Who was your father? What kind of man and father was he?

Was he loving, present, encouraging and able to express emotion? Or was he hard, harsh, stoic and a live wire – at best, unpredictable?

Maybe he was not even there at all?

How has this shaped your life?

The memories I have of my father are brought back by those subtle moments that repeat and echo in most of who I am today and what I do: Listening to that small snotty, runny nose boy as intently as I do the business executive. Tucking in and praying over my girls every night am home. Going through the house, closing the windows, drawing the drapes and turning off the lights, heaters and gas. A predictable night routine.

My father was a man’s man; tough as nails. He was lean, extremely intelligent and very perceptive. I can still see him work the wrenches fixing broken pipes; no, anything that needed fixing. That’s where the road divides for me and him. In place of a wrench, I have a phone number!

I saw my dad choose to take the high road; allowing to be cheated rather than cheat. He was a passionate man who told his kids every chance he got how much he loved them. He made breakfast for the family well into his 70’s. And that in a generation of men who would never be caught being yellow-belly “sissy’s.” He was the quintessential gentleman.

My dad was far from perfect, but am thankful that I had him to lead me on the path to true manhood. And fatherhood. That’s an uncommon privilege in our day. Many men I know are only starting out as the pioneers in their family lineages.

Show me a broken home. Show me a broken society. Show me a broken country. And I will show you a broken, unfathered man. As the man, so goes the world.

Will you commit to encourage that man in your house to be all that he has been called to be?

And to you brother, will you step up to the plate and be counted in your generation? You see, any man can father a child by one simple, no-brainer act. But it takes real guts, commitment (for the long haul) and a keen sense of brokenness (and dependence) on God to be a Father in the real sense of the word.

And It’s dust-and-ashes humbling business to think that on mortals such as us is bestowed the same title as the boundless Creator of all matter, energy, time and space – Father God. Yes, the God who made the sun so big that you could put 960,000 earths inside it. Mmm. And yet the sun is just but one of hundreds of billions of stars in the Milky Way galaxy, earth’s home. And not just that: there are at least one hundred billion galaxies in the observable universe. What honor! Very humbling.