Father to the Fatherless

It's my son's birthday today. As I often do with each of my children, I reflect on the moment we met, when I first saw the face of the much-longed-for child.

This boy was born into strange circumstances. He would never see the face of his runaway father. This child was mine alone. I carried him alone, bore him alone, and raised him alone for many years. But he was not a burden, rather a delight, curious and sweet, a high achiever, a boy of many interests. Now he is a man with a tender heart and many degrees, still curious. He is changing the world for the better with his expertise. My boy is not only my son but my friend. We can talk of many deep things. He brought a wife into our family, adding to my joy. And maybe later children?


Me, a fatherless child. My son suffered the same fate through no fault of his. Are we the people we are because of that fact? How might we have been different? I can see God our Father's hand on my life from the beginning, a frail and broken child made strong. And on my son's life too. This Father has been ever-present, ever-faithful.


My son read Psalm 103 on my wedding day when I married Fred so many years ago:

"Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits, who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit, who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy, who satisfies you with good so that your youth is renewed like the eagle's.

As a father shows compassion to his children, so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear him. For he knows our frame. He remembers that we are dust. As for man, his days are like grass. He flourishes like a flower of the field, for the wind passes over it, and it is gone, and its place knows it no more.

But the steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear him, and his righteousness to children's children, to those who keep his covenant and remember to do his commandments."

Fathers

The excitement has died down and I've had time to think all this through about my father. I am grateful for all the information, some of it quite interesting, but little came directly from him. He really has given me nothing and has made no effort to contact any of us. People keep saying this has a greater purpose. God has a purpose, I know, but I'm not sure what that is yet.

However, we have learned some interesting stories and fascinating coincidences! My parents met in California (my mother born and raised there). They got married and moved to Nevada. I was born in Nevada, and my father still lives in the same city. As a child, without him, we lived in Arizona a long time and then came to St. Louis. Later I lived in Oklahoma and many other places along the way. I didn't come to Pennsylvania until 1983, and I did not feel at home here for a long time. I always felt like a nomad, never being able to settle anywhere. I still remember the day I claimed Pennsylvania for my own. I was in an airplane that was landing and I looked down at the familiar river and the highways and the airport and thought--this is home. I don't want to ever move away.

Through the research, I found out my father was born and lived in a neighboring suburb of this very same city where I live now. In fact, his home was just a few miles from the church where our family attends. His father and grandfather and great-grandfather all lived in this area. I've been surrounded by my ancestors all these years and didn't know it! They are buried here and had successful businesses here. I probably have cousins nearby.

Another strange connection: My great-grandfather applied for a passport in 1916. He was planning to go to CHINA! Amazing! His business manufactured surgical instruments and I guess he was traveling to sell these products overseas. He planned to sail on a ship called the Empress of Russia, leaving from Vancouver. Many years later, I would be making my own trip to China.

So those are the facts. What about the heart issues? I never had a father growing up. My step-father never cared about me and I never even knew what a good father was supposed to be. When I became a Christian and heard God was my father, I thought He must be a hard disciplinarian to be feared, ready to pronounce judgment and condemn. When I married Fred I saw what a good father looks like--a provider, protector, comforter, encourager, source of wisdom. One to whom little girls can run to when they are frightened or sad. One who listens, one who has compassion for the small and weak. One who guides and leads. I didn't know. I began to see God in a new light and found that He is all those things. God is my Father. And not just to me. He promises to be "Father to the fatherless." (Psalm 68:5) "I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to me." (II Corinthians 6:18) And, "If children, then heirs, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ." (Romans 8:17)

When I was fatherless, God adopted me into His family. I've learned that He is a good father. He provides, protects, comforts, encourages, and guides me in wisdom. My inheritance lies in heaven with Him. My need for this earthly father is over.

I will see where this all ends up. But I don't have any real desire to talk with my father. He could have called me, after all. I think I would be disappointed in him because he wouldn't hold a candle to the father I see loving my two daughters every day.

To those searching for a father's love, the promise is for us all. "See what kind of love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are." (I John 3:1)

Thought for the New Year

Arielle has been reading poetry for her literature class. Here are the closing lines of one of them:

"Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?"

