dad

i actually thought about posting a bunch of this today before i had the epiphany that today is father's day.

i've got a great dad. my dad can beat your dad up. ok, maybe that's not the point. and maybe your dad is ronnie lott or someone like that. (i got to meet ryan nece the other day who actually can say ronnie lott is his dad.)

my dad may not be able to beat up ryan's dad, or yours. but he's a giant when it comes to what a man ought to be. for as long as i can remember, dad has always sought to do everything God has given him to do. he has pursued God's plan for his life relentlessly. he has covered a lot of ground along the way, too.

he has been in over a hundred countries, directing ministry-related projects in something like 56 of them. i remember him telling me one year he spent as much time either in the air or travelling to/from airports as a person would spend working 40/hrs a week for a year. i remember more than once when he would return home from an around-the-world trip only to turn right back around the next morning to go around it the other direction.

gone a lot? yeah. even today, he and mom have been back from a few months in africa and they're on their way to iowa from louisiana, and they'll get back for a couple days then head out to australia.

dad is a travelling machine.

but he's more than that. he's a statesman of the faith. he's part of a remnant of what pioneer missionaries gave us. victor plymire asked him when dad was about 4 years old if he would take the place of his child who died in tibet. that began the passion for missions in dad.

dad has served and still serves shoulder-to-shoulder with the "big names" in ministry and missions. he's very aggressively not a "hot dog" - but he's also not a weenie. when we get to heaven and we see what got done for the kingdom, i think there's gonna be a lot of crowns being credited to him (more to cast at Jesus' feet). he has directed massive projects, and he has stood and held aids orphans in his arms giving them an experience that is rare for them - a man showing them true and pure love.

dad is a legitimate genius. he's an avid reader. he's a skillful and anointed writer. (you can read a bunch of his writing on his blog.) he loves my mom (47 years married). he's both a great father and a grandfather.

but of all the things he is, what sums it up most for me is that he is the kind of father like the one who wrote proverbs 3. dad read it to me the day i left home to go to college. i can remember him asking me to come sit on the king-sized bed in his room with my mom in manila, and reading the wisdom of that chapter to me.

i cherish the fact that i have a father. and to have one who i'm proud of and who has exemplified Father God to me so well. it's just icing on the cake that he's a modern-day victor plymire.

i love you, dad.