The Man who Showed Me God

Where does my faith come from?

It is not something I constructed later in life, brick by careful brick. No, instead it is an early root system ... deep, hidden, drinking from a soil I did not prepare. When I look closely, I see that the soil was gentleness.

My faith sinks down into the yard of my grandfather’s house, under the shadow of a humongous willow tree whose branches brushed the grass like long, green prayers. That tree felt ancient to me as a child, though perhaps it was not. It was the great hiding place, it yielded comfort, it whispered joy. And beneath it stood a man whose life was anchored in something just as quiet and just as strong.

My grandfather’s love was the cornerstone of that place. It was not sentimental. It was embodied. He sang at the top of his lungs, as he flipped pancakes ... old Christian hymns that seemed to stretch the ceiling higher. He did not lower his voice for embarrassment. He sang as though heaven was near and he meant to greet it properly. And when he told the story of Jesus Christ, especially the story of the cross, he wept. Not politely. Not discreetly. He wept as though the sacrifice was personal, as though love had cost something real. There was no shame in the tears running down his face. Only gratitude.

He tended to my grandmother with that same reverence. She, who had survived the influenza pandemic of 1918, who believed in God with all her heart, was cared for as something precious. He pampered her in small, attentive ways. He moved toward her needs, not away from them. Their marriage felt like a sanctuary: steady, kind, unmarred by cruelty. Love was not theoretical in that little house on St. George Street. It had hands. It had a voice. It had habits.

When you encounter such love as a child, it forms you. You do not analyze it; you absorb it. It is like sitting in a sun-drenched room - warmth sinking into your skin before you think to question its source. You grow toward it naturally, the way leaves lean toward light.

My parents built our home on that same foundation. Life was never perilous there. Not perfect, but never sharp with fear. Authentic love was the atmosphere. Forgiveness was practiced. Patience was visible. The stories of Jesus were not imported occasionally for moral instruction; they were part of the architecture. They framed the doorways. They held up the beams. They were told and retold with conviction; their purpose was to instill a good way to live life abundantly.

I think I absorbed the Christian story in the same way roots absorb water - quietly, continuously, without melodrama. More than hearing it, I watched it. I saw what belief did to a man. I saw how it made him tender rather than rigid, expressive rather than hardened, faithful rather than brittle. I saw how devotion to Christ did not shrink his heart; it enlarged it.

So when I ask myself where my faith comes from, I return to that yard, that willow, that singing voice. I return to tears shed without embarrassment over a love that would go even unto death. I return to a grandmother cherished, to parents who embodied what they proclaimed.

My belief did not begin as argument.

It began as beauty.

It began as gentleness lived out before me.

Even now ... in tough times when circumstances feel heavy; in weak seasons when my own strength falters; in questioning times when certainty loosens its grip;

and in hurtful moments when life feels sharper than it should... that root still holds. It draws from the same soil of gentleness, from the same memory of love embodied, from the same witness of faith lived out quietly before my eyes. The willow may bend, and my understanding may shift, but the root remains anchored in what I have seen and known: a God that inspires ... a love that endures, grace that sings, and faith that refuses to let go.