Today I miss my parents. It’s not that I haven’t missed my parents up until this point, but it hasn’t been quite this sever. As we drove around Tegucigalupa the smallest things would remind me of them. I was almost brought to tears as we stopped at a mechanic and saw that he was rebuilding a 1965 Ford Mustang. The same car my dad spent my whole life rebuilding. I know they’re proud of me. I know that as I grow, as I work hard, as I love who is around me they are proud. Today I have missed my mommy and my daddy.
But I’ve been struck with something else lately. I simply miss parents. Not just mine. But the idea of parenthood, fathers and mothers. I am in a family and I have never once felt the void in my life of brothers or sisters. I have 50 of them. But parents…sound advice…comfort when sick or tired…or wisdom from many years beyond my own…I miss that. On a daily basis I feel a void of this parental love. I see the street kids who have never met their fathers, the kids who have asked our man Tony to stay with him because it is a better life than with their own mothers. And my heart weeps, my heart breaks for them. I fought back tears today as our Men, Gabe and Devin, simply played with children who have grow up in one of the most dangerous areas in Honduras. Us ladies were talking with Tony and he was telling us the common story of most of Honduras: These kids most likely didn’t have fathers and there is a good chance none of them have ever had Men to play with, rough around with, chase them, laugh with them, love on them… In that moment I was never more thankful for the two Men God has currently blessed my life with. But more importantly I was thankful for the most important man(other than Jesus himself) God has ever blessed me with: My dad. Robert has always been a good man. He loved us, supported us, cared for us, taught us. Never once did I feel like there was anything I couldn’t do because I was a girl, and Robert is a huge part of that. This is the first of many moments I’m sure, I know we will encounter many fatherless children, but my heart is broken today. For all the little girls who never had daddies to chase them, tell them they are beautiful and deserve more, teach them how to check the fluids in their car, to just be daddies to them. For all the little boys who never had daddies to show them what Men look like, to show them how to treat their moms…sisters…girlfriends…wives…friends, to love them like every Man needs love.
So here is my call. Here is my anger. Here is to all the men I know. If no one has ever called you out, well I’m doing it now. Be Men. Be the Men that God created you to be. Strong, wise, caring, emotional, dependent, tough, Spirit-led…the list goes on. Women can’t love the world for you. You have to take on some of the responsibility yourselves. As we talked about the lack of real men in Honduras it came up that the US has the same problem. Why are the churches and mission fields flooded with women? Why can men not man up and start discipling the young? Showing those who don’t have fathers what manhood looks like. I’m tired of feeling guilty for not doing enough when in reality it’s not my job to be the man. It’s yours.
And sometimes discipling boys and young men, especially in a foreign country, doesn’t mean that you have to give your whole life. As I’m learning sometimes it’s just 11 months.
