My Dad

Sep 25, 2013 by Jim and Jerolyn Bogear

Lessons from my dad:

As I type this, I am on a plane with Jerolyn headed to celebrate my day’s 80th birthday. Although he turned 80 back in July, due to schedules, basically my family, we are flying out now and are thrilled to once again get the family together to celebrate.

Recently, I have been thinking of mentors in my life and wanting to celebrate them. In my years in the church world I have worked for 3 senior leaders/pastors. There are many, many more who have influenced me as well up close for a season or from a distance, but I plan to write about them at a later date.

So here are some life lessons and principles dad taught me:

My dad taught me so much, but mostly about being a man of God. To this day his faith is strong and his continued expression of dependence on God is evident. He models his desire daily to grow in Christ, to be more like Christ, and although I believe incredibly holy, to learn and live as a disciple. Note here…he is 80 and still being refined. The process is just that — a process and journey. I am far from done and far from mastering many things including being a follower, learner, and disciple of Jesus. Help me Lord to always keep learning and growing.

He taught me about prayer. We didn’t grow up discussing what the term intercession meant. Suffice it say my dad is an intercessor in pray. I do NOT have that gift and tried to follow my dad in praying like him and as long as he does daily. I failed miserably. I am not like him, but learned the importance and power of prayer. My prayer life is different than my dad’s but the principle of prayer was instilled by him.

He also taught me about being a dad and being there for your family. Although it was a different era he showed us his expression of love through providing. He was present as much as possible but two jobs at times or constantly working on something around the house or on our vehicle often prevented him from being at many of our activities.

Dad taught me a great and strong work ethic. In college I worked as a pre-sorter for UPS. My supervisors and their bosses were very pleased with my performance from almost the beginning. There were discussions, positively most of the time:-), about me. One day my manager asked me directly about why I was performing at such a high level. My answer was the level of expectation from UPS was not as high as the level instilled in me in both attitude and work ethic by my dad. He had set the bar higher so that it was understood that I would do what it took to achieve and exceed the goals expected by anyone for whom I worked. Go in early, stay late, work off the clock, help someone out, a whatever-it-took-mentality was instilled by my dad. Let’s be clear, this is about my dad instilling this value in me than it is ever about me.

He taught us love and along with mom, they were married for over 58 years, a biblical marriage.

He really did demonstrate what it was to be a husband.

On both of these again, I do things much differently. Jerolyn and I have a much different looking marriage and parenting approach, but dad absolutely taught me so many principles of being a dad and husband.

Although there are many ways I live life differently, the incredible principles were instilled, mentored , and modeled by my dad.

Thanks dad for so many life lessons. Happy Belated Birthday. Thanks, Dad, for being my dad. Thanks for walking me to our Heavenly Dad. I trust I have and will continue to do the same for our children.

• What lessons do you need to remember that someone instilled in you?
• What lessons do you need to instill in and model for your children?
• To whom do you need to say thank you for what they have done in and for you?

~Jim