Setting the Stage (Part IV)

On the 4th of July weekend - only a couple days after my girlfriend broke up with me - my friend Jim and I took a trip down to sweet home Alabama where we met his family and I learned that the myths are all too true. What? No. Not about inbreeding and illiteracy. I’m talking about food and hospitality. Come on! We ate well. The mosquitos did too. The only one complaining was my waist line. Best of all, we got to spend a day out on the bayou. Ok, we were on a lake. I just feel more authentic using terms unknown around these parts.

Upon our arrival, the scent of banana puddin’ and comfort welcomed us. Jim’s mom is a delightful lady. She is a retired missionary nurse who, for decades, has healed the people of the world, principally in Africa. As a token of her adventures her house was cleverly decorated; each room had its own theme based on the seven continents. Of course, I was housed in the Africa room. Pictures of her working in clinics and curing African cultures lined the walls. Oh, by the way, did I mention that my girlfriend wanted to be a missionary nurse in Africa? Yeah. Go figure.

As I was lying in bed thinking about where I went wrong in my relationship and how I managed to destroy the best thing in my life, as well as why my father would make the choice to abandon my family and I, a voice - one that I attribute to the enemy, in whatever form it took - spoke to me. In the most malevolent temper, it said, “Of course your girlfriend left you! Even your own father didn’t love you enough to stay. What makes you think anyone else in this world would?”

......................

Even with my extensive background in pubescent warfare, I had never been hit that hard. It was a sudden strike that pierced into the very depths of my heart. In this somber solitude, I realized that my authentic awareness of rejection and abandonment had taken root long before she did it. To the enemy’s dismay, however, the wound pierced so deep that it actually revealed what was buried within. It penetrated to that place unseen; to a place I did not even know existed. God used for good what was intended for evil.

I had been rooted in rejection and abandonment for years. The fruit that I bore gave witness to it. Just ask any of my old girlfriends. Actually don’t. It will make me look bad. The roots ran deep. Too deep for me to realize. It took being rejected again by someone who I loved dearly to drive a shovel deep enough to unroot these issues.

Until this point in my life, if you were to ask me, “Nathan, do you fully believe that God loves you? Do you fully believe that He is trustworthy? Do you fully believe that He will never leave you nor forsake you?” I would have answered you, “Absolutely!” with a smile on my face and a heart that was running for the exit.

Most Christians that I know of who have a similar story as I do say that when they heard of how God is a Father to the fatherless and that He wanted to be theirs, it drew them to His embrace; they yearned to acquire the relationship of which their lives were lacking. This was not so with me. Every time I heard that God wanted to be my Father, my heart would retreat faster than France in...well, just about any war. It located the nearest escape and took it. Why? I don’t know, ask France. Oh, wait, you mean me?

When my father died, the impact warped my concept of who fathers are. Until this time, in the depths of my heart, I believed that fathers, by nature, abandon their families, are the most untrustworthy beings on this earth, are intolerably selfish, and are not truly loving; therefore, trusting them with your heart and life is suicide. Of course I would never admit it, but mainly because I did not realize I held these beliefs.

Do you see the predicament? 


(...Almost there. Just one more blog entry to go to complete the 'stage!'...)