I am thankful that we made it through yesterday’s worship service with no loss of life or limb! It was VBS Sunday. We had 30+ kids on the platform singing VBS songs and reading a little script summarizing the week – and we showed some slides about VBS. Student Praise Team led worship (they’re getting good!), Doxa youth choir sang for the last time before summer break. We updated people on the organ fund being at 75% and announced this summer’s Wesleyan Roundup which will be in August this year – August 13th – and will feature a Western-themed variety showing starring our own folks. And… it was Father’s Day. We had a good time with that – showed “The Dad’s Life” video from church on the move – everyone laughed; we sang the wonderful hymn “Great is Thy faithfulness, O God my Father…” and Pastor Richard preached a good message for father’s day. Miraculously, our combined service which started at 10 was over by 11:20! (Just as I laid it out, thank you very much…)
Every Father’s Day – every June, really – I think of my Dad. I was almost thirteen in June, 1980 when he died in a swimming accident. We were on vacation in Nags Head/ Cape Hatteras, NC. There was a riptide which locals say will eventually wash you back to shore if you don’t panic and fight against it. The problem is, as you’re being swept out to sea, you panic. Dad was a good swimmer, but he panicked and he drowned. His cries for help will haunt me for the rest of my life. We were all in the water except for my little sister. By the time some men with life-rafts could get him on the beach, Dad was certainly gone.
I’m sure my dad had his flaws. I remember that, as a boy on the cusp of his teenage years, I was beginning to see the cracks in Dad’s armor and was starting to take issue with some of his ways and ideas. As I recall, my last conversation with him was an argument; nothing real serious, but an argument nonetheless. But time has a way of washing away common faults and creating an ideal heroic, and that is how I remember Dad.
He was a thoughtful man who unquestionably loved his wife. He used to call Mom many cute names, but the one I remember particularly was “Dolly.” And my sister was “Miss Muffett” (or some variation of that – “Muffy”, etc.) or his own term “Tiny Treasure”. I don’t remember my nicknames, but that’s OK. I do remember wrestling with him on the floor, going to church with him (every time the doors were open), sitting with him during “adult conversations”, and of course, working with him on the farm. Any good work ethic I have can be credited to my Dad.
On occasions when I’m exhausted from work, especially from physical exertion, I recognize it as a “good tired” because of him. He milked 80 cows a day and had a great mind for anything, including farming. It irritates me to hear city people talk of farming as if it is unskilled labor. My Dad had two degrees from the Ohio State University – both in agriculture and animal husbandry. He knew how to take care of his livestock and he did so with great care.
If you have 80 milking cows, you have many more on the farm – usually 40 or so “dry” cows, at least that many heifers, and a bull or two in a pen – and maybe 20 or so in a freezer so you can breed your high producers with other high producers. Yep, Dad knew all about that and took great care to breed his animals well so he had a herd of high-yielding Holsteins. And he knew every cow by their face and their udder (the cows stood on raised platforms on either side of the milking parlor, so that their udders were at eye level).
One of Mom’s favorite stories of Dad as it relates to his care for cows was when he returned after an absence. He went on a mission trip to Guatemala. During that trip an uncle who was running the farm in dad’s absence had been injured in a silo auger (the first of many miraculous survivals for Uncle Les) and, in the aftermath of his injury, in my Dad’s absence, all the famers from church gathered ‘round and took shifts doing chores and taking care of the cows. When Dad returned, the cows greeted him like a hero, following him around the barn, mooing, even licking him with their rough sand-paper tongues. It was quite a ticker-tape parade, to hear my Mom talk about it. I guess I was at school, ‘cause I don’t remember it as vividly as the way Mom tells it!
Dad was not just a good farmer, but he was a faithful Christian. He was always trying to learn more of the Word and grow in his relationship with Jesus. The milkhouse radio was tuned, permanently, to the Moody Radio station from Cleveland, OH. Well – there was a brief hiatus to a new all-music formatted Christian radio station, but that hiatus lasted maybe two days. In addition to music, Moody radio featured all the great Bible teachers – we rode the Bible bus with Dr. Jay Vernon McGee, gained insights for living with Chuck Swindoll, laughed with Dr. Howard Hendricks, and got inspired with preachers like Dr. EV Hill.
Dad took Mom up to Moody Evening School, an extension program in Cleveland, and they went at least once a week. One semester they made a family project out of a report for Proverbs. We had cartoon characters like a hobo named Pa Verty.
Dad loved the Lord and was zealous for good teaching of the Word of God. We left our family church because the preaching was not very strong and the denomination’s hierarchy began making pronouncements with which he disagreed. He wasn’t content to be a spectator in a church. He had a great voice, so it was natural for him to use his talent in the church choir, but he also sought ways to serve the church through his spiritual gifts as well.
He was a great community man as well, serving on the local board of education. As vice president, it was one of his duties to open the public school board meeting with Bible reading and prayer. Those were the days! He also sang in the community, in a barbershop quartet for a while, and then in a mixed gospel quartet which sang in various churches.
So as I think about my own family I give thanks for the example my Dad was to me. I know he would LOVE his granddaughters and be enraptured with his grandson. He would probably dote on all three quite a bit on the one hand, while trying to help them see the value of working on the other… we’re still working on chores in our house. Sometimes I wish we were on a farm, but not enough to actually go buy a cow. I just "have" them every now and then.
I wonder what Dad would say to them as they enter different phases of their lives. What, for instance, would he have said when Bu was cast in Roll Bounce? What would he think of Sizakele’s first boyfriend? How would he encourage them to do well in school? What would he say to Dumisani? What would he do to help nurture their spiritual lives? As I reflect on these things, I realize in a fresh way the incredible privileges I have of being a Dad… God, give me strength, humility, and faithfulness to mirror not just my earthly Dad, but my heavenly Father, in the lives of my kids and my wife. Amen.
