June 15, 2011

Dad's Absolutes

My father died a few years ago. As we were at home making funeral arrangements, I found on his desk a list of texts. Knowing Dad’s love for memorizing scriptures, and finding the list in three progressively different forms, I discerned that this was the list of verses he was in the process of memorizing as his life came to an end.
 
As I went over the texts several times, I started to discern some themes. I’ve decided to call six of them “Dad’s absolutes,” because the overriding theme in them all centered on his absolute confidence in God through Jesus.
2011 1517 page28Before he died, we took my father back to his childhood home, a place he had not been to for more than 80 years. His parents died when he was 6 years old, and his siblings were dispersed, never to be reunited.
 
We walked up the narrow winding stairs to the bedroom where he slept. As we entered he turned to the left and said, “There was a picture on the wall right over my bed. It said, ‘Your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask him.’ I always thought that was talking about my dad.”
 
It’s almost inherent that we have, or want to have, this image of a father that approaches our image of God. Sometimes it’s true, and sometimes it’s disillusioningly false. My grandfather was not a Christian, and how my dad and my family became Seventh-day Adventists is nothing shy of a miracle.
 
My father exemplified a tower of strength, a strong foundation. His undying love for his children was not perfect, but it created for me a love for my heavenly Father that did not die with my earthly father. Instead it was strengthened, and his memory gems substantiated that. Check them out for yourself: ?1 John 3:1; John 3:16, 17; Psalm 103:10-13; Psalm 34:15; 1 Peter 5:7.
 
I have a heavenly Father who loves me unconditionally, accepts me unequivocally, and believes in me unashamedly. And when my earthly father is gone or not meeting those expectations, I can rely on the promise that my heavenly Father is.
 
2011 1517 page28A week after I got my driver’s license I had an accident. I knew we didn’t have a lot of money, and my dad probably had minimal insurance on the old car. I came home having rehearsed the speech of the prodigal son in Jesus’ parable: “Father, I have sinned, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son.”
 
But no sooner had the words “Dad, I had an accident with the car” left my mouth than he interrupted: “Are you all right?” The car didn’t matter; his son did! And with God things don’t matter; His children do. Dad’s memory gems reflected his priorities. Check them out: Isaiah 1:18; 1 John 1:9.
When a father is gone, or not demonstrating that level of forgiveness, I can rely on the promises that my heavenly Father is.
 
2011 1517 page28Dad liked to think he was a theologian. But he was often embarrassed to say anything to an “educated” person because he didn’t think he had the training or expertise to do so. But he did demand accuracy and consistency. He was a printer—before computers—and one of his jobs was proofreading. To the end of his life, when you asked him to proofread something, he would read it upside down so he could read it backwards, just as type was set in the old days.
 
In his Christian life he balked at complexity. He often said, “Don’t make things so difficult. Just love God and your fellow man, just as the Bible says.”
 
His final list of memory gems contained that message. Read it for yourself: Micah 6:8. The difficulty in making Christianity work is not God’s doing, but a desire on our part to control others, as the Pharisees did with their endless lists, or our inability to believe that God’s way to salvation is so simple. When I fall into either trap, I have a heavenly Father who brings me back to the basics.
 
2011 1517 page28Dad’s workday started at 7:00 a.m. His commute was 75 minutes. He never missed breakfast! But he also never missed his time with God. I remember getting up very early in the morning, usually to go to the bathroom, and seeing him sitting at his little desk stacked high with things he was working on. But his Bible was always in front of him. Mom said he usually got up at 4:30 so that he would have time to study his Sabbath school lesson and read his Bible.
 
He taught me the importance of seeking God and making it a habit, knowing that God rewards those efforts with blessings and guidance as illustrated in his final memory gems: Matthew 6:33; Proverbs 3:5, 6; Galatians 6:14. When I get busy with a “to do” list that is longer than the day, I am reminded that I worship a God eagerly waiting to bless me, if I only take time to allow it to happen.
 
2011 1517 page28One of Dad’s pet peeves, included in his list of “reasons for leaving or not going to church” (from a man who never missed Sabbath worship, or anything else happening at the church!), was the pastor who would stand in the pulpit and say, “I’m a sinner. Every day I wrestle with sin in my life and fall so often.”
 
“Well, if the pastor can’t make it,” Dad would say, “why should I bother trying?” Sinning wasn’t an option for my dad for two reasons: He trusted God for his strength, and he didn’t make “sin” so defining! “Sin is the transgression of the law,” he’d say. “That’s all! All that other stuff is just people’s opinion!” I’m not saying Dad was perfect, or never made mistakes (neither would he), but he understood that his strength came from God.
 
This was illustrated in his final list of memory gems: Psalm 46:1; 1 Corinthians 10:13. I have a heavenly Father who provides clear focus on what’s important, and also provides the strength and grace to make my spiritual life a success.
 
2011 1517 page28Three days before he died I had the honor of talking with Dad about his absolutes. I asked him how things were with him and God, and if his assurance of salvation was still strong.
I’ve asked that question to many other people and gotten a variety of responses: “I hope so,” “I think so,” “I want it to be so.”
 
But Dad simply said, “Of course.” And that was the last thing he said to me. When my father is not here physically or spiritually, or even my heavenly Father seems far away, it is then that Dad’s memory gems on this “absolute” come back to ground me: 1 John 5:11-13; John 3:36; Matthew 11:28-30; Isaiah 26:3; John 14:27.
 
I have a heavenly Father who has provided me with absolute assurance of eternal life.
 
My dad enjoyed playing his Hawaiian guitar (for himself, not in public). The music stand still sits in the basement, holding the last song he ever played: “Nearer, My God, to Thee.” What a testimony of the priorities, focus, and evidence of what happens when we develop God’s absolutes in our own lives. I have those absolutes in my life, thanks to my dad.
 
No matter what happens, or what has happened, God’s assurances, built into our lives, give us the focus and strength not just to survive but to thrive in this thing called Christianity. Read it yourself: Job 19:25; 2 Timothy 1:12.
 
I have this assurance. So can you.
 
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Rich Carlson has been campus chaplain at Union College for the past 30 years. For the past 12 years he’s gotten up early every morning to write “Good Morning Union,” his daily devotional to his school family. Then he gets on the treadmill and memorizes scriptures, just as his dad did (memorizing scriptures, that is; his dad wouldn’t get on a treadmill!). This article was published June 16, 2011.
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