A Father's Heart

So, I struggle with the concept of God as Father. You see, the word, Father, or Daddy, or Dad, is so tied up in my relationship with my earthly father. And my relationship with my earthly father is surface level at best, and tense at worst.

There are rather deep wounds, and the distance between us seems to have grown over the last years as I've moved away from the church he pastors, the church I grew up in, and settled into the church I presently attend.

When I think of a Father I don't think of a person I come running to with every wound. I think of a person that I need to be kind of together to come in front of. I don't think of a person who wants to know the intimate details of my life. I think about a person who wants to know the surface level stuff - the intellectual stuff. I don't think about someone who celebrates with me when I'm excited about something new that I've learned. I think about someone who plays devil's advocate even when he agrees with me, someone who will challenge every statement that comes out of my mouth, someone who is always pushing me to think harder, more deeply.

(just reading that last sentence makes me laugh. no wonder I've had trouble with the experiential aspects of faith!)

But, over the last while God has been subtly beginning to reveal His Father's heart to me. Never directly - I don't know that I've been ready to receive it, but always in ways that show me what His love is like.

There was the time I had my arm around a hurting friend, praying for her, and I was suddenly completely overwhelmed with a sense of God's love for her. The depth and intensity of it astonished me as I realized that this was his fathering heart for this hurting woman.

And then there was an experience this week. A group of us were praying together, ranging over a variety of issues, when another young woman began to share. The wounds in her life from her father are deep, and my own heart resonated and understood many parts of what she shared. As we began to pray over her and minister to her, I kept asking God what He would say to her. I paced a bit around the room, needing to move, wrestling to determine if what I was hearing was really the voice of God. And finally, I began to speak. God was telling her that He was not like her earthly father. That He wanted her to run to Him, to be held by Him. That He didn't want to create a spirit that says I must be independent, but rather a spirit that fosters this woman running into His arms with each and every need, each and every moment of joy, with every breath turning to Him. That He wanted to celebrate her because she was His beloved child.

Those words have stuck with me this week. I don't know if they resonated deeply with her or not, but they've bounced around my heart. Slowly, and ever so gently, through the words He's asked me to speak to others, God is revealing His heart for me.

A few weeks ago, as I was laying on the floor at the conference I attended, sobbing, and being prayed for, one of the things I remember Kari saying was that she felt like God was going to heal some more of my Father wounds. A few weeks prior to that, she sent me a note telling me that she was praying a Jason Upton song over me that day. I've written about that song, about the ongoing theme of our interconnectedness in Christ over the last while. I've listened to the song over and over, and every time it impacts me with the truth that I am not alone. What never caught me until tonight, as I began to write this post, is that the song is actually a lullaby that Upton wrote for his daughter, that developed into a love song from God to his children. Part of my father wound seems to have been a driving independence. But that independence was lonely. God is speaking to me through Upton's words... look at the first couple lines of the song:

Don't be afraid baby, don't you cry
Daddy's here it will be all right
You're not alone, you're not alone....

I love the subtle ways that God is working! Thank you, Abba, for continuing to reveal your heart for me.