Brag on Him a Bunch

The place… Admiral, Texas. Never heard of it? No wonder… It is a ghost town. Once a thriving West Texas community during the late 1800s to early 1900s, now all that is left is an old Baptist church building and a cemetery.

Around 1990, my father-n-law, Aaron Rose, was about eighty-five years young. Because of a yearning he felt, he asked me to take him back to Admiral for a visit. His mother was buried there and he wanted to visit her burial site. She passed away giving birth to her fourteenth child. They had four girls and ten boys.

His dad never remarried, and the whole family sacrificed so that all the children would thrive and receive care. How hard would that be? I don’t even want to try to imagine.

Syble, Aaron’s daughter, is quick to sing his praises, and rightfully so... He was a man’s man-- disciplined, loved his family, worked hard, paid his bills on time, and loved Jesus and His Church with his whole heart. I never heard him even come close to saying a negative thing about anyone.

While at the cemetery in Admiral that day I discovered how he became such a good husband, dad, and person. He learned it from his father and from Jesus. His was just like his dad… positive, loving, and accepting. His dad didn’t do a lot of teaching; he just lived it before the family and spoke encouragement to each one.

Aaron told me they had so little money that his dad could not afford a gravestone, so he went out and dug up a slab of sandstone and shaped it into one. For weeks every afternoon he would sit under a tree with that stone. With a nail in his hand, he would etch deep letters in that stone while he wept.

Now you know how Aaron became the man he was… because of the influence of his dad. He may not have always done things right, but he always fixed it as soon as possible… and he loved the song, “How Great Thou Art.”

My father was a wonderful dad, too. He had a work ethic that “spoke” without saying a word. He said to me, as he was dropping me off on the first day of my first job, “Son, remember you are to work for the Royal Crown Bottling Company as you would work for the Lord.”

He was one of eleven children… seven boys and four girls. Even though they lived out of town on a farm, they were always in church each Sunday. His father, my grandfather, could hardly carry on a conversation without telling of his love for Jesus or of the exploits of Paul the Apostle.

As a young man, he seemed to pick me out of the rest of the grandchildren to sing with him, “I’d rather have Jesus than silver or gold; I’d rather be His than have riches untold; I’d rather have Jesus than houses or lands; I’d rather be led by His nail-pierced hand; Than to be the king of a vast domain, Or be held in sin’s dread sway; I’d rather have Jesus than anything this world affords today.”

Oh… I saw their imperfections. I wasn’t so blinded by their wonderfulness that I didn’t see their clay feet. Sometimes I felt a little hurt by them, but I knew they had my best interests in mind though it didn’t seem like it at times.

Would you like to know what the Lord spoke to my heart when I was thirty-six years old? He said, “Are you the kind of father you wanted to be? Were you the kind of father you thought you would be when you had your first child?”

I told Him that I had failed being the father I had wanted to be, but I was the best father I knew how to be at the time. I heard my heavenly Father chuckle as He said, “They did the best they knew how at the time, also.” That statement changed my heart forever.

Please, honor your dad this Father’s Day. Tell him of your appreciation. Give him a huge “telephone hug” or better than that… take him to lunch and brag on him a bunch.