” Almost 30 Years Ago”

Not The Only One !
Post #140
20 Jun 24
” Almost 30 Years Ago”
Howdy,
Hey, thanks for taking the time. I’m sometimes in a zone and locked inside of my head, inside of my own little world ☺️☺️. Last weekend was father’s day and I was completely oblivious that I had offered up a post about two horrible examples of fatherhood and I’m hoping to make a course correction ☺️. So, to all of you fathers in the audience, happy belated Father’s day. There was no connection between the last post and fathers day, just bad timing on my part🤪.
Fatherhood is a great honor , with huge overtones of responsibility. It’s not for everyone, much like motherhood or marriage. Fatherhood is something that usually leaves huge imprints on your child’s life and much like that line in the marriage vowels, it can be for better or worse ☺️☺️.
I had some disastrous history starting out, so I had become soured on becoming a father. I’m the guy who use to go to the mall to people watch and see parents with leashes on their kids wrist, so that they could keep track of them . As I watched the kid wrapping himself around a clothing rack, I would laugh and say that would never, ever be me. The best form of birth control there ever was☺️☺️. Life goes on and sometimes things will sneak up on you. I wasn’t outfitted with a biological clock, but parenthood has other ways of getting your attention. My road to parenthood was probably a little different from most people. I met a woman who had just been discharged from the navy with a newborn or infant of sorts. I’m not going to dig into details but I ended up adopting her little girl and have been a proud father since she was almost a year old. Yeah!, there’s a lot of pieces missing from that story and we will leave it in the land of mystery for now.☺️☺️.
That was the beginning and I had no idea what I was getting myself into as far as being a father, and to a little girl no less, when I was raised in a house full of boys. I hate to be the barer of bad news for those who think that it’s all the same and it just doesn’t matter, but you are just straight up wrong ☺️. There’s a huge difference between boys and girls. She was an amazing kid, as she still is to this very day. It was almost thirty years ago when the weight of fatherhood first grabbed my attention and laid out for me how ill -equipped I was for the task at hand. I don’t always remember it like it was yesterday, because it wasn’t ☺️☺️, but it stays fresh on my mind from time to time. I believe that is was back in 1995 that I found myself at a football stadium, packed with like fifty thousand guys. There was this phenomenon racing across the country known as ” Promises Keepers”. I don’t even know if it’s something that could take place in today’s environment, but it is desperately needed. It was an organization that called men to be better husbands and fathers.
I had some big take aways from that stadium event. There were two that had a profound impact on me and the first was that God placed a man in my life to mentor me on the fatherhood, better husband front. He became my best friend and even though we live many miles apart , we still keep up and I still count Larry as one of my dearest friends. It may seem odd finding or getting your best friend later in life, but he was different and possessed traits that I didn’t have and that I just didn’t encounter with most other men. He wasn’t afraid to be vulnerable, and that was really crazy for me and different. Men just don’t do that, especially right out of the gate. He was and is this amazing man of faith. He poured into my life things that I desperately needed and at the same time I was unaware of there even being a need.☺️ Larry is great, but I want to introduce you to the other profound contact that I had from my time at RFK.
IT was a stadium event and the center piece or should I say the corner stone was about Jesus Christ. We had fifty thousand men from all over the country and from all walks of life. They were different colors, creeds, and cultures, ages, professions, it truly was diversity on display ☺️☺️. One of the things, the main thing that drug me back to church after spending years running from God, was marriage and parenthood. These two things I knew that I was just incapable of doing without God….so was boot camp☺️☺️. So…one of the opportunities that we had to pray openly together, paired me up with a gentleman by the name of Ken. We attended the same church, but I didn’t know him from Adam☺️. He was a little older than myself. I think my kids were three and six at the time and he had adult children with a couple of grandkids. Funny how you look back at things and see them differently, but we got on our knees and basically had our faces in the seat of the chair, not then, but now thinking about how many butt’s had set in that chair over the years☺️☺️☺️. Ok…moving on. This gentleman, Ken just began to openly weep. I don’t believe that I had ever seen a guy do that before, if it wasn’t at a funeral or giving his daughter away in marriage. I made it about me and I was visibly uncomfortable, because us guys just don’t do that.☺️☺️ . I had been raised with some pretty preemptive ideas about manhood and the things that we did and didn’t do, and I was pretty sure that crying in a stadium surrounded by a bunch of other dudes, was not on the approved list of activities ☺️☺️. There were other men who also witnessed this event and moved closer to comfort him. I wasn’t one of those people, but was swept up in it , solely by proximity ☺️☺️. Give me a break this was new for me, and felt much more like something that women should be some where close by☺️☺️. In the midst of praying and what seemed like a never ending spicket of tears, Ken began to confess all of his short comings as a father and husband. Conviction was heavy upon him and I desperately wanted to ease away before it rubbed off on me☺️☺️, but I was kind of stuck there.
