Stuff My Dad Said/Says (Father’s Day)

8 Replies

As an adolescent you tend to de value the wisdom of older folk. As the old story goes about fathers:

“When I was fourteen years old my father was so ignorant I could barely stand to be around him. When I turned twenty-one I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in just seven years.”

In honor of Father’s Day, I want to share some gems of wisdom from my father, Larry Daniels. This is the type of instruction you roll your teenage eyes at in the moment, and then years later look back and appreciate. The old man with red socks and a bald head maybe did know a thing or two:

Lazy folks always work the hardest.

As a naturally chubby lazy kid, this one was quoted ad nauseam to me. I took advantage of plenty of opportunities to prove its truth. In other words: Do it right the first time and you won’t have to redo it. I once remember pulling weeds out of our side ditches. Instead of hauling them off and throwing them in the backyard I threw them back down into the ditch near the drain. Clogged neighborhood drains usually aren’t up to code or satisfactory work for a dad. So naturally I had to go back down into the ditch, fish them out of the drain, and then haul them into the backyard anyways, all adding to my workload exponentially.

Boom: Lazy folks always work the hardest. Especially chubby punk kids with awkward bowl hair cuts.

Whatever you do, be the best you can be.

For this one, my usual sarcastic tongue in cheek response was: “I want to be a garbage truck man. You know, the one that rides on the back!”

My dad would respond without missing a beat: “Well, then be the best garbage truck man you can be!”

When I endeavored to play team sports, from T-Ball all the way up to HS football, dad’s common refrain was, “Don’t forget the three H’s: Hustle, Hustle, Hustle.” My best effort was always expected from me, and as current a father of two young sons I now expect the same from them.

It’ll make a turd

This is one of my favorites. My dad’s a barbecuing King. I’d match his hickory slow smoked ribs against anyone’s in the world. But in the circumstance we weren’t eating his perfectly smoked and seasoned dead animal, his common response was a shrug and:

“Well, it’ll make a turd”

This Big Mac may taste like a fart sandwich, but maybe we’ll get some nutritional value out of it at least.

Those three stand out, but there are plenty more nuggets of down home common sense I could share. The man is a virtual endless reservoir of American history and political knowledge. But I’ll stop there and say thanks pops for your consistent, strong, hardworking spirit. As the patriarch of our family, I appreciate everything you’ve done to lead and love us (especially those grandkids).

Bryan Daniels.

What are some gems from your father you would like to share?

I Hope Your Dreams Never Come True

5 Replies

Call me Captain anti-motivation and the King of Killed Esteem, but in a genuine sense, I hope my dreams never come true.

I hope your dreams never come true too.

dreams

CS Lewis’s wild eyed sea wanderer of “The Dawn Treader” gives a cautionary story to Caspian and his crew. They must turn back from the track they are on, the “Dark Island” awaits them beyond the fog:

“Fly! Fly! About with your ship and fly! Row, row, row for your lives away from this accursed shore.”

“Compose yourself,” said Reepicheep, “and tell us what the danger is. We are not used to flying.”

The stranger started horribly at the voice of the Mouse, which he had not noticed before. “Nevertheless you will fly from here,” he gasped. “This is the Island where Dreams come true.”

“That’s the island I’ve been looking for this long time,” said one of the sailors. “I reckoned I’d find I was married to Nancy if we landed here.”

“And I’d find Tom alive again,” said another.

“Fools!” said the man, stamping his foot with rage. “That is the sort of talk that brought me here, and I’d better have been drowned or never born. Do you hear what I say? This is where dreams -dreams, do you understand, come to life, come real. Not daydreams: dreams.”

After a short moment of thought, the crew scrambles to turn back the ship in manicked desperation. Why? Because it only took a few seconds for them to recall, “certain dreams they had had – dreams that make you afraid of going to sleep again – and to realize what it would mean to land on a country where dreams come true.”

Terror by night

As a child, I used to get night terrors. These are like nightmares on acid and steroids. I only vaguely remember them. I’d bolt upright in bed eyes wide open and crippled by an insane fear. I was inconsolable. Cold feverish sweats. Squirming. I seemed there, but wasn’t. Mom would take me outside on the front porch to look at the moon and stars and coax me out of this nocturnal horror.

