“Son, you know you have to aim for something; Why not aim for the stars? You may not hit the clouds but you can certainly hit a light pole!”
Sometimes, especially when I was a teenager, I grudgingly went along with some of dad’s axioms but not because I was a fan of his thinking at the time.
But, years later, those wisdom moments have borne themselves out to be true!
Forward Friday Legacy Living Pt #2 looks at the area of persevering even when it doesn’t seem like the intended outcome could ever work. Hubert Mills, the man I call Dad was all about persevering, good work ethic and in the lead up to Father’s Day 2023, we continue to look at some of the things that made this man so special and persevering through all sorts of life’s weather patterns was one of them. And as always, there’s good news medicine at the end!
Let’s Get Into This!
Forward Friday Difference #2: Dad Persevered In Every Way, Situation, Circumstance!
Nothing paralyzes our lives like the attitude that things can never change. We need to remind ourselves that God can change things. Outlook determines outcome. If we see only the problems, we will be defeated; but if we see the possibilities in the problems, we can have victory. Warren Wiersbe
That statement was Dad; he never saw a wall that he thought he couldn’t climb over.
Whether it was the obstruction created by a person, a circumstance, a situation or improbable odds, Dad believed that he and God were an incredible team and he would receive the wisdom, ideas, creativity to push past whatever the barrier was seemingly holding him back from the direction where he believed he was walking towards…
Some Cases In Point:
1. Dad was living in a rooming house in Toronto where he came to school at the beginning. At a certain point, he had enough resources to get his own apartment. He had to deal with the discrimination of being turned away a number of times from renting an apartment, but he believed that there would be one who would see the greatness/goodness in him and take a chance. And they did……
2. Dad’s dream was to become a minister and pastor a church. While that part never seemed to play out as he had trusted it for, he became a traveling evangelist, was an accomplished bible teacher and brought grace, truth and love to so many in his many outreach endeavors. We got to tag along on many of those adventures, singing, listening and watching how he turned something that could have dragged him down to a plus so that many benefited from his stick with it, move forward attitude.
3. Some wouldn’t have known this and I didn’t either until after dad had passed away. In talking with mom one day on the way to an appointment, I found out that after my mom’s dad had passed away, Mom and dad who had been living in Bermuda and had me, came back but ended up staying because the estate of my grandfather was taking too long to close.
Dad, recognized that he had to take care of his little family (Keith was coming on to the seen just a few short months later), looked for a job and found one working as a carpenter in the Queen Elizabeth Hospital.
While happy to use his carpentry skills, Dad decided that a change was needed. He moved to become an orderly and performed that job and position with honor. But at a certain point, dad felt that his skills could be utilized in the maintenance department. So he applied and became one of the maintenance supervisors for the hospital.
Oh how he loved to troubleshoot the problems that would arise. The carpentry skills and deductive reasoning elements he would incorporate into those moments were special to him…
and while he was working at the hospital, he would be speaking on weekends and still have time for his family.
4. He would break barriers to gain a friendship, restore one, build one, save one. Rare have I ever seen a person go out of his way to disarm even the most standoffish person, the nervous one, the reticent one, the one who felt alone; Dad (and Mom) would seek out the less than so they could feel like they could belong. He was that kind of man!!!
Now For Some Good Medicine
There are many perseverance stories in the Bible but one that stuck out as I was thinking about perseverance was the woman with the issue of blood.
The account takes in place Luke 8:43-48
A woman in the crowd had suffered for twelve years with constant bleeding,[a] and she could find no cure. Coming up behind Jesus, she touched the fringe of his robe. Immediately, the bleeding stopped. “Who touched me?” Jesus asked. Everyone denied it, and Peter said, “Master, this whole crowd is pressing up against you.” But Jesus said, “Someone deliberately touched me, for I felt healing power go out from me.” When the woman realized that she could not stay hidden, she began to tremble and fell to her knees in front of him. The whole crowd heard her explain why she had touched him and that she had been immediately healed. “Daughter,” he said to her, “your faith has made you well. Go in peace.”
The unnamed woman in this story is a woman who has suffered for 12 years from a certain kind of bleeding; it is often translated or referred to as “hemorrhaging.” She visited many doctors and healers, yet none could heal her.
The scene is chaotic and it could have been in her mind a last chance moment. The simple fact that she was out and about upon in public at that time would have been not acceptable because she would have been considered “unclean.”
Probably people would have stayed far away so as to not feel like there would be any contact. It would have been a very isolated life she led.
But there was this drive inside that something needed to happen; something needed to change so she persevered, pushed and a miracle happened.
Dad would often quote Spurgeon who said, “By perseverance the snail reached the ark.”
He’d also say, Storms make the oak grow deeper roots.
Dad would talk about this story, even speak on it and some of the takeaways from the man who I know would persevere through many trials and obstacles to see some victories won in his life.
A. Know that we are beloved and known by God and He encourages us to push through our own thinking, situations, circumstances to Him.
B. Sometimes, the answer when we persevere through whatever those issues are does not always look exactly like what we are hoping for, but sometimes the end of the push looks like acceptance, belonging, and connection.
C. Sometimes the end of the push looks like not letting fear have a grip in our life.
D. Sometimes, the push at the end is an answer to a dream we had.
E. Sometimes, the end of the push is the touch/love/acceptance from a friend or loved one where we needed it most.
F. To remind us that we are loved and that if we choose to, we can be called children of God.
“So let's not get tired of doing what is good. At just the right time we will reap a harvest of blessing if we don't give up” Galatians 6:9.
“But the one who endures to the end will be saved” Matthew 24:13.
The only way that God can transform these trials into good is if we continue to persevere.
Dad!!! The man from Bermuda! It still amazes me that his life and story lives on!
I desire to live like this; my dad, A man for all seasons……
Dave
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