Paul Harvey wrote that a father

"is a thing that is forced to endure childbirth without an anesthetic."

As hard as childbirth is, it's

the upbringing that wears you out.

A weary man was pushing a cart

containing a screaming toddler through the grocery store. The dad kept

saying, "Calm down, Robert. We only have three more items to find.

We'll be home soon. Just try to relax, and after we get home it will be

nap time."

An experienced mother noticed

this one-sided conversation and gentle touch and complimented the father,

"I'm impressed at how patient you are being with little Robert. Most

parents would be at their wit's end by now."

The father replied, "Oh,

his name is Steve. I'm Robert!"

There's nothing like fatherhood,

and today we salute all of our fathers who mean so much to us.

William Wordsworth said, "The

best portion of a good man's life is his little, nameless, unremembered

acts of kindness and labor."

We thank our dads for all the

little things that mean so much, especially the gift of spending time

with their kids.

The wise dad has discovered

that to a kid, love is spelled t-i-m-e. There are two kinds of dads those

who invest time into their kids, and those who are too busy to do so.

Reflecting upon Father's Day,

one man tells of an experience with his dad that he has never forgotten.

"I was 12 years old when

my Boy Scout troop planned a father-son campout. I was thrilled and could

hardly wait to rush home and give my father all of the information. I

wanted so much to show him all I'd learned in scouting, and I was so proud

when he said he'd go with me.

"The Friday of the campout

finally came and I had all my gear out on the porch, ready to stuff it

into the car the moment he came home from work. We were to meet at school

at 5 p.m. and carpool to the campground.

"My dad didn't get home

until 7 p.m. I was frantic, but he explained that things had gone wrong

at work and told me not to worry. We could still get up first thing in

the morning and join the camp out. I was disappointed, but decided to

make the best of it.

"First thing in the morning,

I was up and had everything in the car while it was still getting light.

Dad said we'd leave around 7 a.m. and I was ready at 6:30 a.m. But Dad

didn't even come out of his room until 9 a.m.

"When he saw me standing

out front with the camping gear, he finally explained that he had a bad

back and couldn't sleep on the ground. He hoped I'd understand, but could

I please get my things out of his car because he had several commitments

he had to keep.

"Just about the hardest

thing I've ever done was to go to the car and take out my sleeping bag,

cooking stove, pup tent and supplies. And then while I was putting my

stuff away in the storage shed and Dad thought I couldn't see, I watched

as my father carried his golf clubs out and threw them into the car and

drive off to keep his 'commitment.'

"That's when I realized

my dad never meant to go with me to the campout. I didn't matter to him,

but his buddies did."

Brian has carried the hurt

of this episode all of his life.

On the other hand, there was

the dad whose son became ill. The doctor put him into the hospital where

a series of tests were run.

Eventually the family was confronted

with the shocking news that the son was terminally ill, and that his illness

was progressing very fast. The father knew his boy had received Jesus

as his Savior, so when death came, his son would spend eternity in heaven.

One day the son asked about

his diagnosis, and the father gently told him that sometime in the near

future he would get to go live with Jesus.

"Are you afraid to meet

Jesus?" asked the devout father.

The little boy said bravely,

"No, Daddy, not if he's like you!"

Fathers, do your kids want

to follow in your footsteps? Which Dad are you most like?

The Rev. Dr. David L. Chancey

is pastor, McDonough Road Baptist Church in Fayetteville. Members invite

you to join them this Sunday for Bible study at 9:45 a.m. and worship

at 10:55 a.m. The church is at 352 McDonough Road, just down the street

from the soccer fields.

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