Father's Day 2012

These 3 make today great.

I have been a Father for almost 8 years. Adam was born in 2004 in St. Paul's Hospital in downtown Vancouver. A medical resident that was there used to be in a Bible Study with my brother at the University of Western Ontario in London. He also knew my Father through the Urbana conference. Interesting connections.

Sophia was born 3 years later in the same hospital. A wife of a pastor at the church I was working at was the nurse assigned to Felicia.

And James... James showed them all up by taking the initiative of being born in the entry way of our home. A 911 operator and 5 firemen helped him make his dramatic entrance into the world.

As I was tucking Adam and Sophia in tonight, I asked them what makes a good father. Sophia said it was playing games with her. Adam said going on hikes was a sign of a good father.

Later on, I thought about my own father: Dr. Abraham Ninan. 3 years after I was born, my family immigrated to Canada so that my dad could study at Regent College. He was so keen on theological training that he was willing to move his young family to this nation so far away from India.

From Vancouver we went  to Toronto, Regina and then Saskatoon. Saskatoon is where we finally settled. My brother and sister were both born in Canada. My Dad was and is a good Dad. Despite working in a high stress job, he always made time for us.

I think one of the greatest testimonies to what kind of Dad my Dad was, was in how I could get hold of him virtually anytime I needed to. My dad is a neonatologist - a medical specialist whose patients are newborn premature babies. He is very busy, has a lot of stuff to do and there's always a lot of activity during his day. Sometimes when I needed to talk to him I would phone the hospital and ask him to be paged.

The operator would try a couple of places in the hospital, and then place a general call over the public address system. If it was taking a long time, she would come back on the line and tell me he's busy or he can't be reached. Then I would play my trump card .... "I'm his son." There would be a brief silence on the other end, and then "Oh, just a second. Hold the line." Within seconds my dad's voice would be on the line asking me what was up. Usually it was something not awfully important - because really what could be that important when you're 12 or 15, or however old I was?

But, he would take the call, listen, respond and then we'd both get on with our respective days.

Him taking my calls meant that I was important - he had important stuff to do - like saving baby's lives. But we were important too.

I hope I can impart that sense of importance to my 3 kids. A Father's love and acceptance is important.

Read this great article on the incredible power of a Father's role in the life of a child. It's a half century of research over 11 000 parents and children and 36 international studies.

http://www.vancouversun.com/health/Father%20love%20moulds%20personality%20studies/6785432/story.html

And Happy Father's Day!!!