When I was a newly minted driver’s license holder at age 16, I had a heavy foot on the gas pedal. But if I offer any excuse, my driving habits were accommodated by the wide-open spaces and quiet country roads that surrounded the community where I grew up.

One road in particular invited my pedal to the metal approach. Ironically, it was the road I took to get to church, including youth group meetings and outings. Outside our small town’s city limits, this road snaked along the county fairgrounds, flowed around a wide banking curve that passed the local cemetery, took a brief straightaway to a single stop sign, and then continued over a long, straight concrete ribbon through farm fields to a glorious, in my view, sharp curve that brought you to the next town and our church, flanked by a few houses and more farm fields.

That curve was my favorite place to put on the speed. It also proved to be the spot that led me to an abrupt and lasting change in my desire to speed when behind the wheel.

And no, thankfully not through a car accident. God graciously spared me that. Instead, he provided dad on the roof.

My dad, born and raised in the same small town where we lived as a family, owned with his brother a family lumberyard and hardware business. In those days before the advent of big box home improvement stores, his local business thrived serving both area contractors and homeowners. But he worked hard, running “the yard," as he called it, six days a week. He and my uncle were known for doing everything they could to keep their customers happy. This often meant not just being behind the store counter, but out in the community, evaluating jobs onsite, especially when an estimate was needed for a contractor.

And that’s how I ended up with dad on the roof. Specifically, the roof of the farmhouse that sat at the apex of my favorite curve. The roof where the roofing contractor, who was buying shingles from my dad, wanted a second look for his estimate. The roof where my dad, hands-on guy that he was, stood atop at the exact moment when his Buick, driven by his daughter, came roaring around that curve and rocketed towards the church parking lot in the distance.

Whenever my dad wanted to “have a word” with one of his four children, he chose the spot in front of the fireplace in our living room. He called it “the front room,” which it was, the front of the house where you entered from the long screened in porch that graced our home. “Having a word” was not a casual conversation. As my three brothers and I all knew, dad waiting for you in front of the fireplace meant you were in trouble. With him. By extension, with mom. And that trouble led to consequences. Big ones.

When I arrived home the day that unbeknownst to me, my dad had seen my speedy whip around the curve, I saw him standing in the front room by the fireplace. He looked at me, and I knew immediately that I was the one in trouble. He didn’t yell, he just stared straight at me and told me that he had been on the farmer’s roof when “what should I see but my car, you driving, going around that curve way too fast.”

I was so stunned at being caught in the act of reckless driving—by myself, on a country road!―that at first, I hardly heard the consequences. Dad, of course, took away the keys. For two weeks. And reinstatement of driving privileges would require another “word with him” and would be severely limited for a longer period.

Dad on the roof. How unfair could life be? This wouldn’t happen to any of my friends. It hadn’t happened to my brothers. How could I be caught by such an unbelievable coincidence?

I sulked for days, enduring the embarrassment of the loss of my “right” to my parents’ wheels, having to ask for rides from friends, staying home instead of going out. But as the days without the keys went on, I started to reflect. On the warnings I had heard in drivers ed. On the sobering stories about teen drivers, some from my own high school, who did have accidents on curves. And especially, on how my dad had not yelled at me or carried on and on. He had stated the facts, let me know he was not happy with me, and handed out the consequences. He was dad on the roof.

But there was something else I knew about my dad. About why he had responded with firm but measured discipline. About why he cared enough to confront me about doing something that was not only disobedient, but dangerous. What I also knew was he was dad in the basement.

My dad grew up with church but not the gospel, so when he met my mom, who insisted that before she would date him, he had to attend church with her, he was intrigued. He went with her, heard the gospel for the first time, and soon became a Christian. He discovered the joy of studying Scripture, and eagerly took every opportunity he had to read the Bible. He listened to sermons at church and on the radio, studied commentaries and took correspondence courses. And he started to read for himself, every day.

And that’s where dad in the basement comes in. We lived in an old, two-story house with a large but partially finished basement. In the unfinished part, right next to the big, old furnace, my dad wedged a large steel desk, chair, and filing cabinets. Here he often did office work in the evenings, finishing estimates for customers or working on his company books. But in the mornings, he read his Bible. And not just read it, but studied it, pondered, memorized. He underlined, wrote in the margins, and wrote in a notebook.

How did I know? Because next to my dad’s rather makeshift office, my parents had installed a small bathroom with a shower. Nothing fancy, but I loved it, because quite frankly, my older brothers hogged the upstairs bathroom, and I hated waiting for my turn in the morning. It was worth the two long flights of stairs to the basement to enjoy my own space. And it was there, most every early morning, that I saw my dad with his Bible open on the desk.

We didn’t really discuss it those early mornings. I knew what he was doing, and he knew I knew. There were other times he did share with me his love of Scripture, and those conversations, but more so his example, still help motivate me today, decades after his passing, to read and study the Word.

My dad of course, was not a perfect parent. No one is. While he kept his cool for the big stuff, such as my driving episode, he did, as so many parents including myself have, lose it over little things. An undone chore, or worse, a half-completed one. Late arrival to the car on Sunday morning. Sibling squabbles. My dad struggled to balance the demands of running a small business with caring for his family. And he and my mom were both caught up in the legalism of the day, something I still work to shake off in my own Christian walk.

But all things considered, he was a good dad. Really, a very good one. He was dad on the roof, but he was also dad in the basement. I needed both, and I’m so thankful I had them. Thanks, Dad.