My Dad, Mark Twain, St. Paul, and All Dads

WHERE WE WERE YESTERDAY

In a recent text convo with a friend, I wrote this —My dad (who died at 48, just before my Senior year in high school), regularly quoted to me a line attributed to Mark Twain: “When I was 13, my father was an idiot. It’s amazing how smart he got by the time I was 21.” Yup.— I never got to tell him. (Cue up the play, I Never Sang for My Father, right?)There’s a lot nobody told us. Or maybe I wasn’t listening.To stuff like, “‘Honor your father and mother’—which is the first commandment with a promise — ‘so that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth.'” (Ephesians 6:2 + 3)

AND SO HERE WE ARE TODAY —

“Fathers, do not exasperate your children,” advises our old friend St. Paul. “Instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.” (Ephesians 6:4)

And right there’s a two-parter: what not to do …and what to do instead.

Said Joe, looking in the mirror.

I notice that Paul’s directions seem not to have an Expiration Date….