The Gift of Fathers

Today, at 7am, as I was driving to church with Sandy my cell phone rang. I knew as soon as I saw on my caller id that it was my brother Roger with the news that I had been expecting for several days, my Father had died during the night. Dad's health has been declining for the last couple of years, and it was his wish to make it through this Christmas, and, by the Grace of God, he did.

The Holy Spirit was at work this week, text I preached on today contained this line from Paul's Letter to the Colossians, "Fathers, do not provoke your children, or they may lose heart." This line fits my Dad pretty well. He encouraged me, challenged mentored me, protected me, and in his generation's way, he loved me. I cannot remember Dad every saying "I love you" but I never doubted that he did. Dad showed his love for me, and my brothers and sister in the way that he raised us.

I will have the opportunity to preach at his funeral, something that I am very happy to do. I can't help remembering though, a good friend of mine from my previous parish who always got on me for my funeral sermons. "You have to preach the Gospel Pastor, you need to preach 'fire and brimstone' at a funeral sermon. There are a lot of folks who never attend church who attend funerals and if all they hear is how great the guy in the box is they will think 'if that guy is going to heaven like the pastor says then why bother going to church.'" Well, I didn't always say the "guy in the box" was going to heaven, as a matter of fact I rarely implied that, but I wasn't preaching with smoke coming out my ears so it wasn't good enough for my friend. Problem is, when a person attends church and all they hear is "hell fire and damnation" it is just a reminder for them why they don't attend church more often.

Dad showed his love for us in the way he lived his life. Mom taught us the Faith; Dad taught us the love of family, community and country. He showed us, by example, the importance of attending church as a family. Dad was raised a Roman Catholic. When Mom refused to have us kids raised in that church he could have simply not attended with us, but he chose to come to church with us. He knew how important it was to go to church as a family, and attending worship in the Branstiter family was never optional. However, it was not drudgery either. I never heard Dad complain about going to church. The only time I heard him complain was when someone sat in our pew (second row from the back, pulpit side, next to the Gaummer stained glass window). Dad never really stopped being a Roman Catholic; he simply loved his family more.

That is what Paul is asking us to do in the reading today, love one another.