As Father's Day approaches I feel sort of empty. On the one hand, I am happy to celebrate my husband, the father of my children and all he is. The other hand is full of how I perceive and experience and understand and relate to my Heavenly Father.Now that my hands are full up with these relationships ,I look into my heart and see the emptiness of having no real happy "my father" memories or feelings.
As I look on Facebook, I see many people posting wonderful, sincere sayings of loss in missing the fathers who have passed.As I see them I wish I felt that way or could. Unfortunately my response to my own fathers passing was that I had lost him decades before. In reality I never had him.After the relationship,or lack thereof that we had, was over and he was gone, I could not see it or feel it any other way.I saw peoples discomfort in my response to his death, but they had not lived my life. For one of the rare moments in my life with him, I actually was honest to myself and to others with that response.Their discomfort with my reality was interesting to me.It gave me more understanding of why people pretend, wear masks, drink, drug, sleep around, overeat, starve , overspend and the lists of addiction go on in the way people try to cope with the realities of life. And the most obvious one of all was recognizing peoples response to my own reality...of wanting to not see it or accept it or give it a voice or a face.To not hear the words I said in regards to his death,although it was one of my most honest statements ever, both to myself and the world at large. To act as if everything was perfectly okay while knowing that's not really how it is, not for everyone.I got it. Its hard to hear. Its also hard to live a lie.
For most of my life, my father was a pretend character in my heart.His alcoholism, his emotional and physical abandoning of me and absence period, kept me yearning for the fairy tale prince I imagined him to be. Because he was very handsome, and charming and funny, others saw him as attractive as well. I'm sure his lies of why his kids were not with him,made him the object of others sympathy. Being manipulative has its benefits.One can twist any story into a truth.Unfortunately that story,manipulation, and lie made my very existence a lie that I carried into my own heart and life for decades.
My Heavenly Father wrote a different story for me, His daughter. In this story ,there really is a Prince. That Prince gave His life for me ,that I might live forevermore.That Prince met me at the very place I was and accepted me and gave me New Life. That Prince gave me Peace in the midst of a chaotic life filled with doubt, and terror and no stability. That Prince gave me Healing and Hope to a heart broken by lies,manipulation and abandonment. That Prince said He would never leave me nor forsake me. That Prince said He wrote my name in His Book of Life that no one can erase. I have a Father, a Family and a Home: never to be taken away from me.
It is funny how we believe Fairy Tales sometimes but not the unerring Word of God. I am grateful that in His perfect Love my Heavenly Father, rewrote my story. I began to see the untruths in the fairy tale, while I slowly began to see the beautiful story in the ugly truths of my life. Wherever the real Prince shows up, there can be a fairy tale ending. I cling to this hope this day as I feel the sadness and emptiness of not really having a daddy. I look forward to seeing the Prince of Peace sitting at the right hand of my Heavenly Father. What an ending to this story that will be. "And she lived happily forever after."
" But on the contrary,as the Scripture says, What eye has not seen and ear has not heard and has not entered into the heart of man all that God has prepared (made and keeps ready) for those who love Him ( who hold Him in affectionate reverence,promptly obeying Him and gratefully recognizing the benefits He has bestowed)". 1 Corinthians 2:9
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