What is harder: being a good father or being a good husband?
I find both incredibly difficult and I fail *all the time*…but there is something I find even harder.
Being a son!
Today, my step dad was emotional as he shared about how close he got to elders that discipled him in a church. He had been asked to speak at the funeral of one of the elders and it was incredibly meaningful to become so close to people from a very different background.
Yet here, in this emotional moment, where this man who tried to tried to father me, who put up with so much of my *bad* behaviour, rejection, attacks, stealing and more, I only feel anger. I’m annoyed at other things happening around me, wrapped up in my own physical & emotional pain that I can’t even connect.
But it’s not an isolated incident. I rarely call or visit or text. I forget important dates. For my biological father, I respected his request to never contact him again. Now dead (as far as I know), I should have reached out to help him and understand where he was at. But avoiding it all was far easier.
It’s a pattern, for my mum, sisters, pastors, friends – I am so disconnected it really is insane. I don’t want to be and Jesus has changed me *heaps* compared to what I used to eye like. But I want to do better – far better.
I see that there is only One Way that can happen: going to God THE Father. But even in this I struggle and fail.
I know He loves me, He has always been faithful, He has never wronged me or rubbed my nose in it when I have gone to Him. I am regularly brought to tears of joy when I worship Him. I am amazed and riveted when I read His Word. I am excited when I share about Him to others.
Yet I *still* ignore, run, rebel and spend time doing things that are meaningless – not how I want to show appreciation to the Father who literally plucked me off the ledge.
I say to you what I have to say to myself:
Don’t give up. Turn to God, accept His perspective, seek His wisdom, grip hold of his Truth, walk in His ways, rest in His love. No matter how you feel, no matter how negative your view of yourself is, no matter how much you fail. Trust Jesus.
Lord, please change me, remove the nonsense – the dirt, the rebellion, the emptiness, the pride, the desire to be comfortable or succeed or have more. Give me the desire and power and strength to do what You want me to. Be the Father I am not to those I fail, give them love and grace and heal them from the results of my failures.
Galatians 4:4-7 (NLT) 4 But when the right time came, God sent his Son, born of a woman, subject to the law. 5 God sent him to buy freedom for us who were slaves to the law, so that he could adopt us as his very own children. 6 And because we are his children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, prompting us to call out, “Abba, Father.” 7 Now you are no longer a slave but God’s own child. And since you are his child, God has made you his heir.
Romans 12:1-2 (NLT) 1 And so, dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all he has done for you. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice—the kind he will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship him. 2 Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.