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My father and God my Father |
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although i have lived in a Christian home all my life, life has not at all been easy for me. my dad has a very short temper and not much patience. from the time i was about 5 to well...it still goes on at times, i have been abused physically, mentally, spiritually and emotionally. this is the story of what my dad's impression is he has left on me and how hard it is at times to accept and understand God as my Heavenly Father because of it.
i have always believed that Jesus is saviour and that He is Lord over my life and over every one of my situations through life. i know and believe that God is my heavenly Father, but my view has been slightly fogged up because of tragedy of circumstance that has happened in my family.my dad had an abusive father. he had a father who was drunk a lot of the time and because of that, took all pent up emotion out on my dad and his brother. and the abuse my father felt when he was a child was passed down to his own children, not because he thinks it's appropriate or at all right, but because that's how he's learned to deal with it-taking it out on other people. and in my family, he's taken it out on his kids.he's very loud and rough when he gets angry...and his anger bursts out when you sometimes least expect it to. my dad has, all throughout my life for as long as i can remember, been tearing down me and my siblings in the process of trying to make himself feel better about something that had gone on at work. can you imagine how hard it is to try to explain to your 3 year old baby brother why daddy is always so mad?for years, probably 10 years, i tried to deny my dad being abusive, i tried to justify why he'd been treating us like crap for so many years, and i hid my pain really well. but you see, i was really afraid of my dad. i always stressed myself out when he was at home, as soon as he came home from work. i never wanted to get him in a bad mood and i would always be telling my three younger siblings to be quiet so we wouldn't upset dad, because we all knew how venomous he could get.i have never ever felt that my dad loves me. i can't genuinely say that i have even believed him when he has said it to me. i find it extremely hard to believe that a man with four kids can behave so atrociously to them and still expect them to believe that he loves them just because he says so. i read a valentine's card he gave me a few years ago and i cried because at the end of it he had written, "i love you".because i have had such a tainted and warped perception on what a dad should behave like, and what a dad is, at times it has made it really hard for me to "get" how God is as a father and what a father is really supposed to be like -what God has made fathers to be originally and wholly.i can't say that i have been completely healed from what my dad has done and continues to do (but not as regularly thank God), but i have forgiven him and i keep praying for him to see his errors. and you know what? a few times he has apologized almost directly after an outburst. that's God working in him.i have looked for love many times throughout my 16 years of life in many of the wrong places, searched but not found what i've been looking for at all. it has only been through my heavenly Father showing me who He really is and who He really created fathers to be that has brought me back to what really IS love.when we take God out of the picture, that's when we mess up. my dad messed up because he chose to do things his own way instead of relying on God to give him the strength he needed to reign in his emotions and frustrations. yes, he did mess up -and yes it has messed me up a bit in the past years, and there are still rocky days.but i cannot say enough about the grace of God and the POWER of God's love. God's love is potent. it will cut through and cut into every wall in your soul. it can melt anything and take away the hurt and pain if you just let it. i know sometimes it's scary to, but trusting Him with all your heart and leaning on His ways takes so much pressure off of your own abilities, our tiny finite little minds can't handle everything the world puts on us, especially not the hurt. God loves you. God loves you. He is the only one who can make you whole, and it is ONLY because of Him that i am whole today. He always has and continues to make the difference from what i lack, changing me and renewing me and making me into a strong woman of God -a living, breathing testimony of God's grace and love.
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