Measured

As a first time parent, those growth charts are extremely important. So much meaning rests within a single point plotted somewhere on the grid. It is not just a dot. It is your child against the world. Where the dot falls is how your child measures up. Before they can sign and talk and rollover and play sports and read and go to college, the length, weight and head circumference of your child is all they have as a basis of comparison. It is surely to come up if you talk to other parents you meet. I can recall one conversation I had with a woman at the Denver Children's Museum. Our children were independently playing next to each other.

"How old is your son?" The woman asked.

"He's twelve months." I said.

"He looks tall!"

"He does look tall, but he's only in the 50^th percentile for height." I admitted. "How about your daughter?"

"He is a boy."

Charlie hated to be measured. He cried when the nurse laid him face up on a yardstick. He arched his back. His big head rolled from side to side, never staying on the inch-wide piece of wood. To me it seemed like the dark ages of medicine. In a world of artificial limbs and hearts, MRIs and sonograms, a yardstick is a crude tool. And it was rarely accurate. According to his chart record, Charlie actually got smaller between six and nine months.

I don't like to be measured either. Compared to societal standards, I feel extremely inadequate. Culture reinforces the picture of who a man should be rich, powerful, successful, fit, charismatic, independent, and tough. I am none of these. I am a stay-at-home dad. I am the anti-man.

The yardstick the world uses to measure a man is broken; extremely inaccurate and dependent on the hands of the inconsistent measurer. Often I try to be someone I am not in an effort to measure up. It is tiring to be everything to everyone. I am done trying to live up to a standard that is unachievable.

I watch Charlie make mistakes every day. He can't do things quite right. He makes a mess when he eats. He falls when he walks. He breaks valuables. He wastes untold gallons of water flushing the toilet. He tears pages out of books. He runs away when I chase after him. But he is more than a dot. His is greater than what he does. He is my son. At the end of the day, I take him into my arms and love him regardless. I am humbled by what being a father has taught me about God's love. I have come to know the absolute measure of a man is the length of God's arms extended in love for us which is not something we could achieve on our own. It had to be given to us. In that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Rom 5:8.