Fatherhood Legacy: The Blessing or Curse a Man Leaves

What this article is about:

Every man will leave a fatherhood legacy—what remains in question is whether it will become a blessing or a curse.

What You Will Find in This Article:

• Why every man will render an account of his fatherhood legacy
• How a confrontation with death clarifies what truly matters
• What King Hezekiah’s failure of stewardship reveals about modern men
• How fathers transmit either blessing or wound to future generations
• What it means to live, like Jesus and St. Joseph, as a being for the other

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Fatherhood Legacy: The Blessing or Curse a Man Leaves

Have you ever had one of those dreams wherein you find yourself in a classroom, sitting at a desk, and suddenly you have the alarming thought, “There is an exam and I haven’t studied for it!”

Or, perhaps more unsettling, you are sitting amidst an assembly when, to your complete surprise, the MC summons you to give the highly anticipated keynote address—but you have no idea what the speech or the event is about.

I have. Many times.

As a result, I force myself to awake from such disturbing and anxiety-inducing nightmares, hoping against all hope that it really is a dream.

However, as disturbing and distressing as these moments are, there will be, for many a man, a moment far more stressful and lamentable—and it will not be a dream.

Every man will render an account of the legacy he has imparted as a father to God’s Kingdom, his family, and the future generations of his bloodline.
It is not whether a man will leave a legacy, but rather what type of legacy he will leave.

Our children and children’s children will inherit something from us, but will that inheritance be something that our successors will deem worthy of inheriting?

The question every man must ask himself is: What will I be remembered for?
Will I pass on the ruins of my sins and immorality to my children?
Or will I pass on a heroic, saintly example of fatherhood, fidelity in marriage, spiritual resilience, and sacrifice?

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Facing the Reality of Death

Around my thirtieth year of life on God’s “green earth,” I dislocated a rib, which induced intensely acute pain every time I drew breath.
A friend of mine, Andy, was in his last semester at chiropractic school, finishing his clinical terms, and needed patients in order to graduate.

We decided to kill two birds with one stone.
I would be his patient, pushing him one step closer toward graduation, and he would reset my rib so that I could breathe without hindrance.
I gowned up.
They performed the standard X-rays.
Andy adjusted me, and I was as good as new.

However,  approximately one week later, Andy called me.

The X-ray

With a tone of terseness and distress, he asked that I return to the clinic as soon as possible.
I went to the clinic immediately.

When I entered the meeting room, Andy and the school’s lead chiropractor professor were sitting at a table, looking down.

It was silent—too silent.

The Diagnosis

The doctor proceeded to show me my X-ray from the previous visit, explaining that my esophagus and trachea were pushed to an extreme position, indicating that a large tissue mass was the cause.

After an ultrasound and a biopsy, it became clear that I had cancer.

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King Hezekiah’s Brush with Death

As was my custom (and still is), I attended the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass that day.

The first reading was from 2 Kings 20:1–19, which recounts the rise and fall of Hezekiah and the legacy he would impart to his successors.

King Hezekiah was hailed by the author of Second Kings as being one of the most—if not the most—righteous kings in the history of Judah; unmatched in justice and fidelity—even more than King David or Solomon.

“After him was none like him among all the kings of Judah, nor any who were before him.”
(2 Kings 18:5; 2 Chronicles 31:20–21)

King Hezekiah made significant religious reforms, centralizing worship in Jerusalem by removing the idols of false gods and destroying all cult objects of worship.

Among his most valorous deeds, Hezekiah was victorious in battle against the superpower rival Assyrians.
When all appeared to be utterly hopeless, God, through Hezekiah, procured the routing of one hundred and eighty thousand Assyrian soldiers—perhaps the greatest single defeat in Israel’s military history.

However, following these astounding achievements, the prophet Isaiah came to Hezekiah and said:

“This is what the LORD says: ‘Put your house in order, for you are about to die; you will not recover.’”
(2 Kings 20:1)

Hezekiah turned to the wall and wept.
However, before Isaiah had departed from Hezekiah’s palace, God commanded the prophet to return to the king and foretell that his life would be extended fifteen years. (See 2 Kings 20:5)

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Damned Self-Preoccupation

After Hezekiah’s miraculous healing, the Babylonians visited the king for the purpose of congratulating him on his recovery. (See 2 Kings 20:12)
Neglecting to recall the fragility of life, while also abandoning humility, Hezekiah proceeded to boast of the treasures contained in the armory, and his storehouses:

“There was nothing in his palace or in all his dominion that Hezekiah did not show them.”
(2 Kings 20:13)

Upon the Babylonians’ departure, the prophet Isaiah questioned Hezekiah:

“What have they seen in your palace?”
(2 Kings 20:15)

To which Hezekiah responded:

“They have seen everything… there is nothing among my treasures that I did not show them.”
(2 Kings 20:16)

The Prophecy

Isaiah then foretold that doom would befall Hezekiah’s legacy and lineage:

“Hear the word of the LORD: The time will surely come when everything in your palace and all that your fathers have stored up until this day will be carried off to Babylon. Nothing will be left, says the LORD. And some of your descendants—your own flesh and blood—will be taken away to be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.”
(2 Kings 20:17–18)

As a result, Hezekiah became distressed as to how this might affect him personally—at which point the prophet foretold that it would not transpire during his lifetime.