(Mary Oliver from "The Summer Day")

What is it we plan to do this year? Will it fade into oblivion, stacked onto the previous years we can't remember? How do we slow this mad rushing torrent of time? I want this to be a year of significance, a year to pay attention and take notice and love well my family and friends. What about you?

When was the last time you read Our Town by Thornton Wilder? I think it is wasted on high schoolers, when, really, it has much more meaning for us older folks.

An Unexpected Gift

What not to do at Christmas:


1. Plan too many projects that must be completed before the big day.
2. Plan too many activities that keep you running from event to event.
3. Plan a big holiday dinner with over-tired, over-stimulated children as guests.
4. Find your father who has been missing for 54 years.

This was an exceptionally difficult Christmas. There were some beautiful, meaningful moments--driving around looking at lights with Fred and the girls, the concert at church, our candlelit devotions in the morning, seeing the girls' joy with their gifts and receiving lovely handmade gifts from each of them. But overall, the holidays were stressful this year. And then, a most unexpected gift landed in my lap--the gift of a father. And I'm still asking if this is really a gift or something else.


My parents split when I was a little girl. I never heard from my father again. Was it his choice to never pursue me? Or my mom's choice to prohibit him from finding me? Who knows. And does it matter? I've been curious about him off and on through the years but I assumed I'd never know anything about him.


Right before Christmas I heard from my sons that their dad was researching his own family tree. For whatever reason, he left his tree and decided to go in a different direction and research mine. I think he wanted to give this information as a gift to the boys. He asked one of them what my original maiden name was. (I was adopted by my step-father.) Now here is the eerie part: Years and years ago my mother gave me a silver rattle and silver cup that belonged to my birth father when he was a baby. I still have the cup but the rattle has been long forgotten and lost. At the same time that the boys gave their dad my name and he did a little research, he discovered this rattle on his daughter's dresser. Where did she get it, he asked. She told him she found it at the bottom of his toolbox. He examined it and saw my father's initials and birthdate. He made the connection to recently discovered information he'd found. He asked my oldest son if he wanted him to contact his grandfather. Yes. So he called the home of my father, far away on the other side of the country. The rattle gave him an opening.


Two days before Christmas one of my boys tells me this story. I am shocked, and buried memories and emotions surface. At this point, the boys' dad has only talked to my father's wife, but they decide on a good time to have a phone conversation with my father--Christmas Eve. So he calls my father and supposedly has a long, interesting conversation. (All info is coming to me second hand from my sons.) My father says he never knew where I was all those years. He is interested in finding out about his daughter and grandsons. He is old. There may not be much time.


So I am planning Christmas with all this turmoil swirling inside. I can't concentrate on anything. I can't sleep. Where is God in all this? (For He is in everything.) The boys and I collect some pictures and information to mail to my father, their grandfather. I find an old picture of a young man holding a blonde giggling child on his lap. His arms are tight around her in an embrace and he is kissing her cheek. Father and daughter.


Christmas is over and there is time to contemplate all these things. I have no illusions of a grand reunion. I would just like a little information to fill in the blanks. Maybe some medical history. Maybe my father really doesn't care after all these years or maybe he wonders if I'm after something. Maybe this is the end of it. And that's okay.


When the girls and I were looking through the box of old pictures, I found several of my grandmother, the woman who adopted my mother when she was a tiny girl. No, she is not my biological grandmother. But she is the one I loved and the grandmother who loved me. I tell my girls that blood doesn't matter. This is my "real" grandmother and nothing will change that. Arielle says, "She's pretty." Liana says, "She looks so kind, just like my own grandma." They are right. She was the best grandma a little girl could have.

Wonder

The moonlight washes across the face of my beautiful daughter when I come to kiss her good-night. She says she loves to fall asleep looking up at the moon full in the sky. She can see it through her blinds. "Put your head right here on my pillow, Mom, and you can see it." I remember her first sentence at fifteen months. We stood on our front porch wondering at the moon that night. She said, "Look! Moon, big, high, sky!" And I wondered at this baby so taken with the heavens.

The same moon, the same house, the same child. But time has changed the people here. I grow old; Arielle grows up. I feel so blessed--so incredibly blessed--that I had the opportunity to nurture this girl through her childhood. I was chosen to be her mother! Of all the mothers of the world... What a privilege! Arielle will continue to grow apart and away from me. It's the plan. But she will always be my precious daughter and I will always be her mother and the moon will rise full through all the seasons of our lives.

