MY DERRING-DO DAD WINSDAY WISDOM

SESSION 19

My mom once called Dad, Mr. Derring-Do. That’s right, derring-do. The dictionary describes derring-do as heroic action, courageous, daring to be brave. And, yes, that is the correct spelling, derring with an “e,” not with an “a.”

The phrase comes from another generational era. It appears in the Walter Scott novel, Ivanhoe, where the knights joust in life and death charges. Previews of an old classic Errol Flynn movie promote “this swashbuckling hero and his tales of derring-do.”

Never heard that phrase? I can recall hearing the phrase only twice. Mom’s “Your dad is Mr. Derring-Do” comment was probably a little sarcastic, and my uncle Derwin’s remark “that our actions were a little derring-do” was most assuredly connected to some humorous adventure by his younger brother and him. It might have been the time they hid the family’s dead rooster on the roof from their mother. It seems the rooster did not survive being substituted for a flat basketball. Apparently, there was just one too many trips through the homemade basket on the side of the house.

I ask you, “Does this little boy in the middle of the porch look like a future Derring-Do?”

When my dad was studying post-graduate mathematics, he received a very unusual comment from his instructor. The teacher returned the weekly test with a large checkmark and comments scribbled in red, “Your math equation is correct, but the answer is wrong.” 

Although my dad worked the problem accurately, he ended up with the wrong answer to the question. How did that happen? He started with the wrong math formula. Therefore, he totally missed the whole point as well as the right answer to the problem.

Joey, one of the main characters on Friends, was like that. He was not dumb, just always incorrect. His answers were confident, but wrong.

We all have relationships that have gone wrong. It is easy to blame the other person as difficult or demanding or disappointing. We tried to make it work, but did we start with the wrong premise? A God-centered formula will always end up with the correct answer, Love First and Love Most.

Thankfully, Dad did not miss the answer to the most important thing in life. My dad’s real-life story had similar themes to the classic Christmas movie, It’s a Wonderful Life.

My dad and his three brothers were mistreated by an abusive, alcoholic father and raised in poverty by an uneducated single mom. Their past was less than ideal; their future looked bleak.

One night, the oldest son was horse-whipped for interfering with the physical abuse his drunken father lashed upon his mother. Under the cover of darkness, my grandmother and her four young boys left for safer quarters. Her five-year-old son would someday be my dad.

As the oldest brother carried the baby, the other three in this homeless caravan carried pillowcases with all their earthly goods. They followed the railroad tracks in the nighttime shadows. They climbed through fences and crossed fields. Soon, they had a new home in a chicken coup.

However, the boys had the courage and faith not to allow their past pain or present circumstances to define their future. Each brother was a derring-do. With God’s care, they changed the destiny of our family. They were helped along the way by their mother who kept them in church and caring teachers who kept them in school.

Three generations of our family namesakes are involved in coaching, teaching, and ministry today because our dad, his brothers, and godly mother would not allow the hate of one man to ruin their lives.

Dad could have used the excuse of his father’s uncaring absence, but instead, he embraced the love of a Heavenly Father. He passed that legacy on to us. As adults, he and his brothers traveled to the west coast in a Volkswagen to reconcile with their father.

What about you? What about your life? Excuses or courage? God is reaching out in love to say you are of great value.

Bad circumstances do not need to define you. Be strong and courageous. God is with you and for you to change your life and subsequent generations for the better.

All of life is a stewardship issue, whether the life belongs to my dad, George Bailey, or us. Tough days come to all of us, whether early or late in life.

No matter how painful suffering comes and how long it lasts, it is only temporary. Some days it does not feel that way; some days it does not look that way. Some days we want to quit, hide in the chicken coup, or jump off a bridge.

However, difficult circumstances should never define us; neither should our suffering. They only reveal what is inside of us.

When anything is squeezed, whatever is on the inside comes out!  It might not necessarily be what is on the label. I once squeezed an orange expecting orange juice but got surprisingly squirted with purple Gatorade which had been infused into the fruit. I have used that as a teaching illustration for my talks with football teams.

Sometimes, people wear slogan embossed T-shirts which are not representative of what is inside the shirt. I have been cussed-out by a lady in a God loves coffee shirt. I witnessed an older man wearing his Philadelphia Eagles outfit spew out hatred for the home team.

An individual does not lose his temper; he finds it when he gets squeezed.

When you get squeezed, what is on the inside comes out. So, fill up with love for others before they squeeze you with their hurtful words and hateful actions. Be prepared for a day in your Wonderful Life.

I never lived with an abusive, alcoholic father or called a chicken coup my home. Neither have my children or my grandchildren or my sibling’s families. Why? Because of God’s goodness to my dad through a “George Bailey” whose good deeds helped my grandmother’s struggling family. His kindness allowed them to move into a tiny shack. The boys earned money from farm chores.

