Sowell

Thanksgiving Prayer 2018

Father,

There is an enemy and we are in a war. One of the weapons You have given us is thankfulness. You repeatedly tell us to give thanks and to be thankful. Although we set aside a day to give thanks, I pray that you would make us into, as You've said in your own words, a peculiar people, that wield that weapon at every turn. Not just on one day of the year, but every day, every moment.

With that as a backdrop, seven swings of the thankfulness sword...

thank you for amazing food, even if it has restrictions,

thank you for my dad,

thank you for family,

thank you for the Church, Your body,

thank you for life, life that You give abundantly to Your own,

thank you for death, for as only You can, You actually use it to bring forth LIFE! how crazy is that?

and

thank you for taking on flesh and dying a criminals death for actual criminals. sinners such as us, standing before You around this table.

bless this food,
in Jesus name Amen

Thank You

I knew the passing of my Dad would be hard, but it turned out to be difficult beyond anything I ever imagined. I pretty much cried my eyes out for the first week solid. I honestly felt like I didn't want to go on with life without Dad. It was easily the most emotionally trying time I have ever been through.

Looking back on it now, it truly was God using something that you could say was evil, at least from my perspective in the midst of it, to bring about good. The biggest wow moments of my life came upon Dad's passing. God has shown me how much Dad loved me, how much I loved Dad and, as I wrote for the service, I am honored and humbled to be his son. My tendency would be to be angry that God didn't show me these things before Dad passed away. In fact, I did just that initially. I later realized He was gracious to show me what He did and I am thankful that He chose to show me these things now instead of in 10 years, 20 years ... or never.

He also showed me how special this body is to me. In particular, it meant a lot more to me than I ever thought it would, seeing TECer after TECer at Dad's service doling out hugs, condolences and support to me in what ended up being the hardest thing I have ever endured. It was amazing. I thank God for TEC...

Thank you for the meals. Thank you for the prayers. Thank you for the texts. Thank you for the hugs. Thank you for doing Romans 12:15 with me.

I love you all,
tgh

In Memoriam: My Dad

A PICTURE OF GOD

When someone becomes a child of God the Bible speaks of them as being adopted as sons. Unbeknownst to both of us at the time, 46 years ago, James M Herr showed me a picture of God when he chose me to be his son. Most do not know that he was not my real Dad. I always knew that was the case, but I never thought of him that way. I never once thought of him as my stepdad. As far as I was and am concerned, this man IS my Dad.

A COUPLE STORIES WITH DAD

When I was 12ish we went to a Seahawks game. They were giving free hats out on the way in. Dad gets the "Adult" hat. I get the "Kid" hat. Of course, right? We ended up trading hats cause mine was too small and his was too big...

In the early 80's my grandpa was running for a city council position. After the election is over, as the sun is going down, Dad and I go around taking the campaign signs down. At the time there was a tire shop called Scotty's on Grove and State. While we were there taking the sign down the cops show up and start interrogating us...they want to see ID from Dad...AND the 12 year old! Dad thought that was hilarious.

We lived across the street from Jennings Park in Marysville. One night something was going on at the park and Dad decided to walk over there, in the dark, to investigate. I'm upstairs in my room listening to the police scanner and I hear "there's a dark figure approaching". Yep, he was the dark figure.

Classic Dad right there.

THE TEACHER

My Dad wasn't a verbal kind of teacher but he gave me so much, mostly by what I saw, by what I watched him do. He showed me how to use tools, read calipers, micrometers and so forth. He taught me how to think outside the box.

A few things I love that I caught from my Dad ... I love a corny joke, a good story, history, music, tools, old cars, anything mechanical, math and numbers (I know, weird...whatever) I love Coca-Cola and finally, heroin (uh relax, that's what he called Cheez-It crackers because they are ohhh sooo addictive.) and the list goes on...

I didn't realize fully, until now, the extent to which Dad loved his people so very much and how very much I loved him.

WHO WAS THIS MAN?

So who was James M Herr? A veteran (101st Airborne), a logger, a machinist, a toolmaker, a builder, a joker, a talker, a collector, a writer and so much more. He was all these things but above them all, to me, he was Dad. I am honored and humbled, to put it in a Biblical sort of way, to be called Terry, son of James.

I love you Daddy. Turns out you're my hero after all.