I never could remember the exact plotline of those dreams, but I did know that something harrowing, unnatural and inevitable was coming after me. Running in quicksand would give way to terrified acceptance. To be “got” by such a brooding dark force was the hell of a six year old.

For my four-year old, Josiah, it’s spider nightmares. Big nasty black ones knee-high. Crawling up his leg in droves. This may be why his favorite superhero is SpiderMan. His greatest fear has become a force for good, a character he can adorn himself with without worry of poisonous bites. SpiderMan helps take the fangs out of spiders.

Spider Man Dreams

But Spiderman still needs to sleep in daddy and momma’s bed from time to time.

Studies show a healthy majority of dreams are nightmares. We romanticize good dreams, where we fly like an eagle over a disco beach party, or reunite with old family and friends over Merlot and T-Bone. But those are few and far between. Most dreams promote a tinge of foreboding and uneasiness. They aren’t just comedies, they are comedy-tragedies, where the other shoe drops on us and jars us awake.

The Deadly Daydream

Nevertheless, to “dream” holds a positive connotation in modern culture. Walt Disney World is a delightful kingdom where “All Your Dreams Come True.” “If you can dream it, you can achieve it,” says the motivational movers and shakers of Self Help fame. From a young age kids are indoctrinated to fearlessly follow their hearts and pursue their dreams into the great future abyss.

Selling the “American Dream” has become a multi billion dollar industry. Coats and boats, vacation homes and 2.3 kids, all have become synonymous with self actualization. Our dreams are filled with stuff and affirmation from people we don’t even like. We live vicariously through the beer commercial, like hot tubbing on a mountaintop or playing volleyball on a beachhead will cure our soul ills. This utopic nationalistic fantasy is just that:  fantasy.

When used in Hallmark Card terms these are daydreams, not dreams in the nocturnal sense. Even these fantasy daydreams have some unspoken darker themes. We dream up a land where we’re the King, where all manner of pleasures bow before our whims, where our closest family and friends would be marginalized and forgotten. If we’re honest, there are certain aspects to our daydreams we would never dream of sharing with our most intimate confidants.

If such recesses of our imagination came to flesh it would shipwreck our life.

We should hope and pray all of our dreams never come true.

That’s why Christ appeals to a Kingdom outside of us as a King over us. All while gently placing His Kingdom reign within us through the Holy Spirit (Luke 17:21). No man can know his own heart fully (Jeremiah 17:9). That sickly hollow muscle must be remade. A world where individual fallen man’s dreams all came true would be a literal hell indeed.

So we chase not after our dreams.

But after a King and a Kingdom.

Where all HIS dreams will come true for us. And nothing but His ultimate glory and our ultimate good will be the standard for our future. Our fantasies. Our sleep.

Bryan Daniels

To Be Ugly and Strong Like John Wayne

17 Replies

John Wayne

He didn’t walk, he ambled.

He had “swag” before the stupid word was invented.

For over thirty years in Hollywood film, John Wayne was the American icon of rugged masculinity and the consummate good guy. Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin ordered Wayne’s assassination as a result of his frequently-espoused anti-communist politics.

Awesome.

Before dying of stomach cancer Wayne requested his tombstone read “Feo, Fuerte y Formal”, a Spanish epitaph for “ugly, strong, and dignified.”

Awesome.

My dad, a roughneck country boy in his own right, has an obvious man crush on John Wayne. Growing up, whenever a John Wayne movie was found on the old movie channels, pops was transfixed instantly like a moth to a flame. He’d seen every one of the Duke’s movies 23 times…at least.

The modern movie stud is a little more metro sexual and sanitized. You wouldn’t want them to have your back in a bar fight anymore than you’d want SpongeBob Squarepants to cater your dinner party. Bradley Cooper is a good actor, but don’t tell me you see him taking on Iran’s Ahmadinejad in a heated war of words.

To be sure, there were always the more domesticated winky eyed Cary Grant’s and James Stewart’s on the scene. But they were nicely balanced by the rough and tumble Rooster Cogburn. That leather face and razor wit. If you were the bad guy, he felt just as comfortable cracking a joke at you as shooting you.

Your choice.

