This Sunday is Father’s Day. I think it’s great that dads get an

official shout out one day a year. I am looking forward to the

pancakes and coffee that my two sweet daughters traditionally “surprise”

me with each year on this special day. There will probably be

a little gift bag with a few cool but total unnecessary gadgets that I

have been wanting; one more flashlight, a new fishing lure, a quality

cigar, a new work out shirt and a sweet card with wonderful words from

my amazing wife. I am a blessed man.

By about 11:00 AM the Dad Party will be over and I will head out to

mow the yard, run by Home Depot for something and pick up some chicken or steaks on the way home to grill out that night. I plan to enjoy the

whole day. There is lots and lots of good in being a dad, but not usually

much glitz or glamor.

Part of the blessing and the burden of being a dad is deciding what matters most to us on a day-to-day basis.

We can decide to focus on our calling or on our comfort. It is a daily decision and a pretty important one.

On our best days we may have a clear sense of the joy and commitment to our calling as fathers.

On other days we may drift into a greater concern or commitment to our own comfort. Our spirit is often willing and our flesh is

generally weak. So it’s pretty important for us to keep grace and truth circulating through our lives.

A few questions you might consider heading into Father’s Day.

Do you think and pray more about your calling or your comfort as a dad?

What are your Comfort Expectations as a dad?

I want to be comfortable

I expect to be comfortable

I need to be comfortable

I deserve to be comfortable

I am committed to being comfortable

It is easy to remain “hazy” on our calling while being crystal clear with our comforts.

This turns out to be pretty convenient when it comes to avoiding the uncomfortable and the inconvenient in our roles as husbands and fathers.

Let’s not surrender our convictions and commitments at the Altar of Convenience.

Comfort is not a requirement when it comes to doing the right thing.

Enjoy your pancakes, your flashlights, your slippers, ties, cigars and fishing lures this Sunday.

Let’s have some big fun on our big day. We are Fathers and there is much to celebrate.

Let’s also embrace the big call and deep joy of loving and serving our wives and daughters.

Happy Father’s Day

Grace and Peace,

Dr. Don Worcester

Relationships are a bit like elevators; they have a tendency to go up and down on a fairly regular basis.

The ride up is pretty exciting and the view from

the Penthouse is magical.

The ride down is a bit less inspiring.

Drop below the Lobby and you may end up in the Parking Garage, the Basement, or the Mechanical/ Storage Room.

Generally there is a little less Magic in this part of the building.

The air, the view, and the lighting all get better or worse as you travel up or down on a Relational Elevator.

Most Relationships have at least some trips into the Basement or Parking Garage.

A visit to the Basement is manageable, but living there is not. We are not designed to live underground.

Joy, hope and purpose are easily lost in the dark.

Here is the thing about Elevators and Relationships, some buttons take you up, and some buttons take you down.

Which ones have you been pushing lately?

Fresh air

Great views

and Natural Light

are best on the Top Floors.

Have you been there lately?

In the end, it is not the Elevator that makes you go up or down. It’s the button you push when the doors close that determine your floor.

How well do you know the Buttons in your Relationship?

Some attitudes and habits almost always take you into the basement. Push these buttons very often and you will notice how quickly the view changes.

Push the Critic Button and you will feel the floors whizzing by, as you head straight below ground.

Push the Defensiveness Button and you will soon be headed to the basement.

Push the,

“I’ve had it button” and you can take the Express Elevator straight down, with no stops along the way.

Every time we step into an elevator or a relationship, we get to make a decision about the Buttons we push and the direction we go.

So where do you want to go?

What buttons have you been pushing?

Kindness is a very simple and powerful button in a relationship. No matter what floor you are on, kindness will always take you up.

Compassion is not always an easy button to find, but if you find it and push it your relationship will be different and better. There will be more light and more air and more hope.

Forgiveness is the hardest and best button we can choose in a relationship. It is a button that we need to push often for ourselves and for the people we love and care about.

