were not always easy or fun in this ministry. Still yet? Dad was faithful in the strength of the Lord. And beyond that? I witnessed his love. I sometimes fear my own love is cold and not what it should be and I cry out to God to soften my heart. For I remember the example of Dad and how he loved others – he loved the weak and the downtrodden and the poor, the people in this world who most would despise and think little of. My dad loved them in real and tangible ways, with time, money & emotional energy, seeking day in and day out to show the love of Christ to those people around him who needed it. Oh that I might model such in my own life, loving others as I put their needs before my own!
And wrapping this up, as I know I have written too much already. I see the love Dad has for my mom and for us his children. Even now as I seek to love my own wife, I remember how Dad loves Mom and puts her needs and wants before his own and how he does all he can to protect, honour, love and cherish her in the mundane of the day to day. Oh if I could love Dani only a fraction as well as Dad loves Mom, I’ll be grateful!! And I see how Dad loves us his children. Yes, he loved us in raising and providing for us and giving us fun times. But also? He loved us in disciplining us and training us in the way in which we should go, teaching us the things of the Lord and mightily modeling what it is to be a child of God. He showed us true humility, what it means to be a servant of all. Dad showed me that only through daily going to the Lord in His Word and in prayer would we truly be able to thrive and rejoice in the trials of the everyday. Even now, as I seek to read the Word each and every day in the knowledge of how much it benefits my soul, I thank God that he gave me such an earthly father, one who points to my heavenly father.
Yes, I know that Dad isn’t perfect. He’s a man, after all. Yet by the grace of God, he’s a redeemed man, one who God chose and blessed and called in ministry to serve him all the rest of his days. And so as I think on my own life and recognize my own follies and frailties, I thank God for the gift of my earthly father and how God has used him to bless me so. I thank God that through him, I am reminded of what it is to be a man of God. I lean on my Lord in quiet desperation and in fervent hope look above to what is to come, that day when we shall be with the Lord and see his face. I know that this too is what Dad longs for. We look to that day when we will be in the presence of our heavenly father and we worship together as brothers, forever.
