Qualifications[1]
I am a parent. My wife and I raised two children. I am a grandfather of one. Those are the qualifications that I present
to you today. Are they sufficient to
help other parents coming along to be better parents? I don’t know.
But, I would like to at least believe that something that my wife and I
have done worked to our advantage to raise two outstanding young people, of whom
we are very proud.
When we talk about parenting, we know
that it is perhaps one of the few things that we rarely have to actually
qualify to become. By an act of nature,
and/or the grace of God, many of us become parents. That’s God’s plan. We can’t change that. What other qualifications do we have to put
forth in order to not only bring another person into the world, but to ensure
that that wonderful gift of life, rises to become a great human being? Whatever qualifications we lack for, I have
to believe that God instills within each one of us a latent qualification. That latent qualification, irrespective of
whatever else we possess in our natural being, is the ability to give love to
another precious life, and make them feel as special as they are. That speciality is the speciality that God
feels towards us, and we have to take that spirit of love that he gives us, and
instill it within the children that God blesses us with. With that said however, loving our children
isn’t enough.
If the only qualification for parenting
would be just to love our children, we would have been pandas, lions, or
eagles. As we know, most animals follow
the path that nature sets out for each species and do exactly the same thing to
raise its young, eventually, pushing them out of the nest, all because the
extent of their responsibilities is to complete the “Circle of Life”[2]. But, and contrary to popular belief, the
behavior of many of those of us who are parents, we are not animals. We are human beings and we have the ability,
if we choose to, to raise some truly magnificent young people for the future. But we have something about us that not only
will not just help us to be great parents, but to motivate us to be the best
parents possible. How can we, at the very
least, be good parents? Here is a
perspective: Footprints.
Footprints?
Obviously, when we talk about
footprints, we can think about footprints left in the snow, in the sand, or in
the mud. From those footprints, we are
able to tell several things, with a novice eye.
For example:
1.
Who or what made the footprint;
2.
What direction the prints are going;
3.
What kind of shoes they were wearing, or how
many toes they had;
4.
Whether they were running, walking, or even
tiptoeing;
5.
How many sets or prints were present;
6.
We can tell if there were large-size
footprints, or, if there were a family of footprints.
From our review of any set of
footprints, so much information can be extracted. So much can be used for someone to make a
determination about what direction someone came from, perhaps if they stood
around, met with someone, and what direction they moved in when they left a
certain area. And perhaps, if you are an archeologist, or a forensic
specialist, you can tell the approximate weight and height of a being by the size
of the footprint. What does this have to
do with parenting? Maybe it’s a stretch,
but I think for of us as parents, we need to understand something about our own
footprints, when it comes to our children.
Not the footprints that we make on the
ground, but the footprints in terms of the messages that we leave behind us
when we take on the role of parenting.
As parents, we don’t have the luxury of getting a pamphlet, booklet, or
even a set of directions that comes with the precious, new bundle of life. Therefore, if we are wise, and perhaps
fortunate, we will be able to look to the leadership of our own parents. But that is more ideal than realistic.
Some of us, as soon as we become
parents, are “too grown” and believe that, if we have a child, we will get the
hang of it, and that everything will work itself out. Sadly, that isn’t always the case, but
hopefully, we are always giving it our best.
As we all know, things don’t always work themselves out. What we may learn about that new bundle of
joy is that their personality doesn’t necessary adapt well to everything that
we want them do. What we learn is that
they cry, but they don’t stop crying when you rock them gently. They don’t eat everything that you give them,
they spit it out. We even learn that
they seem to always get a fever in the middle of the night, and that you have
to rush them to the hospital. Babies
aren’t very compliant, even to us, their parents.
Reflectively, as parents, we have to
believe that our children, as they grow up, that they are always watching
us. I want to believe that if we are
doing justice by our children, that whatever we do, our children will follow
behind us in our footsteps. From the
moment they are able to walk, they follow us.