So here’s to a simpler time. Where the line between good and evil was drawn with thick black paint. Simpler is not synonymous with dumber. We like our heroes to be a little more twisted and torn nowadays.  Like the modern Christopher Nolan protagonists, Batman and SpiderMan wrestle with their darker tendencies while fighting for good.

But maybe we need a straight shooting straight talking Cowboy who will open up a can on society’s evil degenerates and restore order and justice for the victims.

I believe one day we’ll get that. 

But here’s to the late John Wayne and the era of manliness that died with him. Where real men protected women with strong hands, fought injustice with a fierce chivalry, and rode into the sunset of uncertainty with boldness.

When I grow up, I want to be “ugly”, “strong”, and “dignified” like that.

Bryan Daniels

Dirt Wars and The Bane In Us All

3 Replies

(I’m considering on devoting some of my summer time to completing a manuscript, with chapters and such, out of the theme of this post. This would be the incomplete rough draft of Chapter 1)

When I come home from work everyday, I’m ushered into an epic battle royale. Spiderman and his sidekick, the yellow power ranger, have put me in their sights. It may happen right when the door is opened, after dinner, or after bath time. But the beatdown is inevitably coming, like a Mark Wahlberg face off with the Mickey Mouse Club. Their barrage of face racks, shin kicks, chest hair grabs and ear piercing squeals cripple me on the ground.

Their request is unrelenting, “You be the bad guy, you be the bad guy!”

Once on the floor I’m open game. From my mock fetal position the two year old Ranger slaps the back of head, the four year old Spiderman canonballs from the couch into my side. We all collapse into a heap of justice and giggles.

Once upon a time it was Cowboys and Indians, now it’s Transformers and Decepticons. The principles are the same. Little boys are hardwired to admire heroes and abhor villains. They know inherently both are required in any storyline worth playing out. Both are a reality.

Children see it clearly with every nursery rhyme, cartoon, bedtime story and newsreel their parents watch. For them, it’s painted in disarming black and white. It’s expressed in unpretentious terms.

We need a hero.

Because

We have a villain.

When I was a child it was the Allies v Nazis. As the Cold War came to a crumbling end in the walls of Berlin, our youthful ire would also at times be directed to the “Commies.” Either way, we’d find the closest empty dirt lot in the neighborhood and quarter off our teams on opposite dirt hills. Armed with foot long PVC pipes we’d strategize our attack on how we’d take each enemy hill.

If you’ve never fought a dirt war you’re missing out. Stick the PVC pipe three inches in fill dirt and fling it towards your target like you’re throwing a football. The dirt will spread like buckshot and can be accurate up to 35 feet. If you’re a decent shot you can temporarily cripple your opponent with an eye blast for a good thirty seconds. Once you’ve taken the final Nazi hill a Dresden like bombardment on the cornered enemy will surely lead to total surrender.

Of course, instead of conducting war tribunals we’d go back to our buddy’s house and drink Capri Sun while playing NBA Jam (no way John Stockton could jump that high).

The bad guys always intrigued me. Whether it was Shredder, Darth Vader, The Joker or Wile E Coyote. Their dark motives fascinated me as a child. Other than that gut level attraction I didn’t have anything else in common with them. I was a suburban kid from a good family whose greatest crime against humanity was hiding his mom’s Victoria Secret under his bed. A diabolical scheme to rule the world didn’t quite resonate with me, but yet their twisted masterminding did in a way captivate me. The bad guys had layers of complex psychotic struggle that was supplemented by a brilliant maniacal laugh. The good guys were usually monolithic do gooders with a boring personality and cheesy smile.

As much as I love Captain America’s patriotism, his vanilla projection looks more comfortable playing in a ‘50s sitcom than battling the Third Reich. His pure All American motives and neatly parted hair made him a dull boy to me. In American cultural conscience, this is probably why a tormented protagonist like Batman exceeds Mr. Red, White and Blue in phenomenon.

How we view bad guys on the silver screen is one thing.

How we view bad guys in actual life is another.

