So when fall came around, I chose the path less-traveled (and less-tackled): I ran cross-country. The football players called us ‘birds’; we didn’t call them anything back. So, it was with a little trepidation—and a lot of admiration— that I went to see my son play his first football game last week. A decade of playful roughhousing around the house seems to have morphed in him into an appetite for blocking and tackling--and after every play he looked incredibly excited to have actually run into somebody! So I’m going to be watching closely this season, knowing he’s been coached well, he’s practiced hard, and he’s built more stoutly than I ever I was!
Now I’ve watched him play other sports, but none seem as ‘serious’ as football. Maybe it’s the mystique. Maybe it’s the pain-potential. Maybe it’s the baited breath all parents feel as they watch their kids climb out of a muddy pile of tacklers and tackled. And the seriousness of the game makes me to look at my parenting more seriously. I feel that a one-time child is growing into a soon-to-be young man, and it’s forcing me to ask myself things like, What (good) lessons have I not taught him yet? What (bad) lessons have I taught him all too well? I know I’m a casual on the outside kind of dad—but have I been faithful in being serious enough on the inside?
Obviously I’m a parent going through a stage. But the questions I’m asking—and the self-examination I’m going through anew—are common to anyone who sees time passing in their walk of faith: Am I taking my faithwalk seriously? What kind of role-modeling am I doing? Is my faithlife full contact—or just touch?
So we tell others about Christ, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all the wisdom God has given us. We want to present them to God, perfect[a] in their relationship to Christ. 29 That’s why I work and struggle so hard, depending on Christ’s mighty power that works within me. Colossians 1:28-29
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