We take them by the hand, lead them across busy streets, take them up
tall stairways, and carry them to places where we always want them to be safe. If there is a good way, perhaps not the best
way, but a good way of determining how good a parent we are, or want to be,
then we should also understand the importance of what we leave behind for our
children to follow, even if it’s just footsteps.
“Pawpaw,
I want to follow you!”
Our grandson, Josh, Jr., is a handsome
and awesome little fellow. I say that
because he is my grandson, and because, he is a handsome and awesome little
fellow. As he reached that mature age of
three, his curiosity was nothing short of extraordinary for a three year
old. He is five now, an old man, but
there is one thing that he said that always stuck with me. Josh was by our house, his mom, dad and Mimi were
there just enjoying each other’s company.
It came time for us to eat. After
it was decided what we were going to eat, I got ready to go out. Despite little Josh’s seeming to be totally
engrossed in playing with his toys on the floor, he jumped up and ran behind
me. He pulled on my hand, and said,
“Pawpaw,
I want to follow you.”
I looked at him and I looked at his mom
and dad, and his grandmother. The words
were an anchor around my heart, because he didn’t ask could he go with me, he said that he wanted to go with me- that
he wanted to follow me. You know this touched my heart, because I
love this little boy so much. I was
pleased, yet caught off guard at his choice of words.
I had no intention of not taking my little
Buddy with me. His little car seat was
always at the ready in the back of the car.
On this particular day, his desire to go with me was punctuated by an
innocence that I was not prepared for.
To this day, I think about that moment because I never wanted to go
where my grandson couldn’t follow. So I
ask you today, as parents, if we were leaving the house, but for our jobs, or
business gatherings, where do we go, that we tell our children, they can’t come
with us? How often, if our children had
to find us, could they follow our footsteps to find out where we have been in
our lives? More importantly, would we
want our children to follow all of the steps that we have to make as their
parents, or, would we want to somehow sanitize our footprints? Would we want to erase some of the things
that we have done for our children, or the places that we have gone just to
make our children’s lives complete? And
if so, what footprints would we want to erase to be sure that our children had
the best impression of who we, as parents were?
Footsteps to be Erased
As our children grow older, we start to
let go of their little hands, allowing them to venture out a little more out on
their own. It could be a question of
whether we rushed to let go of their hands, or whether they fought for their
little independence. But eventually, our
children began to live their own lives, or try to. They try to live their lives apart from the
lives that we try to carve out for them.
It becomes a challenge as a parent, the older our kids become to keep
them in a way that protects them from the ills of society. Little do they know how much we put into
making their lives as best as possible. We
want only to expose them to the good in the world. Unfortunately, it isn’t always our choice
what our children are exposed to, when they are exposed to it, and whom it is
we need to protect them from. But by all
means, we do our level best to minimize the negative impact of anything that
may impact our children’s lives.
So little do we want our children to
know, that if they had to look back on the lives that we have made possible for
them, they would think that their were times when we didn’t want to be at their
games, or go to school to meet with their teachers. They would think that for all the times that
we missed their recitals, or didn’t come home early to help them with their
homework, that we were doing something else that was seemingly more important
than them. If only we could erase some
of the footprints that we have left in their minds believing that we didn’t
place value on the things that were extremely important to them. What would we erase?
I think we would like to erase the
footsteps where we stood in the cold early morning rain, waiting for a bus to
catch to work, while they laid at home in a warm bed. For it would have been so much easier to have
stayed at home. But we did what we had to do to put food on the table.
Let’s us erase from our past, the
footprints that we left behind, trying to find the best schools in a community
of low performing schools. Let us make
difficult for our children to ever know that we worked 2 or 3 jobs, often for
minimal pay, just so they could have the kind of things that made their lives
livable.
Or perhaps, we weren’t so good of
parents that we spent nights out partying when our children needed someone to
help them with their homework. We
definitely don’t want them find those footprints. If we could arrange for it, maybe we could
arrange to remove from our past the number of times we tried to intervene
between our children and their so-called friends, whom we suspected of or knew
led a life that would impair our children’s future, even though our children
thought we were being mean and judgmental.
