How do I condense who my dad was in just a few short minutes? I’ve written thoughts after the passing of loved ones for years, but this one is hard. Different. Closer. I need more time, but time is the one thing that we don’t get more of, and ultimately that becomes a blessing.
I remember seeing my dad’s shoes as a young boy and putting them on. They were so big! I could never be that big, but I wanted to be like my dad. What was it like to be so big? So strong, so… so… dad. I clomped around for a bit, knowing that dad could wear those shoes but I wasn’t ready to wear them. Maybe someday.
My dad loved. He loved family, friends, strangers. He just loved. Always quick to help someone. A kind ear when life seemed impossible. It’s not just things he did. It’s who he was. And even so, it wasn’t all from him. It was the kindness of Jesus in him. You see, he was a transformed man, stumbling through this world as the best of us do, seeking to follow the light of Jesus. This world can be a dark place and we all need light. A lamp to our feet. A light to our path.
He wasn’t perfect and he never claimed to be. But he was the husband for Mom and the dad for my sister and myself and this was grace. He pulled me out of more ditches, both figurative and literal, than I care to admit. He never got mad at me. He just did whatever it took to get me going again. He was patient and kind.
And even that isn’t why Jesus welcomes him now. The reward that Dad is enjoying is his due to the mercy of God and the exchange Jesus made. Dad’s sin was laid on Jesus. The righteousness of Jesus was granted to Dad by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone to the glory of God alone. And Dad learned this through the scripture alone.
He never told me as an adult to behave differently. Rather, he told me to encounter Jesus through the Bible. My dad wasn’t interested in a son who said and did the right things if those things didn’t come from a renewed heart, and he knew that he couldn’t change my heart. Neither could I. Only God can replace a heart of stone with a heart of flesh.
In his room just over a week ago the question was raised over what his favorite Bible passage was and the consensus was “all of it.” I think Hebrews 11 stood out to Abigail and that seems fitting. A collection of sinners who responded in faith when it mattered. Dad wasn’t ashamed to be a sinner, because Christ came to save sinners, not those who justify themselves.
If you knew him, you know that he loved you. I could tell you stories of him being frequently late getting home from driving the school bus because he returned to a kid’s house with a dropped library book or lunchbox. I recall one night I stopped to help someone on the side of the road after work. He stopped for those same people on his way to work for the night shift. The lesson was to make sure the one you help is able to continue on before you leave.
He always put the needs of others before himself. The second greatest commandment to love others is empowered by the first commandment to love God with your whole heart, soul, mind and strength. That is when you begin to wear the shoes. The shoes of the gospel of peace.
In his final days I read scripture to him. I opened with Ephesians 1, a personal favorite, to remind him of who he was, blessed in the heavenly places, chosen before the foundation of the world, holy and blameless before God. All to praise of God’s glorious grace. After that I decided to move over to some of the words of Jesus, preparing him for his first face to face encounter. I read from the sermon on the mount, then John 14 where Jesus tells us that he is the way, the truth and the life, and nobody can approach God apart from Him. He had told me before that WAY, TRUTH and LIFE are the key words, but the word THE can’t be overlooked. Jesus is the exclusive answer to every question that matters.
I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. John 15:5 ESV
Dad abided in Jesus and cast seeds into every kind of soil. He watered wherever he went. He bore fruit and rejoiced as he went alongside my mother, who was a good helpmate to him. She deserves credit for many things, none less than the purchase of a chronological Bible that Dad would ask me to read for several years. He wouldn’t just let it go!
As an unbeliever, I thought I could do just as much good as he did, but when I was given eyes to see, ears to hear and a heart of flesh it became clear that without Jesus I could do nothing. Instead, he pointed me to Jesus, the vine, and I was grafted in and changed. Now I can live authentically and can bear fruit. If you are apart from Jesus I beg you to seek Him earnestly. If your love has cooled I beg you to remember who you are.
Finally, I want to point out another thing that Jesus said. The context is the resurrection that is coming and it has to do with marriage. The marriage aspect isn’t where I’m going though. It’s how Jesus drove His point home. The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is referenced, and Jesus said that our God is not the God of the dead but of the living. This was 2000 years after Abraham when Jesus said this. How can this be? How can Jesus say that God is the God of the living after so much time had passed?
It is because the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and yes, the God of Ronald Harold McHone is the God of the living. My dad has passed, yet he is more alive now than he ever was and will one day be raised up, never to die again.
If this seems foreign to you, I would love to share with you the good news that you don’t have to be something you’re not and you don’t have to fear for the future. Talk to me. Talk to Pastor Charlie. Talk to anyone you see up here. Don’t delay! Today!
So no, I’m not just trying to be like my dad. His shoes may fit me now, but I have my own shoes. You see, my dad wasn’t trying to be like his dad. He was trying to be like Jesus. And even so, behaving isn’t the goal. Abandon your trust in yourself! Put your trust in Jesus and the changes in you will begin. Because you will be a new creation. Your sin to Him. His righteousness to you.
Just like dad taught me.
I delivered this during the funeral around the 21 minute mark.
