There are numerous reasons I look up to my dad.

Growing up he worked hard. Really hard. He took side jobs and overtime just to keep our family barely solvent. He served our church and our mom.

He got out of bed at 3:50 every morning to be at work in Wylie so we didn’t have to live and go to school in the city. He got home at 6:30 every night just in time to shower, eat supper, and help mom with the dishes.

If there were ball games, he was there. Track meets, present. Baseball games, on the sidelines. He is a tireless servant. But that’s not the best of it.

Outshining all his “deeds” are the piercing rays of his heart for Jesus. I know now the things he did for us, the things he sacrificed and did without were all an extension of who Christ was and is in him; they were reflections of Jesus.

He proved this truth once again this past week. We sat at his table discussing a teaching in the church community we grew up in and I heard him say, “all these years we’ve taught it one way, and we were wrong.”

A man who turns 70 next month and continues to allow his beliefs and his character to be shaped by the Word of God is a man to be respected, a man to be heard when he speaks, and a man to be loved.

Like Paul, we would do well to imitate him as he imitates Christ.

He may walk more slowly than he once did and be a little more bent in his stature, but to me, he will always be 10 feet tall. I love you, Dad.