My dad became a Hall of Fame coach and educational administrator. However, it was not the many victories on the gridiron and basketball court that made him a derring-do. Dad became the George Bailey of our small town. His acts of kindness became the toast of at-risk young men and women who experienced “generational change.”

I grew up in the days of school integration and the early part of the Civil Rights movement still going on today. My dad was on the front lines of the change that was coming. I realize these words are being written in the days of “woke” and “cancel” culture. There are social calls for the privileged to speak up when silent. Then the same critics yell for the speakers to be silent when they speak up, branding their words as “tokenism.” Although still unresolved, Civil Rights is not a new issue.

All I can do is tell the truth of what I saw and learned from my perspective as I watched my dad. It is certainly not the whole story, which is still being written. I saw my dad treat people of all colors with dignity and respect and love. He taught our family to do the same.

I saw Dad treat young men with different colored skin as if they were his own sons. Then I watched as those men became fathers and brought their sons to our house to meet my dad, their coach, their George Bailey. I remember their words, “Son, I want you to meet Coach. This is the man God used to change my life and yours.”

Those visits from my dad’s former players greatly impacted my life. He used his platform of influence to help others. He remembered what it was like not to have a father. He remembered what it was like to walk those railroad tracks in the darkness of night. He remembered living in a chicken coup. He never forgot the people who helped him.

I watched my dad lead his teams out of restaurants who refused to seat all his players in the same area. The plates of chicken fried steak and hot mashed potatoes were already on the tables. When the owner ordered some of the players to go to the back to eat, my dad ordered the whole team back on the bus to go home.

If the coach’s team played together, then they rode the bus together and they would eat together at the same table. I remember climbing back on the bus with the team as we left those hot rolls in the basket. More than once, angry café owners would loudly curse my dad before they relented in the face of lost revenue. Derring-do?

On several occasions, his team sat together side by side, black and white, in the balcony of movie theatres who assigned that place to people of color. The culture was wrong; but love for one’s brother, no matter his color, is always right. That should not have to be a tale of derring-do.

I saw my dad lead the first African-Americans to our church. He sat next to them amidst the exit-protest of at least one church member couple.

Culture does not have to define us or conform us, then or now. Love first. Love most.

My real life “George Bailey” dad helped many young men become the first in their family to go to college, young men who lived in poverty with unstable and dysfunctional families. Most suffered from an insufficient educational environment, poor community support, and adverse childhood experiences. Many struggled with feelings of abandonment, isolation, estrangement, and trauma.

As my brother wrote in a newspaper editorial,

“This world often defines individuals by the name of the street where they live. The haves and the have-nots. The ones like “Us” and the ones like “Them” are pitted against one another. Prejudices, websites, networks, and social media are full of news and fake news driving us even further apart.

It is fashionable and acceptable to unload on “them” and vice versa. Hate speech and name calling. Division, fear, hurt, and more hate. Us against Them.” –Bill Blankenship

If you start with the wrong formula, then you will end up with the wrong answer, even if you mean well. Life was not designed to be self-centered. All the answers will end up eternally marked as incorrect. A God-centered life in which we love like our Heavenly Father will always lead to the right answer for every relationship.

LOVE FIRST. LOVE MOST.

My nine-year-old grandson came home from school and stopped to watch the TV news coverage of the Capitol riots. As he headed to his room, he remarked, “I think if George Washington were here, he would be so embarrassed this was happening to our country.” 

We should all be embarrassed wherever and whenever there is hatred and hostility. Are you focused on those you hate? Or do you learn from your Heavenly Father who loves everybody? “We become like the one we behold” (#1 Textbook).

Justice is doing what is right. Remember the most important standard for what is right in life: Love God and love others. Follow Jesus and do what He does, wherever and whenever.

Justice equals Just-Us, treating one another the way we want to be treated. Love all others, especially anyone different from you. Love them first and love them most. Forgive first and forgive most.

LIFE CHANGE MATTERS. We can change, but the only one you are responsible to change is yourself. It is not too late for you to change for the better. Love First. Love Most.

LOVE IS COURAGEOUS. BE A DERRING-DO OF LOVE.

Love is highly contagious. It can infect the greatest and the least. We need a pandemic of heroic love which changes the landscape of our society and world.

Politics and protests talk about change. Laws and liberties promise change. ONLY LOVE CAUSES REAL AND LASTING CHANGE. Change in the lover and change in the one loved.

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.” Martin Luther King, Jr.

LIGHT UP SOME DARKNESS. DRIVE OUT SOME HATE. LOVE FIRST. LOVE MOST. It’s a Wonderful Life.

How do you love someone outside your circle of love?

Show them the heart of your Heavenly Father who loves first and loves most. (next session)

LOVE IS COURAGEOUS! Be a derring-do, Miss Landry!