Happy, Happy, Happy: My Life and Legacy as the Duck Commander

how to be hospitable and to value people no matter what their skin color or whether they were rich or poor. Most important for me, I learned that as a follower of Christ you could have a lot of fun. It was not so much what we were doing around the riverbank but whom we were with on the riverbank. Thanks, Dad!
A NOTE FROM WILLIE
    I’m happy I get to write about my dad when I’m older in life. The older I get, the more I’m starting to realize how great he really is. Not great because of all of his many accomplishments, but because of who he is and how he has lived his life. I know he has not always been what he wanted to be in life, but all of us have made mistakes; it’s how we deal with them that makes us great or not. Dad spent much of his younger years searching for something. When he found it, he sold out for what it gave him—peace andhope. He lived his early life with neither, and I would have to say I would have done the same if I didn’t know Jesus. He lived his life without peace, and he in turn gave no peace. He lived his life without hope, so he gave none as well. He lived only by what he saw. But after he accepted Jesus Christ as his savior, he learned to live by what he couldn’t see. And that is what he taught me after he found it.
    I find myself living more and more like my dad as I get older. It’s probably because we were somewhat in the same birth order. I am the third in four children and he was the fifth in seven. We shared the same type of childhood. We both had nothing when we were young but never wanted any help and were self-made men. We had to really stand out to “stand out.” Neither of us ever feared failure, and if we did, we surely wouldn’t admit it. Each of us decided we would never live our lives in the trap of some man-made structure or like caged birds doing what we are supposed to do. Both of us knew at early ages that we needed a great partner to help us in life. We both put our spouses through trying times to make them prove to us that they really loved us for who we really were. And both women saw something in us that we did not see in ourselves, something that could be great with a little help and patience.
    I would love to give all the credit to our gals, but without the Lord, it would have been impossible. We will bow to no man, butwe bow to something bigger than us. God is the only thing that can tame the wild horse in both of us. It is as simple as that. It just makes sense to have hope beyond our lives on Earth. If the only thing we can rest on is how good life is here on Earth, then it may be comprehensible to think life ain’t so bad. But I have to wonder, what if I were born somewhere else on the planet? Somewhere that wasn’t so good? What if we couldn’t hunt, prosper, be happy, and have such a good family? It wouldn’t seem fair, would it? That is why we put our hope in something else. God’s way is better.
    My father went through all the bad to teach me not to do it, and I didn’t. I don’t have to testify about how bad I used to be. Yes, I made and continue to make bad decisions, and I am in no way perfect. I also have done many things the right way and have been a positive influence on many people. I have brought many people to the Lord and counseled teens, college kids, and married people. I have worked for the church, gone to seminary, and completed mission work. And I did most of it when I was still only a teen. I don’t deserve any glory. I simply followed the examples my parents showed me and did what my heavenly Father told me to do. The byproduct was I knew my dad would be pleased with what I was doing with my life.
    My dad taught me to be a salesman, hard worker, good man, visionary, entrepreneur, problem solver, good husband, good father, and great hunter. He taught me to be independent, confident,and fearless, but most of all godly. I never remember him talking about his accomplishments on the ball field, and he never was big on homework, ball practice, or how we looked. He did, however, do what my wife said many years ago, which was to “hot-wire us to God.” Not so we would make him happy, but so we would make Him happy. I always tried to do what was right not only because it would make my dad happy, but because it would make the Lord happy.
    As I sit here in my recliner, watching The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, literally turning into my dad, my hope is that I really do turn out to be somewhat like him. I am totally confident that