But if someone erased any part of our
past, they may also erase our future as parents. We have to be careful of what we ask for if
we want to selectively take something out of our past, because it may affect
our children’s ability to make decisions that may help them going forward. For us, as parents today, we can’t change our
past. We may not want our children to
know some of the things that we did that either helped or hindered our children
from doing things that they would have ordinarily done, but we can’t change it,
and we have to live with those decisions.,
(Perfect
Parents-inserted)
The
misconception that many of may have is that we have to be perfect parents. I don’t think that is possible. We do not live in a perfect world. While God
made us perfectly, He did not make us perfect.
He gives us an opportunity to show just what we are capable of doing, in
all that we do. So as parents, we just
need to show that we are doing our best regarding our children. Because perfect parents is more of a myth than
a reality, to me.
In our attempts to erase the past, we
put at risk the lessons that we are able to teach our children in order to be
the best that they can be. In our
attempts to erase our past (good, bad or indifferent), we try to give an
impression that we were perfect parents while raising our children. That is not for us to decide. It will be for our children to decide. So, what if our children decide to research
the footprints that we have left behind?
Let them.
Let
Our Past be Their Present
If as parents, we are the only ones
saying that we were, or are, good parents, then, we have a problem. If that is our goal, to be good parents, the
manner in which we accomplish that has to be reflected in how we put our best
foot forward. We have to know that if
our children, or if anyone else for that matter, researches how we raised our
children, we shouldn’t be afraid for what they will uncover. If our intent was to be the very best mother,
or the very best father, we have to know that we are not going to do everything
in perfect harmony.
As parents, each step that we make, could
possibly be made in error. We are going
to make mistakes. Remember, children
didn’t come with instructions. But we
all, theoretically, came with common sense.
We all, theoretically, came with the ability to love our children and do
right by them. Even if we love them
unconditionally, we are still going to make mistakes. If we love our children unconditionally, and
we are doing the very best that we can to raise them as God had intended, we
won’t spend time second-guessing everything that we do for fear that someone
believe we were not good parents.
(Pray
for guidance-inserted)
At
some point in time, hopefully sooner, rather than later, you will be praying to
God for guidance. Why shouldn’t
you? He made it possible for you to have
children or to adopt a child. He has
entrusted each of us to give to our children the very best of what God gives to
us. And if there is a point where we
feel we don’t know what to do, and we can’t turn to someone that we can trust,
then we can trust that God will provide a way for us to raise our children
according to His will. Get down on your
knees and pray to God for directions. But don’t wait until you get into a bind with
your children, lean on God daily for His intervention and His helping hand to
help you guide your child in the way that He would have them to go.
If we love our children
unconditionally, our children will learn that despite the fact that we denied
them things growing up, that it was not for the hell of it, but because we just
couldn’t do it. We couldn’t afford
it! It was not the right time! It was not in keeping with what you as parent
believed was right for them! Our
children will learn one day, that the reason they were able to march across a
stage was because of the sacrifices that we made to ensure that they could
receive a small piece of paper. Let our
children look back and meticulously study, if they wish, the footprints that we
left behind showing that our love we to ensure that they never had go through
what we go through just to make it.
I would encourage not one of us to
consider erasing, or regretting the many hard decisions that pitted us as
parents against our children, for fear that our children would not like
us. Let them discover how hard it was to
say “no” to them for something that may have meant the world to them. Let our children discover those set of
footprints that showed pacing; that showed worry; that showed joy; that showed
love, and that showed patience and support at times that they never knew
existed.
If our children take the time to
research our past, let it be a present to them.
Let their research be an indicator of our unconditional love. Let their research show that we turned to
God, and that somewhere within all of those footprints, there were knee-prints,
where we either gave thanks to God for bringing them home, or for watching over
them while they were away.
