When I was younger, I figured I would eventually get married and have kids.  After all, I was Larry the Cucumber at Vacation Bible School, and all of those kids either wanted to be me or marry me someday!  I think we all are familiar with the phrase “Cool as a Cucumber,” and I couldn’t imagine that fatherhood would be much different than a day of Vacation Bible School on repeat. 

And I remember thinking to myself, “There are a lot of lame, uninvolved parents out there…how sad.  How hard can this parenting stuff really be?”

Well, life is a series of one humbling event after another.  And trying to equip your own child, whose common-sense cortex has yet to develop, with a Christ-like compass, is a task that will bring you to your knees.  Being a parent makes you feel a lot less like Larry the Cucumber and more like a pathetic pickle in a brine of befuddlement much of the time.  I care too much to ever be uninvolved, but I have definitely felt lame more often than I’d care to admit.

But when I ask my daughter what matters in this life, and without hesitation she says, “Love God, love people,” I feel like we’re on the right track.  And when she wakes up and the first thing she wants to do is make a friendship bracelet for a kid she met at McDonald’s, that blesses my heart.

I relish the responsibility of being a Father, but I know that pride goes before a pickle, so I pray that God gives me the strength, humility, and fortitude to remain Cool as a Cucumber as she continues to grow up.  Fatherhood isn’t always a fairytale or even a Veggietale, but it sure is beautiful.  Happy Father’s Day, guys😊