What I Learned About Manhood and Fatherhood From My Dad

It’s Father’s Day. It’s my third Father’s Day since becoming a dad, and there are so many wonderful things I love about being a dad, too many to name. This year, I am reflecting on what I’ve learned from my own father.

Some men don’t like the word “father” because it conjures up some pretty awful memories. They think of stern, tough men who scolded them when they failed and picked at the flaws of their adolescent attempts at life. Some have had abusive fathers, workaholic or alcoholic dads. Some had dads that were emotionally absent, some who were actually absent, men who bailed on their families when they needed them most. It’s hard to blame those dads. They most likely had poor examples in their childhood of what it meant to be a man. But along the way, the tradition of weak men and dysfunctional dads has been handed down like an heirloom no one cares to own.

I have become more aware of just how blessed I am to have the dad that I have. He turns 63 this summer and has been a dad for 33 years. Since fatherhood and manhood in general has become a lost art, I decided to put to words just a few of the things I’ve learned from my dad about what it means to be a man.

1. Love God passionately

My strongest memories of my dad as I was growing up are of him kneeling in our living in the dark hours of the morning praying. My dad is a man of prayer. I’ve seen him consistently spend time with God, fervently devouring the Bible. I’ve watched him strum the same few chords on his guitar and pour his heart out to God. I’ve seen him weep in prayer, laugh in God’s presence, and dance like a child in worship. He has never been afraid to show emotion in his relationship with God. God was not impersonal or distant. He was near and actual. God was a person he wrestled with, pleaded with, trusted, and obeyed.

2. Obey God at all costs

Out of this living relationship with God came a devotion I have never seen paralleled by another man. My dad, at the peak of his career in a top-class advertising agency, quit his job and, with my mom, my sister, and me, left for America to go to Bible college. He wasn’t chasing a dream. He was following Christ. Years later, he resigned his influential position at the largest church in Malaysia to pioneer a church on the outskirts of a developing town. Time and time again, he has laid down his own interests, ambitions, and agendas.

Is there anything that runs more counter to our culture’s vision of a man? We think a man is one who generates a clear plan for his own life and then marches doggedly toward it, mowing over the weak souls who stand in his way. We imagine a man as being strong and powerful, whose own self-confidence carries the day and creates a way. My father showed me that a real man is one who has laid down his ego, died to himself, and given all to follow Christ.

3. Lay down your life to love and serve your wife and children

When some people hear that according the Scripture a man is supposed to be the head of his household, they think of pot-bellied hot heads commanding their wives to bring them another beer. Thanks to my father, I don’t.

I see a man who did the dishes almost every night after dinner. I see a man who spent the weekends not golfing with the fellas or lounging on the couch watching game after game, but helping my mother with the laundry, and going with her to the market to buy fresh meat and produce for the family. My parents took my sister and I out for a family fun day almost every weekend—and this was during his stressful life as a big-time account executive. Yet almost every Saturday, we went swimming as a family, or played tennis or went to the library or something that created memories and bonds for our family.

4. Be humble enough to apologize

My father wasn’t a perfect dad. He didn’t always make the right calls. Sometimes he got upset when he shouldn’t have. Sometimes he was too harsh. But what made him different that any other of my friends’ dad’s was that he would always come to us—often that night before we went to sleep—and apologize. He would tell us how much he loved us. He would affirm the good things he saw in us and say how he was wrong. I don’t know if my mother prompted him (I suspect that at many times she probably did), but I know how difficult it is for man to admit he was wrong to the people whom he is supposed to be leading. (When was the last time a male boss said that you were right and he was wrong?)

My father showed me that humility and masculinity are not mutually exclusive qualities.

5. Show affection

Maybe it’s the result of an overdose of John Wayne movies. Maybe it’s the fear of being too effeminate. Whatever the reason, men are paranoid about hugs.

Not my dad. I’ve seen grown men break into sobs as soon as my dad hugged them. When my dad became a pastor, his single greatest counseling weapon was his hug. So many young men grew up with dads who never did anything to communicate value or acceptance, fathers who instead of validating the men coming of age under their roof found ways to alienate them. My dad’s hugs were like the breaking of walls built as a defense mechanism, the unleashing of a torrent of damned up emotion. I remember being amazed at the sight of sobbing men collapsing as they began to experience for the first time the Father heart of God through my own dad.

My father has never been afraid to show affection—to my mom, to my sister, and to me. It was never girlish or weird. It was strong yet tender. It showed that he was our father but also that he was leaning on another Father.

This Father’s Day, I am grateful to my father, David Packiam, for showing me what it means to be a dad and to be a man. I love you, Dad. Happy Father’s Day.

Comments

[Jim]

Wow, truly amazing. Glenn, you took the things that I have learned from my dad, and that many others have failed to learn, and put them all down for us to see. Thank you for boldly stepping out and saying what is and should be when the rest of us have not. This is an inspiration to me, and hopefully many fathers around the world. God Bless You, and Happy Fathers Day,

Jim

[Kudzu Fire]

Happy Father's Day.

[Glenn Packiam]

to Jim: thanks for the kind words. i'm grateful for a great dad! may we walk in the footsteps of the great fathers who have gone before us.

to kudzu fire: thanks! you too, if you're a dad!

[Matt O'Connor]

I really appreciate this. I think that masculinity as you describe it is quite healthy and a much more useful description than the machoism I've often ascribed. I do believe that the question of what authentic masculinity looks like will really need to be addressed by my generation to deal with rising homosexuality and reactionary machoism.

Compassion and strength do not oppose each other.