When we hear the names Adam Lanza, James Holmes, or Dylan Klebold a romantic understanding of the word “villain” quickly wanes. But our collective fascination remains. When a heart rending tragedy like Newtown, Connecticut happens, our whole nation becomes transfixed not on victim, but perpetrator. Psychoanalyzing abounds, political posturing picks up steam, and prophetic voices lament a culture of violence in video games. Bystanders blame media, media blames the NRA, and the NRA blames Call of Duty. And the cycle descends into an incomprehensible shout match on network news between talking heads on opposing teams.

Surely, it’s okay to debate the state of our mental illness industry or gun control policies. But these are symptoms of a much greater disease. A disease that spreads and permeates into the recesses of our hidden dreams and nightmares.

Another word becomes apparent in all the intricate philosophizing of the tragic account. A word so blatantly clear we only mutter under our breath for fear of sounding like an ignorant child gripping dark age fairy tales dismissed long ago:

“Evil”

On public airwaves, this word is on the no fly list.

Not just evil in an abstract sense, “out there.” But evil in a tangible personal sense, “in here.” Not evil in the actions of sociopathic men, but evil in the heart of socially conscious me. This childhood intuition that intimates there are real heros and real villains is closer to truth than the educated meanderings of PhDs and lawmakers

And it’s not just something to curse out there.

It’s in me.

It’s in you.

There’s a Bane in us all. It can’t be excised by a surgeon’s scalpel or exorcised by a psychologist. This is always the world’s way. Manipulate and rearrange the outside and you have fixed and healed the inside. Like a zombie with an extreme makeover. For a time, behavior modification may work.

But the way to reach and conquer evil in hearts of men like me is not outside in.

It’s a track altogether impossible.

It’s from inside out.

Thankfully, there is one who majors in the impossible realm. He flows (super)naturally and effortlessly through the hidden recesses of the dark heart.

Jesus is the only lasting answer for terrorism and terrorists, wars and rumors of wars, fanatics and bigots.

Jesus takes the impossibly hardened heart and melts it like wax with his blood covered grace.

It’s before him that all superheros and villains and everyone in between must bow in awe.

Where perfect justice and hope for a better world is not just a comic plotline, but eternal reality.

Bryan Daniels

Like A Cocky Spelling Bee Finalist…

8 Replies

Spelling Bee

I competed in my fifth grade spelling bee. I was one of the biggest fifth graders in the elementary school. Kind of like those sixteen year old Puerto Rican pitchers with beards who illegally compete in the Little League World series…the only difference is that I belonged in the fifth grade.

“Horizon”

“Prosperous”

“Corridor”

None of these words were a match for my dizzying prebubescent intellect.

Twenty or so fellow class finalists stood before our school in the cafeteria/auditorium. After a few rounds the stage whittled down to a handful of contestants. I made it all the way to the final four. The top three went to the County wide spelling bee where a big gold plastic award and an eternity of local fame awaited you.

The final word given by the judges to me was:

“Geranium”

I was flippant in my respect for the stage and this word. I could spell this word backwards while playing “Sonic The Hedgehog.” I spoke into the mic confidently, yet a little too quickly than I should have.

“G-E-R-A-N-I-U-M, Geranium.”

I waltzed back to my seat, like Michael Jordan after hitting a buzzer beating game winning shot.

“Incorrect” said the judge in a bland tone.

I was dismayed as I took my seat with my fellow classmates. I knew I spelled it right. My teacher sat down beside me and asked me to re-spell it for her. She knew I spelled it right.

She made an appeal to the judges. They reviewed the tape and the decision stood. In my hurried haste I had pronounced the “M” to sound more like an “N” to them.

My brief stint of Spelling Bee legend wilted like a geranium in the Sahara.

Sometimes it is easy to be correct in truth and fact, yet wrong in presentation of it.

The burden of clarity is mostly on the communicator.

Orthodox meanderings divorced from a broken humbled heart can muddle rather than clarify the gospel we share.

Let’s not be a cocky fifth grader in our presentation of Christ to the world. There is no other message in all eternity that should be handled with more care. So much more is at stake with our speech than a long forgotten fourth place finish.

Bryan Daniels

The Father of Meth Heads

10 Replies

Every few weeks I lead a Sunday morning bible study at a local drug recovery center. Typically, my father in law leads this ministry but when he’s out-of-town or too busy I’m his back up teacher. I never turn down the opportunity.

