My oldest daughter was about 6 years old, playing on the floor with a church friend of the same age. My youngest, Ashley, was three. She was excluded from their game. Chutes and Ladders was too complicated for her, they thought. But she could count, and proved it to them, so they let her in.
After a few plays they called to me. “Daddy, you want to play with us?” I guessed the door had been opened to outsiders, so I left my book on the dining table and headed to the contest.

My youngest was being bratty. Every time she would climb a ladder, she’d chant in a sing-song, “Na na nuh na na, I’m gonna win.” The others rolled their eyes.
Chutes and Ladders is a tricky game. In just a few spins, the little taunter hit a couple of slides and fell back, and Daddy hit a couple of ladders. And just like that, I won the game.

Without thinking, I chanted in her sing-song, “Na na nuh na na, I won the game!” And suddenly, without warning, she exploded in rage, jumped to her tiny feet, and yelled, “Well I coulda won if it hadna been for my stoopid daddy!” And then she turned and ran to her room.

The three of us were shocked. I didn’t know what to do. Meekly I whispered to the two girls, “Keep playing. I’m going to sit out for a while.” And then I went back to the table and my book.
Quite simply, I didn’t know how to respond. She’d never called me stupid. I had not seen that kind of rage in her. I felt partly guilty because I goaded her, but she had been doing the same. I imagined what my father might have done to me if I had ever called him stupid. But I elected to just keep reading my book.

After a while, I was aware of timid little steps behind my chair. I sensed her. She didn’t speak. Momentarily I turned around to face her. Her little body was in complete surrender. Her arms hung limp at her chubby little sides, her head hung down. She wouldn’t look up. She knew she was in for it, and she had come meekly to get it.
“Do you want something?” I asked. She never looked up.

“I sawwy, Daddy.” A tiny tear fell.

I opened my knees and pulled her into my chest and just hugged her. The other little girls were watching. I whispered in her ear, “It’s okay. I’m sorry, too. I shouldn’t have teased you.” And then we just hugged for while. After moments, I said, “We gonna be okay?”

“Yep.”

“Want to go back and play?”

“Uh huh.”
So I let her go. As she turned, heart all healed, tension all gone, I reached toward her and caught her attention. She froze for second. “Hey,” I whispered, “You don’t really think I’m stoopid, do you?”
Her face screwed up for a second, and then, “Sometimes!” And she was gone. Before I could backhand her across the room, she was playing again.

I spun back around to the table and laid my head in the crook of my arm. I was having a moment, and I needed to have it privately.

“God,” I whispered, “I wish I could know that you love me like I love my kids. I love my kids even when they’re brats.” And in one of those rare moments of life, I heard God whisper back in my ear, as I had in hers, “Where do you think you learned to love? I don’t love you ’cause you’re good; I love you ’cause you’re mine.”

Dave and I lost touch with each other after I left my first pastorate. He worked at the same engineering company I worked for. He had been a nice man, not always agreeing with my religious side of “coffee break discussions,” but never was rude like some were.
When I moved away, I lost ties to my former friends. So when my phone rang 20 years later and a husky voice on the other end asked, “Are you the Danny Carpenter that used to work in Dallas?” I was blown away. It was Dave.
It turns out Dave had converted after I moved away. Married, had a kid, and was now, 20 years later, a Sunday School teacher. And on Sunday his pastor had challenged members to remember the person or people who had impacted them for Christ, and find them to say “Thank you.” So Dave was calling me to thank me. Twenty years ago, he said, I made a lasting impression on him. It was a humbling moment.
After we hung up, I began to reflect on my own mentors. Men who had shaped my life. There were two men who made a huge impact on me. One was the principal of my 7th and 8th grade years. Harold Lichtenwald, principal of Sidney Lanier, took me under his wing and helped me. Saved me. One of the greatest men I’ve ever known.
The other was Fred Gregory, my high school drafting teacher. One of a kind. Cared about his students’ futures, not their grades. He showed me that character was more important than skill. And he helped me long after high school.
I decided to look them up. Mr. Gregory was easy. He still lived in the same house in Mesquite. I phoned him, and wrote a column about him in the local newspaper. My way of saying thanks.
Mr. Lichtenwald was a little harder to find. When I did, he was dying in a nursing home in Dallas. Parkinson’s, diabetes, and something else. But I walked in his room unannounced, and he asked, “Are you looking for someone?”
“You,” I said. “I’m a voice from your past.”
He smiled. “How far back?”
“Sidney Lanier,” I said, knowing he’d never guess. But to my surprise, he teared up and said, “Danny Carpenter.” I couldn’t believe it. He cried a while, and then, embarrassed, told me he couldn’t move his arms, and he could really use help with his running nose and eyes. It was my privilege.
I loved those two men. And I was pleasantly surprised to discover that they loved me, too. Mr. Lichtenwald passed away a year after I found him. Mr. Gregory just passed away a day after this past Christmas.
I am glad I found them. I’m glad I thanked them before they slipped away.
Who do you need to find? Find ’em. And thank them.
You’ll be glad you did.