This is was our Family Truckster when I was growing up and this picture says so much about our family and the sacrifices my dad made for us.
But remember, it’s all about standards.
And one standard my dad has is no matter what you’re driving, it must be clean and if chrome, it must be shining!
I’m sure there’s a bible verse somewhere saying that…
CSD
Photo Source: Mochadad.com
Standards.
Maybe that will be the theme for this entire weekend, I don’t know.
But another standard my dad always set was that we were going to church as a family. Not only did we go to church, but we were to be engaged in church! That meant that we were expected to bring our bible to church, (he would check up on us to see if we had read our bible at home as well), we weren’t allowed to roam the halls when we were supposed to be in another class, and oh yea, you better be paying attention.
I remember him once saying, “You haven’t even been reading your bible! Look at all of that dust on it!”
We attended a small church growing up and the door opened up right into the auditorium. I used to turn around every time the door opened and one day my dad said, “Why do you keep turning around looking at the door? Ain’t nobody coming in to see you!”
To this day, no matter the venue or event, I try to give the speaker my undivided attention out of respect for them, and not turn around to look at everything else going on inside the room.
(Okay, my dad might not say this now-a-days with the fools walking into churches and robbing them!)
So I started thinking.
Dad, have you invited your kids to go to church with you on Father’s Day?
They say that a large group of people only go to church on Mother’s Day and Christmas and/or Easter. The reason Mother’s Day is mentioned is because we as kids know how proud we make our moms when we go to church with them. So why not set the same standard for Father’s Day?
Dad’s if your kids do not care, is it because you never held church attendance very important either?
So if you go to a gospel-centered church with a pastor who doesn’t lay into men for “not stepping up” in his Father’s Day message (one of my pet-peeves, as I’ve never heard a Mother’s Day message blasting women for “not stepping up”…and there are many who do not), invite your kids to church on Father’s Day.
Let us begin creating a new day standard where our children immediately know where dad’s going to be on Sunday, and how proud and blessed we feel before God that he has been so graceful and merciful to us by giving us children that we get to raise for Him.
What a responsibility, a privilege, an honor!
So, who’s going to church with their dad tomorrow and why or why not?
CSD
Today a colleague at work was asking my son about home-school and I loved his comment about me.
He said, “Well, I know you think your dad is tough, but lets just say that he has standards.”.
I loved that comment and went on to tell him about a standard my dad had that I didn’t know about, and I’ll call it, “You can get with this, or you can get with that…”.
In my neighborhood growing up, we only had a choice of two junior high schools in our area. One was public and could have just been called Prison Prep, and the other was a small Catholic school a few blocks away. My parents chose to send me and my siblings to the Catholic school at who knows what kind of cost to the family budget.
So likely in considerable debt to give us a better life, I had the nerve to jump in the car after a day I probably got picked on for my weight and glasses (yes anti-homeschoolers, not all socialization is good socialization), and told my dad I wanted to quit school. Calm, cool and collected, I remember my dad gently explaining to me that I could do that if I wanted. My mind began to hit the dream sequence of getting a job as a batboy for a major league team, until they are ready for me to play at 18, and I’ll live at home playing baseball everyday till then (can you tell my junior high days pre-date video games?).
But dad didn’t stop there, he also told me that I must be prepared to move out because nobody that didn’t go to school was going to live in his house.
Huh, wait…what?
Just like I knew that dad was serious when he told me if I ever went to jail, he would not come get me, I knew he was serious about this as well.
Dad knew that the street had nothing to offer me. So I guess why pass-go, and just hit the street at 12 or 13, because that’s where I’m going to be any way with no high school diploma. Did my dad think that a diploma was some kind of Willy-Wonka magic ticket? No, but he did know that if I finished school, that success will set a new sort-of subconscious standard in me, keep me off the street (meaning out of crime, not necessarily homeless for my hood-impaired readers), and maybe even set me up for a “good-job” one day.
Did I quit?
Well, to this day I love setting a particular goal and trying to meet what I set. I stayed away from the street (overall except for a couple of years at best and by God’s Grace, I survived) and I guess many would say I have a “good job”.
Dads are so unlike moms and that’s a great difference. There was no soft non-offensive answer, he didn’t care if I got mad and didn’t speak to him for a while, it was just time for me to decide if I wanted to make man-decisions while I was still a boy. He let me know that I better be ready to live with my choices.
That’s not being tough, that’s setting a standard and I think that no one sets the standards for the family as properly as, the father.
Happy Father’s Day Weekend!
CSD
Not a day goes by that I’m not relaying some lesson that I learned my dad to someone.
This weekend, I’ll share a few with you that perhaps you can relate to, heard as well, or just plain find silly.
But first, a lot of press is being made with this stat:
Americans are expected to spend about $7.4 billion less on gifts and goodies for dads this Father’s Day than they spent on moms for Mother’s Day last month, according to the National Retail Federation.
Is this really a surprise?
A mom gets dinner, an expensive purse, shoes, clothing, jewelry, spa trip, hair “did”, etc..
A dad gets tools (but you better not get her a vacuum), socks, a tie, hat, book and if all else fails, a gift card he’ll never use.
Then lets really keep it real, if you’re a single-dad, you’re lucky to see your child on Father’s Day, as something may ‘come up” in the mom’s life where your child is “unavailable” for a visit! Even if they’re old enough to visit on their own, you’ll be lucky to get a visit then either. But there’s NO WAY they would miss making it to mom’s and feeling her wrath, if they didn’t get over there for Mother’s Day.
All I can say to all of this is:
CSD
I’ve never met this brother.
I’d like to though.
In 4-minutes, he broke down a struggle that I had known for many, many years.
What he said was not very profound, for it is a story that many of us know so too well.
But it is profound, because he put it together in a poetic way, unleashing the pain, sadness, desire and compassion that only a father on the outside can feel.
Prentice Powell, keep spreading your message man, because brothers like us see every Father’s Day in a unique way.
We also know that our metric of a good father is not defined by our son’s mother, our friends, or the judge in a courtroom, but by that person we see in the mirror. That’s what makes us fight.
CSD
Furious Fathering 