Am I Merciful?

I want to preface this story with this. My father is the single most influential male figure in my life. I live the way I live today largely impart of the Godly example he set for me. You will understand why I preface this story with that comment when you hear it.

I was in sixth grade in Nampa Idaho. Like all sixth-grade boys in the Pacific Northwest I had a strong desire to be the next Steve Largent of the Seattle Seahawks. I declared my intent when I told my dad I wanted to sign up for youth football. My dad obliged, and I joined the Nampa city league youth football. Now…most people look at my physique and instantly guess that I must have been a real powerhouse on any football team. Of course, they don’t.

I was place on the team as a 5th string running back, occasional wide receiver, and half-back on defense. I like to joke that most football teams I played on had a special position for me. I played “Way-back” that stood for way-way back on the bench. I was TERRIBLE. I was the kind of kid that would wait until the tackle was made and then hop on the top of the pile and celebrate like I made the tackle. Physical contact wasn’t for me.

One particular Saturday I was at a game and my dad was there to watch. At this time in my life I had a nice little lawn mowing business happening. I mowed anywhere from 6-8 lawns per week. So as a result, we had loaded up the with Ford F-150 with the lawn mower and weed eater so that after the game I could stop by a client’s house and complete the mowing. This game was a typical game for me. I came in for a few plays and did my usually running around the field without a clue as to what I was doing and hopping on top of the tackle pile after the play was over.

When the game was over we hopped in the pick-up and headed to the job site. I notice something was different about my dad this time. He was quiet and deeply…well….troubled. I wasn’t sure exactly why and just blew it off at the time.

We arrived on the job site. I was still in my uniform as I had not brought a change of clothes. Lord knows it wouldn’t have mattered to get more grass on the already grass stained football pants. Of course, those stains were not created by tough, hard tackling but instead from just sliding around on the grass for fun! My dad got out of the driver side door and swung it shut particularly hard. HMMM! Something was up. Before I knew it, my dad had grabbed me by the shoulder pads and threw me to the ground! I was stunned to say the least. I looked at him stunned. He began to shout at me that football was about hitting people. I needed to hit people not just stand around and watch the game happen. At this point he began yelling at me to get up and hit him. I half-heartedly ran at him blinded by the tears in my eyes. He grabbed my shoulder pads and threw me to the ground. I sobbed heavily. Eventually I got angry enough I finally hit him fairly hard. I think he faked going to the ground. Once he got back up he said that was better. As I peeked around to see if anyone saw what had taken place I saw the curtains close behind the window at my clients house.

I tell this story often and I really feel no ill will towards my dad because if it. However, as we have spoken about it over the years the realization that this was a poor example of grace has come to the surface. You see, for my dad at this time I had to merit his favor in terms of acceptance as a football player. This isn’t grace. The outcome of course was that I didn’t play football much..which really was a good thing. As it turned out I was a much better distance runner than football player and this helped steer me towards that realization so in retrospect it really was a good thing.

I saw NO Mercy!

What is Mercy?

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