Let our past be a present to them that
it showed the kind of love where we stepped out on faith, believing in God,
that we were gong to make their lives the best that it could be. We should never want to erase the steps that
we made, however painful, embarrassing, or however joyful. Let it be a present to our children, that they
uncover the countless number of minutes, hours and days that we spent trying,
just trying, to be good parents.
As a present to them, let them unwrap
how important we believed their dreams were, and that even if we couldn’t make their
games, their recitals, or special events, we made sure that they were able to
achieve their highest and best in all that they did.
In
Conclusion
To you, the Parental Class of
2013-2014, I ask that as you go about your parental duties, that you continue
to plant your feet firmly in the responsibility of being a parent. Leave your footprints, well place. Perhaps it was a stretch to call our works as
parents footprints, but we sometimes need a way to connect. As parents, we have to be aware of what it is
we do, or need to do to be at our best. We
know we can’t be perfect parents. That’s not possible. We can complain about the lack of
instructions that come from raising our children, but the important element of
having our children is the unconditional love that God bestows upon us, and
that He simply asks, and entrusts in us, that we will do the same for the children
that he blesses us. All God asks us to
do when things get a little rough, just to fall on our knees and ask Him for
the helping hand that he surely will provide.
It is very hard to be a parent,
bringing another life into this world.
There all kinds of evil that lurk in this world, ready to take advantage
of an unprotected, unloved child. As
parents, we can’t protect them at every turn, but we can leave a lasting
impression of how much we try, day by day.
Sure, there are things that we do as parents, we would never want our
children to ever know about, but then again, we have done those things because
we’ll be damned if we ever allow anyone to harm our children. That’s that unconditional love. And if our children decide that they want to
follow us, it’s because we have demonstrated to them that we were good parents. And if we see them carrying out the same
level of love for their children that we did for them, having helped them
accomplish so much in their lives, then, we would have to conclude that we did a
pretty good job.
As parents, I ask that you feel
empowered, encouraged, inspired, and uplifted from this day forth. I ask that you continue to walk with our
children, hold their hands for as long as we can. Walk with them to school and leave your
footprints; Walk with them to church and leave your footprints; Walk with them to the hospital in the middle
of the night with a high fever and leave
your footprints; Walk with them away
from danger and leave your footprints; Walk with them to the playground and
leave your footprints. Walk with them
to the dinner table, clear it off, and
help them do their homework, stand by their sides, and be sure to leave your
footprints; Walk with them to their
bedsides, kneel with them, leave your knee prints; Walk with them wherever we need
to be, knowing that we are leaving loving footprints in their lives.
As I close, members of the Parental
Class of 2013-2014, let it be okay for our children to uncover the footprints
that we have left behind us. And let
them discover those things, good, bad or indifferent that we have done as
parents. Let it be a present to
them. Maybe, it will be for them a set
of instructions, or a roadmap to how we were able to help them to achieve their
best through some of the most difficult of times of our lives, while they never
knew what was happening. I encourage
each of us to continue to leave our footprints as parents. Do not change a thing. That we continue to parent each and every
child from this day forth not fearing the loss of their love, but gaining the
confidence in all that we do for them;
that we plant our feet firmly in the decisions that we make, with God’s
guidance, and that we set high expectations for our children.
Plant our feet firmly, Parents, in the
belief that our children will challenge us even as we try to do everything
possible to make their lives the best that it can be. Don’t second-guess yourselves as
parents. Don’t you waiver; don’t you relent, and don’t you give up on
our children. Plant your feet firmly,
and know that in the end, you will have done the very that you could to raise
one of God’s most precious gifts. Plant
your feet every time you take a stand in parenting each of your wonderful
children. Plant your feet, knowing that
one day, they will rediscover that you had a love for them that you couldn’t
just tell them about, you showed them.
You showed then, and you will continue to show them from this day
forth.
As I close parents, I encourage each of you to
plant your feet and leave an everlasting footprint for not only your children,
but for all of the world to discover.
Plant your feet, firmly, and leave an unmistakable footprint of the love
that you have for your children. Be
Blessed.
