My Dad’s Been Gone 32 Years

32 years ago today my dad lost a battle with cancer at age 34–I was 12.

I’ll never forget the morning my mother sat us down to tell us he had passed, it was the single most painful day of my life to date.

But that traumatic event has largely shaped who I am today in some very positive ways.

Here are a few that come to mind today as I reflect back:

• I learned that life is too short to take any day or any person or any thing for granted. All of life is a gift and should be received with much gratitude [the joyful and the disappointing parts too]. When I’m grateful, I’m most fully alive!

• Being the oldest of four [two younger brothers and a sister], I learned quickly and instinctively to love, lead, and care for others in crisis moments even though I too was wounded myself. I think I became in that moment what Henri Nouwen calls a “wounded healer.” That ended up being a good incubator for a pastoral calling that was emerging out of my life.

• I learned that “faith in God” means abandoning outcomes that do not turnout the way I’d hope and yet still trusting God anyway. We all put faith in something. I can have faith in God or desired outcomes…but they are not the same!

• I experienced the self-sacrificial love of a mother that embodied the very nature of Christ so her children would know and experience Christ’s presence daily despite the overwhelming sense of loss.

• I learned that although I no longer had an earthly father, I was not fatherless.

God is a capable “father to the fatherless” ps 68:5. God’s words are true and he never leaves us alone!

I’ve grown to understand and trust that no matter how dark the darkness, devastating the loss, or deep the despair, God is never distant but always near.

Three Thoughts and Prayers for Someone:

If you’ve lost a father or have been abandoned by one, know that God’s near and can heal you.

If you’re a father, and not acting like one, pray for God’s help and know things can change.

If you’re a wonderful father to your own children, please pray for opportunities to reflect the heart and love of God to those who are fatherless and who need to know they’re not alone.

Needing Some Father’s Love?

Play this video clip and I pray God’s Spirit will visit you and you’ll know He’s near!

Life-Expanding Gratitude

Gratitude for people is a wonderful thing that opens up our hearts to so much more of life.

For me, when I think about the wonderful ladies God has blessed me with to love, care, and provide for, it moves me to a much larger perspective of living than I could ever see or experience without them.

Being grateful for “stuff” is certainly better than taking it for granted, but there is no real essence of life in “things” to give back to us anything other than the use of them. Conversely, living in constant gratitude for the people God’s places in our lives, now that’s Life-Giving!

So, love more deeply and allow gratitude to flow for ALL the people placed in your life. And, experience more meaningful and expansive living that opens you up to all kinds of new and exciting adventures.

Drinking Water From Your Own Well

Today I posted on the 31 Day Challenge about the warning of adultery. If every man and woman took seriously the warning of today’s chapter (Proverbs 5), the image and experience of marriage [and perhaps all other relationships that flow out of it]     would certainly look and be vastly different than they are today to all of our benefit.

In fact, not “paying attention” to the wisdom and “words of insight” written in this chapter arguably may have contributed to some of the most damaging consequences we face in our homes, families, and culture today.

Solomon has taken this entire chapter to emphasize that marriage and sexuality are so sacred and pure, that two people coming together and giving ALL of themselves to each other, is not to be messed or interfered with, so that it might last forever. In essence, adultery can never truly satisfy, because it can’t…

It’s living outside of how God created us to live!

One verse that stood out to me was verse 15:

“Drink water from your own cistern,
running water from your own well.”

Poetic for sure, but also amazingly clear, isn’t it?

Love and Hurry

Do you think love and hurry could be fundamentally incompatible? Think about this: Love takes time, but hurried people have too little of it [time]. 

The most obvious sign I’m too hurried is a diminished capacity to love. Ever struggle with this? You come home after a long, hurried day, only to be frustrated and short with those whom need your love and time the most.

I wonder sometimes, are we so over-commited and so entirely over-extended with our time,  that hurry is what might lie just beneath much of our frustration. Could we be too tired, too busy, too drained, too pre-occupied, too hurried, to love the people we love the most in the right way? I think, so. What say you?

Is It Any Wonder…

Take a few moments to stop and look–perhaps even from how God sees it–at this amazingly beautiful floating blue ball we call earth.

Is it any wonder that God absolutely loves all that He’s created, including us? No wonder He’s so commited to redeeming it all.

The Earth Is The Lord’s And Everything In It!

If Looks Could Kill

Tempted To Be Spectacular

I confess, I have a great desire to do something great which has both positive and negative potential. The negative potential is that of doing something spectacular that would win me great applause. I’m not proud of that, yet it’s always before me. And, I struggle with the tension of doing something great, not for great applause, but rather out of great love.

Mother Teresa said it best: “We can do no great things, just small things with great love. It’s not how much you do, but how much love you put into doing it.”

I’m learning to discipline myself, to resist the temptation to be spectacular, and to immerse myself more fully in the great example Jesus modeled for us in the way of great love and servant leadership. That’s the greatness I desire most!

Extraordinary Kind Of Love

Debbie and I are celebrating 18 years of marriage today, and we’ve agreed to “go” another year with the hopes it can still get even better! ) I often think–in a culture where ‘breaking marriage’ is way too common–why has it seemed to work so well for us? I’m really not sure there is a definite answer, but here is what I believe to be true for us:

Friendship is a major component to real enduring love! Sometimes it’s less glamorous, or even less passionate, but it’s deeper and kind of wiser. At the heart of our relationship is a great friendship.

Unfortunately, much of our culture only knows the erotic piece of love, yet it’s only one part of a larger whole. But when the erotic is joined together with commitment and friendship, it becomes a much higher, bigger, complete, extraordinary kind of love that you just can’t let go of!

MLK – In The Name Of Love

Today’s the 40th anniversary of Martin Luther King’s death, and yet what he lived for still lives on, why is that? The freedom and equality he preached was motivated by love, in fact, love is the ultimate expression of both.

I can’t help but think that the power of love is the most powerful force in the universe, and it seems to maintain that power in both life and death; that’s why we are still inspired by people like MLK long after they’re gone. Henri Nouwen says it like this:

“The real question before our death, then, is not, how much can I still accomplish, or how much influence can I still exert? but, how can I live so that I can continue to be fruitful when I am no longer here among my family and friends? If the Spirit of God guides our lives–the Spirit of love, joy, peace, gentleness, forgiveness, courage, perserverance, hope, and faith–then that Spirit will not die but will live on!”

Think-abawgt-it!

Love Can Change The World!

Do you believe it?