Some of the faces I see again and again, but many are new. After jail time served this live-in program tries to prepare the recovering addict for life normalcy and a steady job. After three months or so most have met their counseling hours and legal court ordered requirements and they are given tentative freedom apart from the structure of the house.

All the faces at the study, men and women, are worn and marked by hard living no matter how young they are.

I used to wrestle with what message I could bring to these weary souls.

The extent of my illegal drug intake was a brief stint of youth binge drinking. I never served hard time for anything, just a few hours of community service for “underage consumption of alcohol.” Spring break court got me off easy.

The stories of these struggling addicts testifies of meth labs, broken families, prostitution, theft, and strings of court proceedings.

I’ve found I don’t need to pound much on their sinfulness and wickedness. The fallout from their fallen nature is all too evident to them. They’ve been pegged mercilessly by the curveballs of life. It’s all staring at them in the mirror every morning.

They know their grave error(s). They’ve made a shipwreck out of their lives, their families, their careers. They’ve abused the trust of those who love them most They’re at this voluntary weekly bible study because they’re well aware of all this.

The Law misapplied would only exponentially add to the guilt they daily carry.

So I don’t speak much at all about addiction or how to be a better parent, church member, or law-abiding citizen. I can’t offer much in the way of witty sounding psycho babble and I’m not qualified to lead them up the mountain of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.

I choose to speak about grace.

I speak about a Father who adopts rebellious children, regardless of dark pasts, A Father who supersedes and perfectly satisfies the deep intimate family craving they’ve felt since an infant.

I share what it means to be adopted by a King.

What it means to be an heir of His Kingdom.

What it means to have an elder brother sacrifice His life for us.

What it means to be a child.

I don’t know if that is exactly what they need or want to hear. I know it is the best news I can muster up for bruised reeds who are already broken.

Their addiction doesn’t have to be the all consuming label of their lives. The Father of Addicts sees them through the lens of His perfect Son’s blood. And they likewise are perfect.

Whole. 

Beautiful.

Precious children forevermore.

Bryan Daniels

The Greatest

7 Replies

There’s nothing you can do that could make God love you more than He does right now. There’s nothing you can do that could make God love you less than He does right now. That’s the nature of His grace.

Some may posit this sounds like “cheap grace.” That such a strain of theology will produce lazy Christian workers and spoiled children.

But it’s a grace that cost God everything in giving His own Son to be a rejected bloody spectacle for us. This grace has a high eternal value incalculable to finite minds. Can we return the favor? Can we reciprocate such a sacrifice?

Can we ever repay?

Never.

That’s kind of the point of grace.

“But we shouldn’t take it for granted!”

No, we shouldn’t. And the Law tells us as much. But the Law can’t empower or comfort us towards new life. The gospel of grace does that. And reality is, we’ve taken God’s grace for granted before our feet even hit the bedroom floor each morning. The oxygen in my nostrils, the sleep I got in my own bed, the roof over my head.

I take all these for granted at least everyday.

The way forward in life toward broken humble gratitude is in a revelation of the all consuming unconditional grace granted to us in Christ.

I always appreciated Martin Luther’s response to a works minded magistrate who said to him, “If I believed what you did I’d do what ever I want to do!”

Luther asked:

“Well, as a blood-bought-born-again-child-of-God what exactly do you want to do?”

It’s a life far from perfect. But it is a life transformed through a daily experience of undeserving favor. Adopted children sealed into the family with their elder brother’s blood cannot forfeit their rights because of immature stumblings and addictions.

After falling, they get snatched up by the strong arms of the father with a little more thankfulness, and dependence, and humility. And they’ll never stop needing this grace anymore than they’ll stop needing water or breath. Dying to self is akin to dying of self-dependence. We are reliant on the daily care of the Father every bit as much (and more) than a newborn baby is to his mother.

I’ll never stop having the impulse to scoop my son’s up when they’re in falling into a ditch of their own making. I’m a fallen man. How much more complete and loving is the perfect Father’s love towards us as His children (1 John 3:1)?

Grace purchased for us by the Heavenly Father’s sending and the only Son’s sacrifice sounds like the gospel.

Good news.

No, great news.

The greatest.

Bryan Daniels