To lay down your life… Being a father isn't for wimps

“This is my commandment: love one another, as I have loved you.

No one has greater love than this, to lay down his life for his friends.”

John 15: 12-13

What father doesn’t imagine the moment when he will be called to put himself between danger and his child? A speeding car, a threatening situation, an ominous stranger… I would imagine that most fathers have these daydreams.  We are preparing ourselves, playing it out, getting ready. Summoning up a ready store of courage for when the moment comes.  And always hoping that it won’t.  The fantasy –my fantasy—almost always involved a man with a gun, and me stepping between him and my daughter(s).  Though there was that time we got lost in Memorial Park and I began to consider the possibility of staring down a feral potbelly pig (the size of Okja)…

            But always there is the sense that a father will lay down his life for his child.  Becoming a father, means his life is not about him anymore; it is about protecting his child.  I know that the movies and comic books of my youth have had a lot of influence on this part of my fantasy life. I half imagine that somehow, when faced with a threat to my children I will, like the Hulk (or John Wayne), suddenly be filled with super human strength and be able to overpower whatever danger we encounter. Or, as fast as The Flash (or Bob Hayes), I will dart into the street, scoop up my child and leap out of the way of an oncoming car –or toss my daughter to safety just before the car sends me hurtling into the air.  Those are the fantasies of a father worried about protecting his children.  Hoping that when the time comes, he will lay down his life for his child; courageously, heroically, and without hesitation.

            And there is always the epilogue fantasy that involves something like a Hallmark Hall of Fame moment of the children in their maturity gathering together on the steps of the old wooden porch with a pitcher of lemonade and a plate of cookies (a box of old photographs) remembering their selfless father –the one they never really appreciated… until it was too late. But, oh how they appreciate him now… break for commercial. Closing Credits. Reminder that the DVD of tonight’s movie: My Father, My Hero is available at your local Hallmark store.

            But, with my youngest daughter graduating from high school, and my middle daughter about to move to another state for graduate school, and my oldest time traveling back to the Little House on the Prairie… I am reassessing that Hollywood hero-mode fantasy.  Opportunities for jumping in front of a speeding train or under a falling piano are getting fewer and farther between. 

            Which brings me back to the reading from the Gospel of John.  Whenever I hear this reading, hear Jesus speak these words to His apostles, His friends, I always think immediately of the cross.  And for the most part that makes sense. In the context of the Gospel, they are spoken during the last supper and therefore point directly to His cross. But when I think of how they apply to me, I have to wonder: When and where will Jesus ask me to lay down my life?  So far, nothing too dramatic –and I kind of like it that way.     I have never been in a position where I needed to step in front of a speeding bus, throw myself on a landmine, or climb the Eiffel tower to rescue an untethered dirigible filled with school children.  So, if God is asking me to lay down my life, then how? Where? When?

           Hmmm. How many times have I been in a situation where what I wanted, what I perhaps even needed, was somehow at odds with what someone else (my wife, for instance) needed or wanted?  And how many times have I been faced with the opportunity to lay down my want, my need, for the sake of another (my wife for instance)?  And how many times have I done it?  I can assure you, and so can many others (my wife for instance) –not nearly enough. 

            It is easy and even a bit thrilling to fantasize laying down your life for a friend when it means you will die heroically and be remembered lovingly, with a halo of glory surrounding your sacrifice.  But how hard is it to lay down your life when no one will notice, perhaps not even the person you do it for?  Where no one will remember?  How hard is it to lay down your life (your hopes, your dreams, your wants and even your needs) for the sake of a friend who has her (or his) own needs and wants and hopes and dreams?  How hard is it to lay down your life, one little piece of it, every day, just a little at a time?  Coming from someone who can get grouchy over spaghetti for dinner when he wanted tacos, I’m here to tell you –it can be plenty hard.

            But, perhaps this is how God is asking me to lay down my life.  A little bit at a time.  One cup of coffee or one piece of toast or one pot of spaghetti at a time.  Die to my wants, my desires, my self –just a little bit more each day.  How does it work? What does it really look like?

  Perhaps you take that moment you were planning to spend reading Hemingway on the back porch and instead offer to rub someone’s neck or their sore back –without being asked.  Or maybe you sit down with your daughter and say: I just read something interesting. I’d like to know what you think about it. And you really listen to what they have to say. You set aside your own thoughts, your own ideas, and you listen to the other. Give them an opportunity to be heard, to feel valued.  Maybe your martyrdom is measured not in blood and glory but in shared moments on the couch watching a Purple dinosaur sing and dance.  Or in cleaning up your child’s dinner dishes so she can finish her homework or get some sleep.  Maybe you lay down your life every time you set your complaints about work aside and offer to sit and share a cup of tea (or a quiet moment holding hands), or each morning when you offer your spouse the first cup of coffee fresh from the pot. 

Every time we turn from self (our plans, our needs, our concerns) and ask another person: May I help you with that? Would you like to go for a walk? You look like you could use a friend; is everything okay? Do you need to talk?  –don’t we lay down our life, at least just a little? We’re giving ourselves away, letting go… literally giving up part of our life (whether it is ten minutes or the next 30 years) for the sake of another. 

Thought about in that way, well… it makes you think.

            And it makes me think that most of my life I’ve looked at things wrong way round; dreaming of some big sacrifice that makes everyone see me as a hero… But what if the big sacrifice I was asked to make was really just a series of little sacrifices, little acts of kindness and selflessness each and every day that will mostly go unnoticed? What if the heroic part wasn’t the action, but the willingness to do it for the sake of another --without resentment, without bitterness, without letting my heart grow hard?  I doubt the Vatican will build a statue in my honor, or the Houston Chronicle even notice that I existed.  And maybe that’s part of it too. Lay down your life for another…

So, how do we know whether we’re really doing it? How can I know when I succeed? Or when I fail?  Who do we ask?  God, of course… and maybe someone who knows you really really well, someone who won’t hesitate to tell the truth (good and bad). Your spouse (for instance) or your children. I’m sure they will have a lot to say; and when they do, I recommend you just listen.