After this past birthday, I have recalled several events in my life. Having had many birthdays, I know that tends to occur.
Two particular events come to mind regarding my father. He was always influential in the lives of my brothers, I and my mother….but he became a man of great influence after the age of 37, when he
surrendered to a call on his life which had been present since he was about 20.
When I was twelve, I saw him step out of a row of people and walk a short distance to proclaim that he was changing his life…because of that Call.
I knew it was a big deal, yet I knew not what it took for him to do that until I became a Man myself.
About a year or so after seeing him take those steps to change his life…he had the opportunity to rescue me one morning.
In the seventh grade, the Vice Principal at
Rosemont Junior High School collared me and Gary Miller for throwing paper cups. We were to report to his office the next morning.
It felt as though I was sentenced to San Quentin.
I came home and thought I was disguising my fear and dread, but both my parents knew something was amiss. After dinner I made the statement that.
I was going to bed.
They knew.
The next morning, after squirming in the bed all night dreading the visit to Mr. Rhome”s office…
I went into breakfast with the same blank and mouth-agape stare I had the evening before.
I quickly returned to my room to bide the time before walking to school.
My father came into my room and shut the door, telling me I was going nowhere until I told him what was wrong.
After quickly thinking that not talking could get me out of going ….he looked at me, told me he loved me….and again asked what was wrong.
That’s when the 13 year old boy busted out crying and spilled out the big trouble I thought I was in.
He looked down at me, put his hand on my head, and told me it would all be okay.
He then prayed with me to The One Who had called him to change his life, and asked that He would give me Peace and Protect me.
As his hand rested on my head I looked up at my father, and he told me I was going to be okay.
I believed him.
At that moment, and I can recall it perfectly even now….every bit of anxious dread left me.
Immediately.
As I walked the few blocks to school I had no trace of the fear which gripped me walking home the day before.
The visit was over in two minutes as Mr. Rhome told Gary Miller and I he knew we were good young men and would not do that again.
He was right.
Did my father call and speak to him?
I will ever know.
But the words he spoke to me that morning have never left me….
and it was over 45 years ago.
It was the memory of those words that led me to call him and ask to see him in the Summer of 1980.
The plans I had made were falling apart.
I was 26 years old with plans to pursue and they had all met an absolute dead end.
I saw no way forward toward my goal.
I called my father.
I went and spent two days with him in the woods at a Camp he ran. As I drove there, I knew and remembered when he had put his hand on my head and told me I was going to be okay.
We walked, talked. I told him where I was.
I spoke of the apparent failure of what I had been working toward, and how every effort had reached its dead end.
He spoke nothing of failure. As good as my memory is I cannot tell you the exact words he spoke. But I can tell you what he told me.
He told me I was going to be okay.
He prayed with me and for me to The One Who had changed his life and granted me Peace and Release those years before.
After those two days, as I drove home….again…
I knew not how…but I knew I was going to be okay.
Two days later, the dead ends were still present…
but another avenue opened, and paved the way for the next four years of my life which were full of rewards, honors unexpected, and many moments of fulfillment and accomplishment.
Again, my father had gifted me with prayers of Peace, Release, Preperation and Encouragement.
He died during those next four years.
He died suddenly….
but he had gifted me immeasurably in my 30 years with him.
Today, over 30 years since he died….
his words and the measure of them are as real and vivid as those days he spoke them.
My brothers and I still have guys who hear our last name and speak of how great and positive an Influence he had on their young life.
I knew that first hand in 1965.
His Presence is gone, but the effect of his words and the influence of his changed life still live in me, my brothers, and in the many lives he touched.
The One I still call on is The One Who called my father to a changed and effective life ….
and I receive the same Peace and Release I did that day, long ago, when their hands rested on my head.
Terry
August 2016
Terry Bethea 