Dad Taught Me...

• "Everything is going to be okay. But when it's time to worry, I'll let you know." That sounds a lot like God.
• "Rights" aren't all they're cracked up to be. People will tell us that life is all about getting what is rightfully ours, about defending our own rights, about being right. Consider a life of absolute surrender to God instead ~ consider laying down rights in exchange for relationship with Jesus; consider trusting that the Way of Jesus might be safer, wilder, more rewarding, less arrogant than living for self alone.
• Listening takes time. Listening requires that the hearer be silent, slow to speak.
• Sometimes physical health (or it's absence) is a choice. Choose wellness.
• Compassion is sweet and powerful...and sometimes hidden.
• Crying with another in their grief is right. Do it. But don't make it about you.
• It's okay to mumble the odd expletive, especially if, while patiently teaching your daughter to drive, she nearly spins everybody into a ditch.
• "Integrity" is about what goes on in secret; about who we are when no one's watching.
• Diplomacy and wisdom invite peace. Sometimes they even make peace.
• Forgiveness is what we live, no matter how angry we are or how much we're hurting.
• It is never okay to disprespect our elders. It is never okay to disprespect anybody.
• Change is possible. Teachability is imperitive.
• It's probably better to err on the side of generosity, even if the service is bad and the meal is cold. Who knows what sort of day your server is having?
• Silent laughter, the kind that sees tears coursing down a cheek, heals.

My father lives his faith. Every day. His largely silent example (italisized with the occasional, well-timed German cuss word) shapes me. It shapes my family. It works itself more deeply into who I am with every year that passes.His journey has been as real-life, human, painful, successful, uncertain as any. But his steps are sure and he's carved a path worth following.