But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work (2Ti 3:14-17, ESV).”

It was almost a lifetime ago that I went to the Oregon State Basic Police Academy.  It could be close to twenty years.  In fact, when I went to the Basic Police and Fire Chaplaincy course at the Oregon Police Academy, I thought I would get my police records just to have a copy.  Turns out I could not just request them through the Department of Public Safety Standards and Training (DPSST) because they had been moved into the archives.  I had to request them through a different agency.  The lady at the desk said I could go online and make the request.  I imagined the scene at the end of Indiana Jones Raiders of the Lost Ark as they wheeled the Ark of the Covenant into a Top-Secret warehouse filled with antiquities.  Perhaps my files were in the same building.  It could take months to get my records.  While I was relaying my Raiders of the Lost Ark story to the lady at the desk she decided to just go to the website and help me out.  I had my records emailed to me before I got back to class that day.

Anyway, I remember the police academy like it was yesterday.  That kid’s voice still haunts my thoughts although his body probably would not score as high on the physical fitness test these days.  Two days I especially remember, the emergency vehicle operation day and the range day.

I did not expect emergency vehicle operation to be so much fun.  I had not given it much thought really.  They taught us that because of the location of the center of gravity it was impossible to roll your car if you stayed on flat dry pavement.  They gave us a car and an old airport runway and told us to prove them wrong.  I still remember the conversation I had with myself as I brought the car to eighty mph with the intent of doing a hard ninety-degree turn.  Turns out at eighty mph it is hard to make your body obey that command.  I did a couple of three sixties and made a few more attempts but I never proved the instructors wrong.  At the end of the day the academy had us park all the training cars at the local tire shop.  Each class required new tires.  Man did we have fun!

I expected range day to be fun.  I grew up hunting and had already gone through basic training for the Army.  We practiced and qualified with our duty weapons, went through some simulation training, and got familiar with the rifle but it was the shotgun familiarization that I have been thinking about lately.

I do not remember the model, but I remember they gave us only one round more than the shotgun could hold and about six seconds to go through this little shooting scenario.  I told them I was going to need a few more rounds if they were going to give me six whole seconds.  They laughed at me but obliged by asking me how many I thought I needed.  One of the purposes of the scenario was to teach us the difficulty of rapid reload with a shotgun.  I went into the scenario with a fully loaded weapon, three or four rounds stuck in the band of my “boonie” cap, three in between the fingers of my pump hand, and one more in my teeth just for good measure.  They laughed some more but I was all in now.

Before my six seconds were up, I had expended every round and hit every target.  They had never seen someone fire and load so quickly.  There was no laughter when the range sergeant asked, “were you born with a shotgun in your hands?”

The truth was pretty close.  I do not remember when I first started bird hunting but every fall my dad, and brothers, and I would compete for who could bring home the most pheasant, quail, and ducks.  The competition was so fierce we eventually had to resort to different shot sizes so that if a kill were contested the autopsy would reveal who got the point.  I could shoot fast and I could shoot accurate even with a plug limiting the amount of rounds I could load.

What is my point?  Well, it is Christmas eve 2020 and my wife and I are on the eve of another sort.  We are one day past our due date and so the eve of our daughter’s birth is upon us.  The anticipation is almost too much to bear. I have spent the last nine months in almost constant contemplation of what it means to be a father.  How do I do it right? What do I want for my daughter?  How can I prepare her for her generation?  Paul, writing to encourage Timothy, reminded him to continue in what he believed, trusting in what he had learned, and to rest on his understanding of the Scriptures.

I know that there is no guarantee.  You can do all the right parenting and still your child will make decisions contrary to how he or she was raised.  But what I do want, and what I think I can do is give my daughter an understanding of the Word and encourage her to know it well. I want to put these things before her. Then, someday, when a false teacher is trying to convince her of a lie, she will know the truth so well that any false teacher will have to ask, “were you born with a Biblical understanding?”

I want her to know what Christmas is about.  I want her to know how much her God loves her and to what extent He was willing to go to demonstrate that love.  I want her to be as familiar with her Bible as I was with a shotgun growing up.

I know that some of you might worry that I will “pound” the Bible into my daughter’s head.  Or have to force her to church every Sunday.  But what I know is that no one had to force me out of bed before dawn and remind me to grab my shotgun and ammo.  And it was not the drive of competition but rather the opportunity to spend another day with my family doing what I enjoyed.  I want to give her a love of the Word that comes from a desire to spend time in fellowship with those who believe because she knows that God loves them too.

Shouldn’t every Christian want this first for themselves and then for the Church? Shouldn’t we all have the ability to rightly divide and understand God’s Word (2Ti 2:15)?

Merry Christmas everyone.  I hope that this season finds you confident in what God has done for you in the gift that is Jesus the Christ!  Oh, how He loves us!

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