This button will change your view, your heart and your relationship in dramatic ways.

Decide today who you want to be in your daughter’s life.

Some days Your Buttons will get pushed and it will not be perfect or pretty; but, understand and know this; Every day is a new day on the Dad Elevator.

Before the doors open, before we step in, let’s decide that we are Going Up!

Grace and Peace,

Dr. Don Worcester

Be Courageous:

Courage is not a lack of fear. Courage is doing the right thing in the face of fear.

As dads we are called to be Courageous. Courage does not “Back off”, “Take off” or “Go off.”

Courage squares off with whatever comes through the door.

The Courage in the heart of a Father is “Pre- Loaded.”

It is already in you as a dad. When things get dicey, you need to find

your courage and press ahead, there is no way out, only a way through.

Are you finding your Courage when it matters most?

Be Strong:

Where does strength come from? Physical strength develops as we push through resistance,

lift weights, and push the limits of our cardio capacity. Strong people have developed a commitment

and habit of doing hard things.

How are you dealing with and responding to the hard things in your life?

Do Everything in Love:

Not some things, not lots of things but do Everything in love. Love is a “doing” thing more than a “feeling” thing.

Love is something we demonstrate to our daughters. Love is what covers our daughters, it is what grounds our daughters

and it is what launches our daughters.

Is your daughter seeing your love?

Let’s keep it simple

Let’s keep it clear

This really is important!

Grace and Peace,

Dr. Don Worcester

It’s pretty easy to get discouraged, distracted or defeated when you are managing the responsibilities of loving, leading and providing for a family.

We should pay attention to the things that hurt us and to the things that comfort us.

Things that comfort us generally have much more potential for ruining our lives than the things that hurt us.

Things that hurt us are quickly recognized and noted as dangerous. We are likely to take measures and avoid any future contact that would put us back in harms way.

Things that comfort can draw us back again and again. We may slip into a costly habit and lose track of the real price we are paying to feel better.

There is a very subtle and seductive kind of comfort that helps us feel better without actually getting better. The pain relief is real but any sense of real health, progress or healing is a mirage.

This kind of mirage reappears every time we cycle through this kind of comfort.

It is hard to deny or resist a comfort that you know works well and works quickly. We may gradually develop a relationship and habit with our agent of comfort.

When we step into the comfort we also step into a current that pulls us along.

The current is generally soothing not threatening. It requires little from us. The scenery is pleasant and the drifting is relaxing.

The progression from wanting to needing often goes unnoticed.

A person who is hurting may care more about the relief they are getting, then what they are getting into.

Hurting makes us desperate and desperate people often make bad deals that create more desperate circumstances.

This cycle can become a spiral that takes us further away from any real peace or restoration.

As Dads we need to keep track of our hurts and our hearts.

We need to find legitimate comforts for the stresses and pressures we

carry and manage. We need to be willing to ask one another and ourselves

honest and real questions about the health of our habits.

We are intended to find comfort in our relationship with God,

we are invited to come and receive freely from Him.

We are invited to come as we are. There is no hook in this kind of comfort.

Jesus comes as a Messiah not as a Mirage. The river we are invited into is River of Life, not a river of dependency and destruction.

We are delivered not destroyed as we become dependent on

the one true source of Comfort.

Some comfort is Bad Medicine. It only deadens our symptoms and does nothing to heal our soul.

A good physician does not administer Bad Medicine.

Let’s get to the Good Physician

Let’s seek his Good Medicine.

Let’s get better.

Grace and Peace

Dr. Don Worcester

A foundational feature in all great relationships is Grace.

There is a strength and beauty in a gracious welcome. Grace is always waiting on the porch, scanning the horizon for our approach.

Grace rushes out to meet us and welcome us in whatever state we arrive.

Grace smiles at us reminding us that we have lost our way, not our worth.

Grace is free and unstoppable.

It is not naive or unaware like some kind elderly caregiver.

