Growing Up Without a Dad

Twelve years ago yesterday, my dad passed away.  (March 4, 1999)

I love my dad.

It is amazing the impact that the words of a Father have over a child.

Please hear me: I love my mom.  It couldn't have been easy raising two teenage boys alone.  My mom is an amazing woman.  "Love mom the most," he used to tell my brother and I.  And I think we did that while he was still with us.  He loved us boys and cherished our affection and attention, but he really wanted to see us develop a healthy loving relationship with our mom.  He knew we would need it to make it through this life.  I sometimes wonder if he somehow prophetically knew that he was going to pass early.  But with all that being said, there is something about growing up without a dad that leaves me feeling somewhat incomplete.  I feel like there are so many ways that I missed out by not having a dad present.  I know its nobody's fault.  I'm not mad at God about it.  Its just made some things tough and other things very tough.

It is not easy to develop a healthy understanding of what it means to be a man without a dad.  It is difficult to know who or what to imitate in other men, because they have different DNA.  Most of my fears and insecurities come from this missing role in my life.  I still have a lot of learning to do - about myself, manliness, and godliness.

My dad used to pray a blessing over my brother and I:

"May you know goodness and greatness, and may you know God's Goodness and Greatness."

I feel like this blessing has profoundly impacted my life.  I have spent much of my life trying to live out these words.  I had consciously forgotten them for a long time, but hadn't stopped chasing after them subconsciously.  My life is one of pursuit after excellence, but also a pursuit of generosity.  Most of my life choices are an attempt to show goodness towards others and to do so effectively in ways that will have an impact on the world.  Behind all of my choices though, I find an unrelenting pursuit of God that continuously grows in passion.  I desperately want to KNOW God's Goodness and His Greatness.  My dad was a man of God.  I want to honor him and his relationship with God Our Father, by developing my own.  I want to know my God the same way my dad did.

I think I would have made my dad proud.  I think we might have become good, close friends as I matured into adulthood.  I wish I could know the insights and wisdom he would have given me.  I wish I could have experienced life with him as a coach and fan by my side the whole way.

Every time you find Jesus talking directly to God (praying) or teaching on prayer, He is addressing God as Father. Abba. Daddy.  He uses terms like God and Lord, but only when teaching the people.  But He still mixes in His fair share of "your Father" and "my Father".

Jesus had a deeply intimate relationship with His Father.  He made people nervous and angry (jealous?) by the intimacy with which He addressed God and spoke about Him.  It is impossible to read the words of Jesus and not recognize the importance of the Father-Son relationship.  Jesus' ministry is marked at His baptism at the beginning of His ministry and at His transfiguration by the words of the Father: "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased."  God loved His Son.  The Son loved His Father.

Yet, astoundingly, this perfect love had one moment that cut deeply into the heart of the Son (and I imagine just as deeply into the heart of the Father).  It strikes me that there are few wounds in this world as shattering as the wound of a broken relationship with a father.  Even Jesus experienced this.  On the cross, we read the words of Jesus, "My God, my God, why have You forsaken Me?"  Jesus felt abandoned by His Father and it hurt so deeply that the One who could not stop calling the Holy and Perfect God of the Universe "Father" could not bring himself to use that name.  It hurt too much.

There is no relationship quite like the relationship between father and children.  Jesus at one point claims that anyone can be his brother or sister or mother, by doing the will of the Father (Matthew 3:31-35).  Only one relationship in Jesus' life is set apart.

I know that I have a long way to go, but I know that my God, my heavenly Father is for me.  He cares deeply about me and longs to see me step into abundant life.  I may have issues and problems, some of which come from growing up without a dad, some of which don't, but God loves me anyway.  He chooses me anyway.

In John 17:3, Jesus prays to His Father, "And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom You have sent." So I pronounce this blessing over you: May you know goodness and greatness, and may you know God's Goodness and Greatness.