GENDADS

FIRST, IT WAS THE LORD’S “STILL, SMALL VOICE“(See comment below).

THEN IT WAS THE DEVIL’S TURN…Or was it?  You probably noticed.  I got hacked.  Messed up my rigid plans for the day.  BUT it got me back into this blog.  I’ve been planning that for over a week.   Or is that spelled, “weak?”  I ‘spect I’m being prodded by the Lord to re-enter the blog world as part of the mission to pick up my book writing.  Been away all summer helping son-in-law start his business. It’s actually a ministry of reaching out to families in chaos by way of equine assisted therapy on Deep Rivers Family Ranch.

SUDDENLY, THE LORD WHISPERED LOUDLY…”Take a break, son.”  He was refering to my time on my blog and social media.  He reminded me He wrote His Book, and now I should write mine.

SO FOR MY VISITORS OVER THE FIRST HALF OF OCTOBER:  This is a perfect place for a static page.  It introduces the book and a bit of our life touched, incredibly, by grace uncommon.  Feel free, however, to leave a comment (tap “comments,” above).]

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Per the blog header, the focus  of GenDads is pretty clear.  It’s about “generational fathering,” the concept of promoting multiple generations participation in the fathering challenge.  If the goal is “good and godly” children as lights of hope and righteousness in a darkening future, then the father and the father’s father would be a better set of tools to hammer out that sort of legacy.

One thing is obvious.  Like other “obvious” truths, we need reminding: it’s not the quantity (as in two complementing generations) but the quality of both that will assure the quality of the newest and very challenging generation being molded.

See the cute, happy couple? If the photo is 46 years old, does “happy” continue (even if “cute” is long gone)?  It’s a serious question.  The handsome Navy flyboy has wrinkles, white hair, and a protruding belly now.  But it  is the quality of his life–and his  “Happy Couple” marraige–that determines the quality of imprint “Popi” will have on his grandchidren.

This weekend Sunday service forces this issue.  You see, Carolyn (the still “cute” and obviously better half) and I were asked to share our testimony and given the entire message slot.  We would never have guessed (and still are a bit dazed) the overwhelming event that would become.  It was not the 46 years of walking with God together done in 40 minutes, but the entire week it took for us to forge Our Story from memory and pictures.  Tears, smiles, awed silence and shaking our heads in wonder as we reviewed each segment of the journey.

Reviewing our life under the Utterly Gracious Hand of a Loving God has changed us.  Our life forward will be different.  The “Finishing Well” phase of life  (like a race, a poem, a painting, a landscaping project…heck, like anything of worth) depends what’s been invested, hammered, built, tested, sacrificed (etc., etc.,) in early stages.  We were overwhelmed (I mean that; really, we were swept up in the wonder of it) at the amazing and unearned grace of God to have favored us so.  I type through tears even now.

This could be a very long post.  Or it could stop here.  Or maybe I should hit the “pause” tab for now.  I think over the next couple of days, with writing Generational Fathering highest on my priority list, I’ll take time on GenDads to share the highlights of that journey.  WHY?  Back to the “quality” thing in leaving a legacy imprint on my generations to follow. The quality of God’s grace is never in question.  How we appropriated it–that alone a mystery of unmetited grace–is the essence of how my life (amplified by my still-cute better half) will imprint these six grandchildren I so dearly love.

AND YOU?  HOW WILL THE WORK OF GOD IN YOUR LIFE UP ’TIL NOW IMPACT YOUR LIFE ONWARD..AND THOSE HE GIVES YOU TO LEAD, INCLUDING THE GENERATIONS TO FOLLOW FORWARD?