The Pastor’s Piece, Pastor Kevin Cernek. FCFI Chaplain

FCFI

May 10, 2025

As I write this, today is our daughter’s birthday. A couple thoughts come to mind as I reminisce about her younger years and those of her brother. When she was just a toddler, I came home one night after a hard day’s work where she greeted me enthusiastically in the garage. She led me to the backyard where she had something to show me. She climbed up in the swing and began to pump her feet and lean forward and back and pretty soon she was high in the sky going back and forth. “Look Daddy,” she yelled gleefully, “I don’t need you to push me anymore.”

I smiled and laughed and encouraged her, but my heart was breaking because this was just one less thing I was no longer needed for in her life. I was sure more were to come. But then, a day or so later, I was on the back patio doing something and she was around the side of the house playing. There was an abandoned train track that ran through the woods behind our house in Monroe toward the new ethanol plant. The engineers were busy re-opening that track so train loads of corn could get directly to the plant. Suddenly, for the first time in her lifetime, a train horn blared loud and long and it sounded like it was coming directly toward us. She ran around the edge of the house terrified, saw me, and shouted “HELP HELP” and leaped into my arms without breaking stride. Yes, I was still needed.

At night, after she was put to bed and the rest of us were quietly snuggled in, she would call out in the darkness: “Mommie. Daddy.” And we would answer, “Yes honey. We’re right here. Night night.” Upon hearing our voices and sensing the security of us nearby, she would doze off into sleep.

When our son was a toddler, he would watch from the window as I pulled away from the house on my way to work. He would stand on the heat register in order to gain a couple inches so he could see over the windowsill. All I could see was the blond tassel of hair on top of his little head and his hands as he waved goodbye. When I came home later, he’d be watching from that same window, and waving at me just like when I left. When I came into the house, he and his sister would stand at the top of the stairs in our split level house shouting in unison at the top of their lungs: “Daddy’s home. Daddy’s home!” And then one at a time they would leap from the top step into my arms. I cherished those moments.

When he was about six years old we bought a go-cart. It had a little Honda motor on it and a belt/clutch drive that made it go. He would drive that thing around the orchard all day long day after day having the time of his life. Later he graduated to trucks and when he was 15 years old he bought a worn out Dodge truck with a first generation Cummins engine in it. The engine was fine. They are indestructible, but the body was in sad shape. We bought grinders and wheels and discs and sanders and he went to work restoring it and before we knew it, his truck was show-room ready. He’s had it ever since – even took his girl to their Senior Prom in it.

Since the month of May always brings back these memories of the heart, and since it’s also the month we celebrate Mother’s Day, I’d like to say again – God is good. His plan for home and family is wonderful. He has given me a Godly wife and through her, He’s given me a family after His own heart.

(Kevin Cernek is Lead Pastor of Martintown Community Church in Martintown, Wisconsin).