Wounded Heros

It is annoying how your ideals can change when new information is added. I think of how Halloween was such a fun day growing up. I never got into the scariness of it, but I did enjoy dressing up and getting candy. There was never a question as to if you were going to go out trick or treating, that is just what you did. Fast forward to adulthood and you find out its horrible roots, and the spiritual implications and all of a sudden as a Christian father you are wondering if you even want to participate in such a horrible festivity.

Another example somewhat similar would be from the movie "The Matrix". At one point Morpheus confronts Neo with a choice, red pill or blue pill. Red pill everything stays the same and life continues as you know it, blue pill you find out the truth of your existence.

I have had few male role models in my life, and growing up I really had no one that was willing to really invest in me. To spend quality time with me and showing me what it meant to be a man. At some point in my childhood I attached to my Grandpa. Even though I cannot remember him ever really investing into me, one on one, I saw some traits in him that I admired. And at some point I decided I wanted to model my life after his.

As a man I now ask myself what it was that I saw in him. First and foremost I knew he was respected and considered wise by those that were close to him. Second he was a man of faith. While he still had his eyesight he was constantly reading the bible and his daily bread devotional was always on that days date, having been read that very morning. We were always blessed to have him ask the family get-together's meal because when he prayed he prayed as a man who knew the God whom he was praying to. I knew he was a gentle man, soft spoken and slow to anger. Compared to my own father my Grandpa was his opposite, and as painful as it is to admit I was looking for my father's opposite.

Going through my masculine healing journey I have come to some realizations that in many ways caused me to build my foundations on sand. Grandpa was a wonderful man, and I do not want anyone to hear anything other than my admiration for who he was, because I loved him very much. But I have realized the he was not that different than me. He was wounded.

He grew up in an alcoholic home and I can only assume his way of dealing with his alcoholic father was to just get quiet. He married my Grandma and from everything I can gather she was very similar to his own Dad in her harshness and controlling of him. My Mom had recounted many memories from her childhood of my Grandma verbally beating my Grandpa into submission. Grandma also had the gift of gab which took the pressure off Grandpa to be the conversationalist. And so he fell into the background which is where he seem content to be.

Both my Mom and my Uncle have recounted to me how even though Grandpa was there in body during their childhood he wasn't really there emotionally. And in may ways he cheated his children from any emotion, positive or negative. He met the Lord when he was a young man and through his many years of reading the word had much wisdom, but to tap into his wisdom you had to almost force it out of him. I can appreciate how he would have felt beat down by my Grandma, but what was it in him that was okay with his passivity?

It has only been through revelation in my healing that I have been able to recognize the same wound in both of us. I hypothesize that my Grandpa struggled with the question of what it means to be a man as well. I think the fact that I looked to my Grandpa as a masculine role model really communicates how mixed up I was. One of my favorite books (Raising a Modern Day Knight) has the best definition of manhood. author Robert Lewis defines it as:

"....someone who rejects passivity, accepts responsibility, leads courageously, and expects the greater reward; God's reward".

That is the awesome thing about God, realizing this does not bring resentment. Actually the opposite, I see my Grandpa as a fellow wounded man and it brings me much compassion for him. I wish Grandpa could have been the man God created him to be, I wish he could have been a courageous leader, but regardless I know he was a man after God's heart and I will see him again someday.