Amy Grant sang a song some time ago entitled “My Father’s Eyes.”<\/p>\n
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She says she may “not be every mother’s dream of her little girl” and that her “face may not grace the mind of everyone in the world.” She continues by saying that she hopes, when people look inside her life, she hears them say that she has “her father’s eyes…..eyes that find the good in things when good in not around…eyes that find the source of help when help just can’t be found…eyes full of compassion, seein’ every pain”…eyes that know what someone is “going through and feelin’ it the same”…just like her father’s eyes.<\/p>\n
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Amy is talking about her heavenly father, but the lyrics so remind me of the family I talked about yesterday.<\/p>\n
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It’s worth thinking a few minutes today about that family again.<\/p>\n
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Early in his life, the young man found himself very attracted to a certain girl in his community. He liked her stamina, her determination to do a good job at whatever she did and her ease of working with children.<\/p>\n
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As he got older, he knew he needed to ask her father for her hand in marriage and was working up the courage to do so. Finally, he did ask and the father wholeheartedly agreed. It was their custom to ask the father without little thought of the daughter’s desires. The father and his wife knew it was the right thing to do.<\/p>\n
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The parents brought the man and his “fianc\u00c3\u00a9” together to tell them both the news. She had no idea – but she would abide by her parents wishes. Their custom was to wait one year until they could be officially wed with the understanding there would be no intimate contact between the two of them during that time.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Sometime between this conversation and the marriage date, she left for awhile to visit relatives. When she returned, it was obvious she was pregnant.<\/p>\n
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Here parents were furious, and also were very concerned about her future. They had seen many young women put to death for this kind of behavior. The young man was heartbroken as he knew the baby was not his. During her absence the love he had for her grew and he was so glad to see her. The last thing he expected was this.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The young people talked together about what their future could be like. She told him stories about the pregnancy that filled him with more questions than answers. He just knew he wanted to be with her as her husband so badly that he was going to marry her anyway.<\/p>\n
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In his eyes, he found the good in the situation. He had a sense of compassion and saw the pain and anguish the family was going through. He was going to make the best of the circumstances as his love for her had grown stronger.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
This young man could have disowned his fianc\u00c3\u00a9. He could have left the family. He could have taken the easy way out…but he didn’t. He had a deep love for her. He wanted to be part of the solution because, through his eyes, he thought it was the right thing to do.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Turns out that he was a great father and that he and his wife raised a fine son who made a remarkable difference in the world. He wasn’t a perfect father, mind you, just a loving and compassionate one.<\/p>\n
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What would you do in this circumstance? Though the cultures may be a bit different where you are concerned, decisions would still have to be made. How would you handle it?<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Would you see it through similar eyes of this man?<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I am amazed on a daily basis to hear and see of those who take tough situations and handle them with dignity. We have little idea that there are so many of us out here who have weathered tough decisions with compassion, understanding and love. Each of us who is able to manage things with dignity sets an example for the others of us who will be making hard choices as time goes on.<\/p>\n
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I don’t know about you, but I find great comfort and hope in the story of this man and his wife.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
My wish for you today <\/strong>is that you have the strength and determination to handle life’s challenges with the depth and understanding it takes to make wise decisions….just like this young man did. You just never know who may be watching.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n ~Joellen<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Amy Grant sang a song some time ago entitled “My Father’s Eyes.” She says she may “not be every mother’s dream of her little girl” and that her “face may not grace the mind of everyone in the world.” She continues by saying that she hopes, when people look inside her life, she hears […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,19,16,27,18,31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-122","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-conflicts","category-religion","category-life-events","category-living-life-to-the-fullest","category-parenting-families","category-releationships-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/reflectionsfromacountrygirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/reflectionsfromacountrygirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/reflectionsfromacountrygirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reflectionsfromacountrygirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reflectionsfromacountrygirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=122"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/reflectionsfromacountrygirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/reflectionsfromacountrygirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=122"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reflectionsfromacountrygirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=122"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reflectionsfromacountrygirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=122"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}