When Father's Die

I just found out today through an email forwarded to me that my best friend lost his father.  I haven't had a chance yet to call him since I just found out, but the emotions of when I lost my own father have already started coming back and I feel the need just to write a little now about the tie between sons and fathers. 
You see, even many years later, the mention of a variety of things is enough to trigger my emotions in this area and I know it will be the same for my friend.  My father was the one who coached my baseball teams, was at most of my high school games and he was also the one who drifted away from me after I went off to college.  It wasn't that I didn't want to keep that relationship strong, but that he was ready to do something else with his life.  Until that day I received the call that he had cancer and was in a hospital in Washington state, I probably had not talk to him in years.  But he was always with me.  As a man grows older, you see your father in the way you move, a certain way you phrase something, your actions and it always catches you by surprise when you realize that you are seeing your father in yourself.  In my case, I wanted to be better than my father, a better person, a better father and in those times when I wasn't it seemed as if I was failing.  When my father died, it was one of the worst days of my life, because unlike my friend, I have little hope that I will see my father in heaven.  You see, my father could never, at least as far as I know, understand not only why we, as his family, loved him, but that God would love him.  And this is the tragedy, that God came to save us from our sins and our failings and in the end, my father never understood that God's love could be bigger than his personal faults.  Death in this life doesn't scare me, but a hole still sits in my heart when I think of my father, because he had nothing but death staring at him in those last hours with nothing to look forward to on the other side.  Even though it will be tough for my friend in the coming days and even longer, I am thankful for him that instead of that sense of eternal loss, he will tackle the upcoming days knowing that Jesus is calling out to his father as He did to Lazarus in the grave, "My Child, come forth." 
My friend, I leave you with these words of comfort from Jesus as I join with you in your sorrow.
 "I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die; and whoever lives by believing in me will never die."