For future generations

It was the late 80’s, a different time and place. Especially for a kid growing up in a small town tucked away in the Oklahoma Ozarks. We’d ride our bikes across town and go down to the creek, chasing crawdads and pulling leeches off our legs. My friend’s grandpa taught us how to throw cherry bombs off the bridge so that they would explode halfway down echoing through the hills. There was a town dog, a St. Bernard named Rocky. I have no idea who he belonged to, but when he heard kids playing on the playground at recess he would come trotting down and plop himself in the middle of us all, keeping guard. But Rocky wasn’t always able to keep us out of trouble. And in that part of the world and in that time, when a kid got in trouble it meant one thing: a paddling. I was a bit ornery back then and very familiar with the paddle. My second-grade teacher’s paddle hung next to the chalkboard, the principal’s behind his desk. Both of which I knew well.

I was going through a bit of a phase. I was getting into trouble at school most days and even managed to chase off a couple of babysitters. It all must have driven my parents to their wits end. So, when my dad walked up one Sunday morning to deliver his sermon and saw etched into the pulpit’s one-hundred-year-old veneer the letters M-A-T-T, I can imagine the frustration and disappointment he felt toward his oldest son that day.

After the service was over and the parishioners had gone home my dad led me to his office. He asked me if I had etched my name into the pulpit (as if there was anyone else who would have done it). But I lied, as if I could somehow save myself from what I knew was coming. In minutes the truth came out and I was told to bend over the armchair that set in the corner of his office. I closed my eyes as I heard his belt coming off. My whole body winced as I felt him come closer. I could sense his arm drawing back the belt, winding up for a blow to my backside. I remember it as if it were yesterday. It was as if the whole world stopped. The belt came whipping through the air and – WHACK! I heard the belt land hard. But I didn’t feel anything. WHACK! The belt landed again, and again I didn’t feel anything. I looked behind me not sure what was happening. Tears were running down my father’s face as he drew the belt back one more time and brought it down hard on the back of his own leg. Petrified I staired at him. “Matthew,” he said with a tenderness in his voice and what I now know to be grace in his eyes, “I’m not sure what’s going on with you lately and I don’t know what to do anymore. But I’ve taken this one for you because I love you more than you can imagine.”

My life changed that day. I learned more about Jesus from my father than I ever did from any felt board in Sunday school or in 90 credit hours of divinity school. How will you show future generations the greatness of his grace?