By Ralphine Major

ralphine3@yahoo.com

Father’s Day 2020 will be drastically different than most others we have celebrated before.  The third Sunday in June is designated as the day our nation sets aside to honor fathers.  The special day often fell on our father’s birthday.  This upcoming summertime holiday is right on track, but life is anything but normal.  As 2020 reaches the halfway point, we celebrate yet another holiday during the Coronavirus pandemic often referred to as COVID-19.

Our country is slowly reopening.  Each week, more churches, more businesses, more theme parks, and more restaurants are cautiously reopening; and many require that masks be worn.  Though experts still advise the best safeguard against Coronavirus is to stay home, some family members may travel out of town to their hometown to spend the day with family.  Lots of families are likely to come together and enjoy cookouts, watermelon, and homemade ice cream on this special day.  Yet, some children and adults alike may have lost their father to COVID-19.

As we face the anxiety of navigating through this Coronavirus that seems to have taken over our lives these last few months, it is more important than ever that we recognize another Father.  He is the one who made us, who created the heavens and the earth, and who controls the universe.  He understands our deepest fears, our struggles, and our needs.  He knows all about us.  He cares for us.  He is our heavenly Father.  Be safe and well!  Happy Father’s Day!

Words of Faith:  From the New Testament, we find comforting words in Matthew.  “Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them.  Are you not much more valuable than they?”  (Matthew 6:26 NIV).