Grace sees all and does not turn away, it does not flinch, and it does not retreat.

It approaches us and embraces us when we are not yet embraceable.

It gives us courage to return to ourselves and return to others.

When you are broke and broken you can still afford Grace.

When you afraid to ask and afraid to receive you can still be welcomed by Grace.

When you don’t know you need it and your are not sure you want it, Grace will still run to you with open arms and a warm smile.

Grace is simply Amazing!

After Grace welcomes us, Truth invites us in. We enter the truth because the Truth sets us Free.

It is the only thing that sets us free, and it sets us completely free.

Great relationships operate in truth and being nice is a poor substitute for being Truthful.

Avoiding the truth about ourselves, each other or the relationship will keep us circling and cycling in the shallow end of the pool.

The truth takes us forward, if you are going around and around with the same issues and the same outcomes

you might be doing some version of a bad dance, probably some kind of “Avoid-Dance.”

The Truth will take us into new territory and these new places are often beyond our comfort zone.

Are you willing to speak the truth with your daughter? Are you willing to hear the truth from your daughter?

Grace welcomes us, truth invites us in and love covers us head to foot as we sort it all out.

Grace gives us courage to hear and tell the truth. Love protects us once we have.

Love is the antidote for fear, and fear is always looking to shut us down and keep us apart.

When the truth brings pain and uncertainty, love delivers hope and peace.

Let’s build great relationships with our daughters. Jesus came brimming with Grace and Truth.

He was completely approachable, completely welcoming, and completely gracious.

How are you and I doing in this department?

Truth is intended to reveal and restore not to condemn and reject. Are we speaking True words to our daughters?

Are we praying and looking for health and growth in all areas of their lives?

Your daughter’s Love Language is Love. It is her native tongue.

She can do without lots of things, but not without this.

Find a way to look in her eyes and say the words that will give you both life.

I love You and that will never change!

Grace and Peace

Dr. Don Worcester

A few years ago we did a family trip to Disneyland. This was kind of a big event for our kids. They were more than excited when we cleared the gates and headed into the park. They studied the map and quickly agreed to head straight for the Indiana Jones Jeep Adventure. They were pumped and ready to buckle into, the Big Ride.

Our excitement grew as we reached the front of the line. Then it happened. Abigail, our youngest daughter was asked to step against the Measuring Post, to confirm she met the height requirement for this big ride. A little tear formed in her eye and rolled down her cheek when the attendant reported she failed to meet the requirement. Abigail and I missed the Big Rides that year. We rode the Tea Cups and heard long renditions of  “It’s a Small World.”  It felt like a Small World.

There are requirements at Disneyland and in life for the biggest and best rides.

Micah, the Old Testament Prophet (chapter 6, verse 8) identifies three requirements for a full life. We are called to; Do Justice, To Love Mercy and To Walk Humbly with God. These requirements are necessary for a full life and for effective parenting. If we show up as fathers without these requirements, we are going to miss the best and spend way too much riding “Tea Cups” in a pretty small world.

Doing Justice means doing the right thing, because it is the right thing. We never need permission from anyone else to do the right thing. Your life is a seminar that your daughter is watching everyday. What is she learning about life, faith and love by watching you?

Mercy is a Divine quality and we are called as followers and fathers to love Mercy. When you give people what they need, rather than what they deserve, you are, loving mercy. Your daughter will have missteps and mistakes along the way. Find and release the Divine mercy that will give her fresh starts in broken places.

Walking Humbly with God is a requirement. Pride will jam us up as dads. Independence will leave us cut off from one another and our daughters. Walking with God gives us the boldness and the humility to love and lead our families and ourselves.

That family trip to Disneyland was not the end of the story for Abigail. She came up a little short that year, but she was not done. She came home, kept growing and was back in line for the Big Ride the next summer. It was worth the wait, the Big Rides always are. Keep going and keep growing, parenting is a great ride and none of us are done yet.

Grace and Peace

Dr. Don Worcester