“But Hezekiah said to Isaiah, ‘The word of the LORD that you have spoken is good.’ For he thought, ‘Will there not at least be peace and security in my lifetime?’”
(2 Kings 20:19)

Did you get that?

“It is good,” Hezekiah says.

How could he deem the prophetic destruction of his dominion as good?
Because the tragedy would not occur during Hezekiah’s life, but during his successors’.

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Failing to Understand Stewardship

Hezekiah did not understand stewardship.

He failed to comprehend that the things God has given to us are not ours; rather, they are gifts from on High with which we are to be trusted stewards.

As St. Paul asks:

“For who makes you different from anyone else? What do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it, why do you boast as though you did not?”
(1 Corinthians 4:7)

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The Cursed Legacy Men Leave to Their Children

There is a single attribute—a virtue—that separates our Lord Jesus, St. Joseph, and other faithful men from a man like Hezekiah: they are “other-focused.”
Our Lord Jesus and St. Joseph had inestimable concern for the future, the generations to come, the Kingdom of God, and the souls who were yet to exist.

Jesus and Joseph dedicated the entirety of their lives to ensure that their successors would have a Kingdom to inherit.

Indeed, they could have surmised, as did Hezekiah, “I will live for myself—my own self-preservation.”
This attitude is akin to the man who, because of addictions or poor financial management, cashes in his insurance policy, spends the proceeds, dies, and leaves his wife and children to fend for themselves.

Men do this spiritually—all the time.

We fail to understand that the flagrant immoral dissipation that forms our actions and attitudes heaps curse and wrath not only upon us, but upon our children and children’s children.
Yes, we as fathers can and do transmit the consequences of our sinful treachery to our offspring.

However, they are not necessarily bound by our immoral decay, but are most certainly wounded and influenced by it.
There is hope.
To overcome such wounds demands that they surrender to Jesus Christ.
It demands a willingness to render themselves available to the divine scalpel to extract the spiritual cancer they have inherited.

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The Blessed Legacy We Are to Leave to Our Children

Pope Benedict XVI, in his inspiring work Jesus of Nazareth, Volume II, described Jesus:

“His entire life is a being for the other.”

In the final analysis, you and I, as men of God, sons of the Father, and disciples of Christ, have three goals:
to glorify God; to have an intimate communion and union with God; and to lead others into that communion with God.

Hezekiah suffered from spiritual amnesia.
He forgot that God gave him all that he had, and therefore all that he had was to be used to glorify God—not himself.

Men often suffer from spiritual amnesia.

God spares us from impending doom—a sickness, a financial trial, joblessness, a crumbling marriage, or a child suffering from an addiction.
Sometime afterward, God then grants us success and a time of peace.

What about us?
How do we express our gratitude to Him?

By showing the world all that is ours: our achievements, our honors, our vacations, our wealth, our wisdom.
And we transmit curse rather than blessing to our successors.

Our life’s goal is not to draw attention to our own pathetic, man-made glory.
We are to use and spend the short time we have here on earth in the noble effort to shine a spotlight on God’s eternal glory.

In the final analysis, there are two types of men: those who use God for their glory, and those who use themselves for God’s glory.

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What to Do With the Time That Remains

Looking back on the day that I was diagnosed with cancer, I recall realizing that—up to that point—I had only lived for myself.
Like Hezekiah, I was a man of grave self-concern.

That self-preoccupation was the magnet that drew my soul to Hades.
However,  God the Father offered me another life—a new opportunity to live for others and leave a legacy, an inheritance worthy of inheriting.

Identify what you will do with the remaining years, months—perhaps days?
A legacy of a father is a generational legacy—either blessing or curse—and it depends upon a father’s spiritual leadership.

The question remains:
What will you be remembered for?

Will you spend the remainder of your earthly pilgrimage building your kingdom, or will you assist in building the Kingdom of God?

Are you determined to be like Jesus and St. Joseph: a being for the other?

If you do, your successors will inherit the greatest blessing : the self-giving love of God, which grants freedom to the burdened soul.