On Being a Daddy

For some reason, I decided to put off being a husband and father.  Everyone around me could see I'd be good at it but still I resisted.  As my own dad says it was because I was hard headed.  Be that as it may, I finally came around to the idea and am very glad I did.

I have a beautiful wife and a wonderfully playful son.  I adore both of them so much and will try not to sound too cheesy in this post about it.  My cousin and I were discussing fairly recently how great it is to watch our wives be mothers to our children.  He's a fairly new father as well, they had their first child a few months prior to David being born.  

David turned 1 year old a month ago, and things have really started taking off for him.  A day after his first birthday he took his first steps and now he's already practically running.  He's a blast to play with at this point and we've started play wrestling which I love and miss from when I was a boy myself.  I obviously can't be too rough with him but I do love snuggling him close and rolling around on the floor with him up in the air over me.

He brings me such joy it's hard to describe.  And then I think of how God our Father takes even more joy in me and it is nothing short of mind blowing.  How can God take that much joy in me?  But He does, He lavishes His love upon us and calls us His children.  He sings over us with joy.  These verses mean so much more to me now that I have my own child.  I understood them intellectually before but now I get it more on a heart level.  Some people don't need to have children to 'get it' by the way, please don't misunderstand me.  But for this hard headed guy it was necessary.

It's not always easy either of course.  The joy and pride I feel over him far outweigh the difficult times at this stage in the game.  I'm sure that may be more difficult to remember as he gets older and starts back talking like every kid does.  I think if I can remember to spend more time helping things go right than time spent disciplining and correcting him things will be alright though.

I mean, I thought I'd hate being a dad in the first place and I turned out to be completely wrong on that side of things too, right?  :)

The Difficulty of Parental Empathy

This past week, we had our son circumcised.  Needless to say, it was a long week.  Most people get their sons circumcised at birth but they don't normally do that in Spain where we were when we had him.  It has been really hard on him and on us as his parents.  The good news is he won't remember this.  That softens the blow a little but it has still been really hard to watch our son in pain like he has been.

There's just this feeling of helplessness.  He has been waking up in the middle of the night after finally sleeping through the night once we settled in Louisville which has left everyone a bit off center.  The pain meds wear off and that's usually when he wakes up.  He did finally sleep through the night last night so we praise God for that.

As I understand it, that usually never goes away; watching your kid in pain never really gets easy.  You just learn to cope with it after some time.  I can handle pain on my own, but watching my son struggle with it, that's another thing altogether.  Please don't misunderstand me, I know it could always be worse and there are a lot of kids in way worse situations.  But we've been blessed to have a baby boy who hasn't even hardly been sick his first year of life so it's a new thing for us.

The first day especially was rough as one might imagine.  General anesthesia is something I'd prefer to not ever have to see my kid need again unless it's for wisdom teeth when he's a junior or senior like I was.  Plus the days leading up to it you just have this underlying stress and nervousness because you think of what might happen rather than what usually happens.  What if your kid is the anomaly?  What if something were to really go wrong with the procedure?  Irrational thoughts like that go through your head and I'm sure that's pretty common amongst new parents.

It does give you a new appreciation about your own parents and how they used to worry for you when you were a kid.  Pain and suffering are common to the human race.  Some have a lot and some very little.  Worrying doesn't help though.  I kept praying prior to the surgery to just help me leave it in His hands.  I'm sure that'll be a common prayer now that I'm a parent  :)  

What Kind of Legacy?

I went to church earlier tonight and the sermon was about legacy in honor of Mother's Day.  The preacher talked about how Timothy was encouraged by Paul to walk in the ways of his mother and grandmother.  He spoke of his own grandmother and the legacy she had left behind.

A really good thought he had and drove home was that the legacy we inherited doesn't have to be the legacy we leave behind.  Many people have unfortunately inherited a legacy of abuse, addiction, any number of things.  That's not the end of the story though.  Change and transformation is available to all who believe at the foot of the cross.

I thought of my own mom and grandmother, each of whom have an incredible legacy that they're living and will outlive them long after they've gone onto glory.  I like to say I come from a long line of criers...my grandma and my mom both cry almost every time we say goodbye and now I'm about to the same point.  Particularly when I'm going to be away from my son for any length of time.

We all three cry for any number of reasons; sadness, grief, joy, happiness, reconnecting, worship, truly just about anything can trigger it.  It can be annoying at times, but I've learned to appreciate that side of me.  In my opinion it's because I love on a deep level.  I feel things more than others, and that's nothing to be ashamed of even though I'm a guy and guys aren't supposed to cry in our culture.

I have been broken over many things, both personal as well as things on a global scale.  That brokenness expresses itself through tears most often.  There's just something cleansing about having a good sob for some reason.

Steffani and I laugh that crying is one of the things where we take on different roles than what is stereotypical.  She can still cry of course but not nearly as frequently as I do.  Even during her pregnancy I was the one who would cry more often.  We'd laugh as I questioned whether I was the one with the pregnancy hormones instead of her.

If my son cries like I do at different things, I'm quite alright with it.  I don't want him to be overly sensitive but I do want him to have a soft heart towards the things of God and towards other people.  Most importantly, I want to leave him with a legacy of pursuing Jesus and His ways for us, not our own.  

I of course can only plant and water seeds and pray the Holy Spirit grows those seeds into fruit in his life.  Ultimately I have no control over where he'll end up.  But I'll do my best to point him to the One who loves him more than even I do.  I'm sure I'll screw up plenty of times, but I pray he's able to see past my insufficiencies and put his hope in the only One who is truly sufficient.  

Church in America

Before living overseas for a couple years in a very difficult area spiritually I was quite critical of the American church.  To be sure, there's room for improvement and I think we need to have constructive criticism.  Now when I look at the American church though, I see beauty I never realized was there all along.

For instance, the worship one generally finds here.  It can vary wildly depending on the church to be sure, but just being able to worship in your native tongue is an act of grace and beauty that I find myself in on a weekly basis now. 

I get emotional at times during worship, which is kind of ironic.  Before I moved overseas, I didn't have much use for worship in the traditional sense of singing and music which is what I've been referring to.  I just wanted a good and challenging sermon that kicked me in the butt and pointed me towards Christ and what He wanted to do through me.  I was a crotchety old man in that regard even before the age of 30!  God had to break me in order to show me what a gift singing to Him can be.  We sang in church in Spain, but I usually didn't have lyrics so it made it rather difficult to keep my mind from wandering.

I've also enjoyed taking communion on a weekly basis again.  That too depends on the church you normally attend, but I grew up in one that took it every week and find myself in another one that does the same.  It might be my favorite part of every service, when I reflect on what Christ did for me and for the world.  I repent and trust in faith that His blood washes me clean.  Again, it's an act of grace and beauty on the part of God Himself.

If you've been following this blog for a long time, this entry may shock you as I've been hyper critical of the church in America in previous seasons of life.  As I mentioned, there's always room for improvement, but in this season I'm enjoying her more than I have in a long time and I'm grateful to God for that gift.