Like father, like son—a goal for somewhere besides the golf course
By Dean Collins
If you haven’t seen it already, you should watch one of the YouTube videos of Tiger Woods and his son, Charlie. Even if you don’t like golf, you will catch yourself smiling at the similarities of these two on the golf course. It’s more than their golf swing; it’s nearly everything from how they walk, their expressions when they do well and when they miss, how they celebrate, and even how they pick up a golf ball after sinking a putt.
Charlie surely had a great teacher in his dad, but most of the behaviors he shares with his father I assure you were never taught in a lesson. They were caught by watching and simply hanging around his dad. I suspect both Tiger and Charlie were surprised when they first saw one of these many videos highlighting their similarities because I’m confident neither of them ever planned to do these particular mannerisms with this precision, if at all. Tiger and Charlie are a perfect picture of “Like father, like son.”
What are they learning?
I suspect that even if you had a great dad, you saw many things in him you didn't want to replicate in your life. While it’s common for a child to take up an occupation similar to his parent’s, it is not uncommon to have a different job and a different life. Time after time I have watched college students decide to pursue a life different from their parents’ choices or their parents’ desire for them. There is something in us that seeks to be unique. There is something healthy about discovering your own career path.
Watching Tiger and Charlie will give you pause about what your children and grandchildren might be learning from you, even if you don’t realize it’s happening or want for them what they’re seeing in you. The good news is we have an opportunity to introduce and model the attitudes and behaviors of our Heavenly Father. However, this will require that we spend some time with our Father in Heaven and allow our time with the Father and in his Word to shape us into the men or women he created us to be.
Who are you loving?
In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus told his disciples their righteousness should exceed that of the Pharisees. At first blush that seemed difficult. This religious crowd were very precise in following details of the traditions they had learned from their fathers and teachers. They had nearly perfected it. The problem was they were imitating scripts but not practicing the love of God. In many places in the Gospel records we hear Jesus say as much. His focus was that his followers love the Lord with all their heart, mind, and strength and their neighbors (both the ones they liked and the ones they didn’t) as they loved themselves.
One of the first glimpses of this main teaching of Jesus appears in Matthew 5:43-48. Jesus quoted what the Pharisees and others were saying and teaching: “Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.” The problem was that God never said that. Even as far back as Exodus, the children of Israel were told that if their enemy’s ox or donkey was in a ditch or wandering away, they were to help retrieve it. That sounds more like love than hate, doesn’t it? Maybe this is an example of God teaching us to care for all of his creation. If that’s the case, he certainly calls us to care for each other as much as we care for our pets and livestock.
Jesus corrects this faulty teaching of the Pharisees by telling the disciples to love their enemies and even pray for the enemies that oppose or persecute us. That’s a pretty big difference from how the Pharisees had been living, regardless of whatever words they used to somehow attempt to prove otherwise.
Who is our teacher?
Here is the part I don’t want us to forget. Before Jesus finished his sentence concerning loving the ones who persecute us, he said this: so that you may be sons of your Father in Heaven. He then goes on to explain that God causes the rain to fall on the good and the evil and the sun to rise and set for those who are living right and those who aren’t. I think the point Jesus was making is that God loves everyone, and if we want to follow Jesus, we must do the same.
If we could see a video clip on YouTube about God the Father and Jesus his Son, I suspect we would see a large bunch of the same behaviors. The clip would include each of them feeding the poor, healing the sick, comforting the grieving, and so on. Jesus showed those of us here on earth exactly what it looked like in Heaven. He showed us what love is and what it looks like in action.
I doubt Jesus pays much attention to the videos on YouTube. But I am pretty sure he does pay attention to whether we are developing the behaviors he showed us. In order to love like Jesus, we must allow him access to our hearts and minds. We must spend time with him in the Word and in prayer. But we won’t be like him unless we also start to do the things we saw him do. Then, as Jesus said, we may be sons of our Father who is in Heaven.
My prayer for us today is that someone might catch a glimpse of us in action and think: Like father, like son.
Your time with God’s Word
Matthew 5:43-48 ESV
Photos by Keith Allison from Hanover, MD, USA, via Wikimedia Commons and by Ksenia Chernaya from Pexels
To receive daily posts delivered directly to your inbox, complete the form at the bottom of our home page.
To download a printable version of today’s post, click here.