Good morning and the cool morning air is wonderful as the sun blares across the hardwood floors and the smell of coffee begins to wafting to my needing nostrils this morning. This has been a uniquely busy week and this will be a busy day as we look toward a busy Sunday; Father's Day. I rarely do not get all misty nor reminiscent of past holidays and I must say, especially say Father's Day but my family always makes it special for me so on this morning, I have awakened with this gnawing at the vital nature of a father in a family as our new century painfully unfolds.
As the father of a daughter and of three beautiful grand daughters but as point of influence to thousands of women either as students, inmates, friends, relatives, the role of the male in the role as father is under challenge and threat as never before in my life time. On these pages and on ranting flows on FB posts is evidence of the sensitivity that exists today on this very topic. You may call it same-sex but that final point of focus is the role of a father in male form. It is ludicrous to even write something like that to me but alas, that is the politicized fury that has been ushered into the lexicon of today; the role of the male in a marriage!
Yes, I grew up with a father in the house. Ideal would certainly not define nor describe that reality for there are not warm and fuzzy remembrances of that living situation. I have no recollection of wisdom transformed and implanted into my in word nor deed from my father. My father was a strong man, a smart man, a hard working man, a WWII decorated combat veteran. For all of that I can be and am quite proud of my father. He provided financial means for the family. I will keep this on the positive side and not venture to the liability side of the balance sheet. But he was there!.
One thing I have come to realize in the last decade is that a man in a house with a group of people, "being there," does not qualify as providing what a family needs so desperately from a man, a father and a husband. There is a distinct, established, tested, Scriptural role for a husband and a father in a family and those roles are irrefutable and unchanging in a normal family if that normal family hopes to produce normal offspring and start the cycle again in a next generation. It really is that simply. To morph, to abuse, to upend a principle of life always creates angst and disarray. I believe none can argue that the level of angst and disarray that abounds in the name of EQUALITY is at fever pitch. I will take more grief for even writing this but frankly right is right and wrong is always wrong and no wrong will ever be make right until the light of right is shown on the wrong.
The role of a man in a family is to provide stability, direction, nurturing, example, protection and a shared love with the mother. My entire life I have heard and now fully concur that a girl learns her value system toward men, a mate, from what she sees in her dad and will seek her spouse using the compass learned in the home from watching and interfacing with her father to commit her life to that spouse and future children Absent that male and influence and compass, how can you expect anything other than the chaos we are witnessing on every hand, right?
There are many gifts and rewards on this earth a man can compete for and attain but to have your daughter respect you, seek your counsel, want your opinion, love you, comfort you, make things special; there is no greater reward for a father. Then to have your grand daughter want to love you, brush your hair, read to you, pitch with you, want you at their games, recitals, baptisms, sit in your lap, kiss them, hold them; yep, that is the reward of being a father. I did not get to experience that in my home as I grew up for that was not the nature of the culture of the family nor did my two sisters and it leaves a gap and a void into the future.
Daughters want to be special, feel protected, shown attention and given the opportunity to grow under the protection of the Tree of Fatherhood. Daughters that are not afforded this look for it as they mature and too many times they search in the wrong places and find the wrong results that taints a lifetime and a generation. That is the reality of our world today and this whole same-sex marriage thing is perfect example of aberrant behavior run out of hand due to the very points above I believe. The thousands of women I have met and spoken with in jail worship services further attest to the longing of a young girl to have a father that is there in every way and if not, finds solace in the wrong places. It is just so sad and frankly, angering to me to see myriad examples.
Our family is close and we work at pulling the boundaries of that closeness more tightly all the time especially with our five grand kids and most especially our three beautiful grand daughters.
On this Father's Day, it takes more, so much more that just a man in the house. It takes a man and a woman as a husband and a wife together committed to weathering the storms of this life, and surely they come, for those jewels of children are watching and listening and will example how you, together, navigate those storms. Then they have a reservoir of traits, memories and values to tap into as they assume their rightful role as a parent with a husband and a wife that yields children.
So it is far more than just being there! It is about being there fully engaged and committed to the journey through the good times and the bad, the highs and the lows for as my mother used to say, "little eyes are watching." What are your little eyes getting to see for the tape recorders for the future are running 24/7 and yes, it is a daunting task but what a blessing!
No comments:
Post a Comment