WARNING: I apologize in advance. This post is longer than my usual.
“Honor your father and your
mother, that your days may be long upon the land that the Lord your God gives
you.” Exodus 20:12 (5th
Commandment)
Many would argue that the requirement
for us to keep the 10 Commandments passed away as part of the Old Covenant when
Jesus paid for our redemption by His blood.
Many others would argue to the contrary.
But no follower of Christ would insist that the 10 Commandments were bad
things to do. As a matter of fact, each
one provides a nugget of wisdom and is the basis for the moral code of a number
of modern societies.
The 5th Commandment
speaks of honoring our parents which is a good thing to do. It’s interesting that this is the first commandment
with a promise – long life. Nice. So since I penned a tribute to mothers for
Mother’s Day, I want to talk about honoring fathers today. It is a difficult thing for me to write for
several reasons:
·
I am a ‘daddy’s girl’ (Yes, I actually call him,
“Daddy”)
·
Daddy passed away last year at the age of 93, I
miss him
·
As the title indicated, my father not only
didn’t always do right but he hurt a lot of people
·
I have to omit specifics because
o
I want to be respectful of people whose lives he
negatively impacted and
o
I don’t want to cause any embarrassment to family
members, my church or anyone I am in association with
But I know that I am not the only
person in this world who has had to deal with a dad who didn’t always do the
right thing, if that was your situation hopefully you will gain some
encouragement from my story.
When I was a little girl, my dad
was like a superhero to me. I’m told he
was handsome, but as his daughter I just saw him as my dad. He was big, strong, authoritative, and he
treated me like I was his little princess.
So much so that one day I even asked him if he would just change my name
from BARBARA to PRINCESS. Looking back I
am grateful that he merely smiled, and assured me that I would always be his little
princess. That satisfied me. I waited for him when he got home from work
most days. He usually brought me a treat
that I had to find in his red ford pick-up.
I used to sit on his foot and wrap my arms & legs around one of his
legs, so I could ride as he walked around the house. We would play kiss tag, which was always to
my detriment because by that time of day he would have major 5 o’clock shadow –
I did not care. He would read to me. He didn’t do ‘girl things’ so he took me
fishing and to baseball games. I adored him.
The problem was that he didn’t
treat others as sweetly as he treated me – some, but not most. As I got older and began to understand what
kind of person he really was, he began to distance himself from me. I knew he loved me, but the shame he felt &
his desire to continue living as he did came between us. After
that, there were times he wasn’t so sweet to me.
Fast forward to my
adulthood. Daddy continued to be a
jerk. He could be selfish and just plain
mean, but I knew that I needed to love him.
Because God is love, I could not allow anyone other than Him to set my
standard for how I treat others. So I made the decision to love my father. When he was other than kind, I would give him
the choice as to whether I would love him up close or from a distance. He would apologize and tell me that he wanted
me close. But he was prickly, I knew
that at the drop of a pin, he could slip back into the mean Daddy.
Fast forward again to my father’s
later years, when he was unable to do for himself. When his mind started to be less sharp, he
became more distrustful along with the tendency to be mean. Some days, I truly had to ask the Lord for
strength to deal with him. I was
determined to see that he was cared for properly, and spend as much time with
him as I could. I wanted him to know that
he was loved and not feel alone. I said
earlier that I made the decision to love him.
It was not only because of the love God wanted to give him through me,
but in the natural I remembered the love he showered on me as a child. He was
imprinted on me. He was the man that
showered me with love and made my childhood fun. He was still my Daddy.
I was rewarded for my efforts a
few months before he passed away. His
vision was low and he was unable to read his Bible. He had always read his Bible, he just didn’t
follow it. He actually had memorized a lot of scripture,
and the Holy Spirit began to remind him of it.
He wanted to discuss it and he wanted to pray. That happened several times, but one day, he
broke down. He cried like a baby, he
confessed all the wrong he had done in his life and asked God for
forgiveness. Then he asked me for
forgiveness, and told me how grateful he was that I’d shown him love when he
had lived such a horrible. He said he
loved more than anyone else on earth, except for my Mom. He said that he considered it a major blessing
from God that he had lived long enough to not only repent, but to realize that
I was in the Lord and had a wonderful husband to share my life with. I was blessed to have been there to experience
his acceptance of salvation, and have him share his heart with me.
When Daddy passed away a few
months later, I had perfect peace. Yes,
I miss him. But I have no regrets over
our relationship or my treatment of him because I had shown him honor. And though his reputation was as one that
others won’t expect to see in heaven, I look forward to a reunion with him
there.
I am a living example of how
honoring my Daddy who didn’t do right, ended up being a blessing to me.
But if you have one of those
other kind of fathers, Praise God. In
either case, God has a blessing for you if you take care to treat your Daddy
right. Be encouraged.
+++++
Happy Father’s Day to Daddies
everywhere and all men who embrace the role of shaping young lives and raising
up children in the way they should go.
You are our heroes! God bless
you!
