My Father and me
Happy Father’s Day to all of you dads!
If you have a good father like me, we celebrate with you today.
If you had a bad example for a father, hold on just a minute …
Brokenness gets passed down.
Wounds are rarely acknowledged in Fathers, therefore they are rarely healed.
But we can break the generational curse with God’s help by just rising up.
My dad was my hero. He still is.
He was the first man in my life that I wanted to emulate.
And what I really wanted is for him to be proud of me.
My first recollection of my father was riding him piggyback, pretending to be asleep.
Arms wrapped around his neck, I felt so secure.
It was a wonderful beginning.
| In my elementary school years he coached me in both baseball and football.
I learned the value of being a part of a team.
I learned the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat.
For 50+ years we went to football games at the University of Oklahoma.
On Wednesday mornings we played golf together enjoying each other‘s company.
And on weekends you can find us eating dinner and playing board games with my mom, and my wife Gina.
Oh, did I mention that we take trips together?
He will be 94 years old on July 3 and we’re flying to California to celebrate.
He also worksout religiously and has a fitness trainer.
During the toughest part of my life, he moved our family from Oklahoma to Charlotte, North Carolina.
Dad got a raise with his company and to ease the transition we went out of the way to St.Louis for a ballgame.
He took us out for a steak dinner to meet my second hero, Stan Musial the great ball player for the St. Louis Cardinals.
As a little boy, I still remember listening to the radio and keeping the lines score of the Cardinals games with him.
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| So whether you had a good Dad example, or a bad Dad example, let me offer four Father tips for us all.
Provide
Protect
Play
Pray
Before I make my dad sound like a saint, he is far from that. I know his faults and he knows mine.
Generational influences come and go. My dad never verbalized he loved me while growing up. You just didn’t do that then.
He gave me a firm handshake and that was supposed to suffice.
On another front, I am a divorced dad. My kids have seen brokenness on a new front.
My four bonus sons (stepsons) have seen my faults up close. Faults of playing favoritism and comparison.
And I was too soft with my biological kids during this period of my life.
The conclusion is this: no one has a perfect Father, nor a perfect family!
What gets passed down is a mixed bag of both the good and the bad.
The question is what are you going to do with the bag that has been passed down to you?
As for me, I want to stand on my Fathers shoulders to go higher.
And regardless of the example you had in your life, I hope you want to do the same.
Happy Father’s Day,
Craig Morgan
June 20, 2021
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