Father’s Day 2023
A time-warp Story from June 18, 2023
Father’s Day. Because of childhood memories, I’m always hearing the Disney Cartoon narrator from “Goofy Celebration of Fatherhood” when I read those words. “It all starts with a bachelor…” starts the old cartoon that highlights Fatherhood in a Goofy sense but before the entertainment industry really made fun of Fathers.
Our culture has tried to reduce fathers to a joke. Sadly, that is the farthest thing from the truth yet popular movies, songs, and tv shows portray fathers as not worth respect. The butt of jokes. Maybe a breadwinner. Unimportant.
In truth, it’s movies like “Courageous” that get it right. Fathers are vital. The Bible tells us the father is the head of the home. The primary moral compass of the family. It’s summer camp at my gym. I love to watch the excitement the kids get when they get picked up; “Daddy! Watch what I can do!” or “Mommy! Look what I made!” I hear a lot about mommies and daddies.
We heard about spiritual fathers at church today too; those like Paul who calls Timothy his “son in the faith” and “beloved son” though he wasn’t his biological son. My father lost his father as a young man just entering adulthood. I never met my grandfather Theodore Pearson, but I know he was a strong, giving, loving man because of the legacy he left in his children whom I met. Our daughter “Theadora” was named in honor of him. My father also had a spiritual father; Mr. Bob Suber. I loved him. I first met him when I was about 7 or 8 years old. His wife Betty taught me how to embroider and sew clothes. I watched him talk with my Daddy as we spent many evenings at their house for supper and the adults would go into discussions. I sat cross-legged in front of him with starry eyes listening to stories of his childhood in the nineteen-twenties and thirties where he and his buddies used to swipe fruit from orchards and try not to get caught or pick raw corn and dig potatoes from the edges of farmland and would roast them for lunch on fires they’d make and share food with traveling hobos. He said his mama always cooked a big broth pot from whatever squirrel, rabbit, or game he or his younger brother got that day and would toss in root vegetables and greens and herbs. He said her pots could be smelled for miles. After her family ate, she fed a bowl of broth to any hobo that stopped and asked. Mr. Bob died when I was about fourteen and I saw my Daddy cry. He said that Bob Suber’s graceful acceptance of death reminded him of other men of faith that Mr. Bob had pointed out – and he wanted to be sure he had that peace and grace when his time came. In December 2018, he showed that grace and peace at his own time when God called him home.
Fathers are so important.
I am very grateful for my Father. For the blessing I had of being his daughter.
I’m also so thankful for the Father God chose for my children. Louis is always striving to be the most godly father he can be.
I pray for the men God will lead to my girls to be fathers of their children. I pray that we raise up Lucas to be a godly man and father.
Life is far simpler than we make it out to be. Love is our center. Family is our core. God made it that way from the beginning. I pray that we shoo away the distractions and focus on the truth; choosing to follow Jesus in all things and put our families first. Fathers bold enough to be fathers have that power inside them; God put it there from the beginning. Each man simply has to choose.
Type at you later,
~Nancy Tart