As the tears became a little less and his murmuring became coherent speech, nothing like snot and tears mixed together ☺️☺️, he greatly lamented that his adult children didn’t know God and that he somehow felt responsible for that. He didn’t have a great relationship with his kids and I gathered that things were strained with his ex wife as well. I don’t recall all of the failures that he was divulging to the immediate circle, but I knew that he was broken and that both his heart and spirit was in pieces. Sometimes I will hear people talk about the apostle Paul and his profound knowledge of God’s grace and mercy first hand and that it left an undeniable impression on his life, at that very moment, that was me, because remember it was about me and my ability to be the most uncomfortable that I could ever remember ☺️☺️. Then it darned on me, that no it in fact wasn’t about me, but something to take away, but also something to give as I moved inside of this man’s pain and hurt with compassion. Sometimes people will go to therapy for years or even perhaps decades and not have that kind of breakthrough. God gives us what we need , when we need it and not usually a moment to soon. I think that is so we don’t talk ourselves out of things or get to puffed up as ” I got this”. It didn’t matter what Ken’s failings were as a husband. I don’t know if he cheated or was abusive, or just sometimes guilty of being a guy and believing that the world or our families revolve around and cater to us. I don’t know what his failures were as a father, again, was he just absentee, or somehow otherwise aspirated his kids with rules and no relationship. I don’t even know how long Ken had been a Christian, this could all have been fairly new to him. There is something about looking back at failures and missed opportunities, and how they can be just so suffocating, and yes I know something about that☺️☺️.
Guilt and shame can be a juggernaut , but it’s no match for the grace of God that expounds as if it’s covering thousands of galaxies across the universe, way more than any one individual could ever require. That day with my face in the seat of a chair, where so many butt’s had set before ☺️☺️ , God gave me a new identity of what a man is, and a father and a husband. It’s kind of crazy, but it’s like everything else with God. There is this huge standard that you will spend your entire life trying to get to , and every day grace and humility reminds you of how far you have come, but also how much further you have to go. If I’m being honest with myself I know that it’s something that I’m incredibly stupid to do on my own, or without God’s help.
It was almost 30 years ago, on that day that God showed up and informed me that real men do in fact cry and that it’s OK if it’s not at a funeral, or when you give your one and only daughter away in matrimony☺️☺️. That was just the beginning and it’s been met with other uncomfortable lessons In life, such as learning how to be vulnerable with other men, or being brave and secure enough to go buy tampons ☺️☺️. God is always trying to teach us new things about Himself and about ourselves as well if we will let Him. There is an art form to being a somewhat ok husband. I’m not saying that being some what is OK, but the art form is fluid and changing and most men just hanging on by a thin thread because we are trying to just keep up. ☺️☺️ I mean who wants to expound for forty-five minutes about their day and not want you to fix it or even offer suggestions on how to make it better , but just to shut up , be engaging and listen ☺️☺️. This is not a rabbit hole that I’m going down today.☺️☺️. Kids need fathers, more importantly they need dad’s. They need someone who is strong , but knows how to be soft and gentle as well and know when which is the appropriate response. They need someone to show them how to catch and throw a ball. They need someone who is proficient at tea parties and doesn’t mind having their finger nails painted pink☺️☺️. They need someone to keep them in line when they push back up against their mother and forget about how remarkable she is and all that she brings to the table. They need some one to teach them about honor, respect and responsibility. They need someone to point them to the direction of manhood and to prepare them for the crazy things that they will encounter in life. They need someone to teach them that they have value and worth separate and apart from what others may say and think about them and that only God get to define who they are and will ever be. They need to know that regardless of what she may look like, in her father’s eyes she will always be the most beautiful daughter ever ☺️☺️. Fathers should share in all of these roles and know that no one does it perfectly or gets it right all the time. As fathers we should encourage our kids to soar, but only after being firmly anchored and grounded in a love that they know will never fail, disappoint or not be there, and as much as we love our kids, only God is the father who is a hundred percent of the time a hundred percent there for them.
There is a shortage of manhood and masculinity in our culture now days and I both worry and wonder how we will move forward in a culture that is overly feminized. I’m not being macho or disrespectful, I’m just pointing out the obvious that no one wants to talk about or name. Yes, men should absolutely help out around the house and contribute, with child care, dishes, laundry or whatever. I think that it’s unfair that women think that if it’s not done to their specifications or the way that they would do it….then it’s wrong. How about a compromise of sorts and you allow your guy to keep his testicles ☺️☺️. We need each other and the two are supposed to work together. We are men and we are supposed to be a little clumsy with certain things and it’s OK, the sun will still rise tomorrow ☺️☺️. It’s just kind of hard to appreciate certain things if you don’t know what they are or what You are missing and unfortunately that is what’s happening with masculinity. It’s becoming a lost art form, just like with much of our sense of humor. We have forgotten how to laugh at ourselves and not to take ourselves so seriously. I guess I will just put those last two under a sidebar, before I go off on a rant or tangent☺️☺️.
I started this off with trying to recover from my last outing. We were talking about fathers day and I know that many of you may not have grown up in a house with a dad or perhaps a bad one. I want to stop to thank mom’s who did the job of both, for whatever reason. It could have been death, divorce, a dead beat situation, or some other misfortunate unforeseen circumstance, but you stepped up and did what needed to be done. Also for any teachers, coaches , pastors, or anyone else who has stood in the gap and taken on the role of father figure, I tip my cap to you. Almost 30 years ago, I was getting and starting a crash course in being a father and husband and class has never ended, nor do I want it to be over, because it just takes me to a different degree of learning and growing. I’m going to break one of my cardinal rules today and share a scripture verse about being a father. First Corinthians 16 :13-14., please read it for yourself, but it speaks to five things that fathers should be about. Be on guard, a protector. Stand firm in faith, set the standard or a parameter. Be courageous, be brave, not a time for the knees be knocking together ☺️☺️. Be strong, because you are going to have to be . And last, but certainly not least, do all of it wrapped in love . If love is missing, then it’s just all for not.
Thanks again and remember how much God loves you and if He didn’t provide you with a wonderful representation of a father, that’s ok because He is for You what you didn’t have and if He did provide, remember to say thank You to your father but also to God Himself 😊.
Till Next Time ✌️ Peace!
Sandy The Southerner

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