Of course, I have another equally treasured daughter who might read this and say, "What about me?" Liana, I will tell your story at another time.

A Christmas Weekend

Despite my failures, God continues to bless. What a beautiful weekend! Saturday we busied ourselves with housework and projects. I've learned to thank God for TIME to clean. I don't like doing it, but I like a clean house. Fred was given a restaurant gift card for his birthday, so he treated us all to Olive Garden! We don't often go out to eat, so it is a special occasion. Olive Garden has gluten-free pasta and all that salad! It was very cold outside, but cozy inside this bustling restaurant on a Christmasy Saturday night. Afterwards we drove through winding streets on the way home to see the houses all lit up while listening to Christmas music on the radio. We passed through the old neighborhood where the boys grew up, bringing ghosts of memories as I remembered people who lived here long ago. My next-door neighbor who lost her son in Afghanistan a couple of years ago has her house adorned in twinkling lights. We were glad to see that. Hope lives on.

At home the girls and I played a rousing game of Quiddler in front of the fire. Driving around looking at the lovely (and cheesy) decorations people set up, listening to the meaningful (and silly) Christmas songs, playing games on a cold winter night: these are our traditions. Are we missing the true meaning of Christmas, as some might say? I don't think so. Our traditions remind us of God's goodness in past years as we do all over again the things we've enjoyed before. They give us hope that we will continue them next year and beyond. And when we are gone, our children will carry on these traditions.

Our family was asked to light the Advent candle in front of the church on Sunday. Oh, the turmoil for the girls in deciding on an outfit, and how would they do their hair? I reminded them that all their friends will be in their Sunday school classes and would not see them. Still, it was exciting and a little scary for them to stand before the throngs of people watching. These same two girls a few years ago sang a duet in front of hundreds on Christmas Eve. What happened to them, that innocence lost? This morning we were up front about one minute total, so it really wasn't too traumatic. With the girls dressed up and lighted trees surrounding us, we had the perfect opportunity for a Christmas photo. So here it is. Long gone are the days of my babies posing at the Sears portrait studio. (So sad...)

One of our best family traditions is to attend the concert at our church each year. This is definitely not a "holiday concert" but a Christmas concert. Through music and the word the message is clear: God's son was born to die in order to save the world. Crazy, huh? So, in spite of our fun traditions, we remember what Christmas is really about. Carl Trueman writing on church services this time of the year:

"It is foolishness and a stumbling block. Foolishness, because the very idea of the sovereign creator and ruler of the universe being born of a teenage virgin in a stable in a tiny nation of no account at the far end of the Mediterranean is utterly ridiculous. Indeed, one might say that it looks very much like proof that God cannot exist -- at least, that is, God built according to our specifications and requirements. An offence because I do not need salvation, especially salvation brought by a pre-modern peasant's child in some backward place nobody would otherwise ever have heard of." As we proclaim the message of Christmas, we should not attempt to "make Christianity look sophisticated or moral as the world understand these things. Least of all is it stand-up comedy designed to entertain those who might otherwise seek their fun elsewhere. Its agenda, especially at Christmas, is not to be determined by unbelief or what the hipsters in the Village will tolerate or what the brain's trust at MIT think is plausible."

I stand on what I know to be true. "For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes." (Romans 1:16)

Confession

I have a disorder of mind and spirit. It's called "I-can't-be-bothered." The older I get the more I like to seclude myself from others and just stay home. I can explain this by saying I'm overwhelmed with all I have to do. That's why I don't teach Sunday school or cook for Alpha anymore. That's why I didn't want to serve the staff lunch or go into the city and do a work project last summer. Our family was asked to light the Advent candle at the morning service next week and my response (in my mind) was that I can't be bothered. Why us? Ask another family. (We will be doing it, however.) So when someone at church asked if I was going to the Women's Christmas Brunch, I said no, I wasn't planning to go. Why not? Well, I can't be bothered. I want to stay home on Saturday morning. I didn't say that, of course. Later, I thought I would invite a friend of mine and if she wanted to go, I would go. She said yes. Thank you, Helen!

It was a wonderful morning! Each year women volunteer to decorate a table, bringing their own special china and table settings and creating a centerpiece. I am definitely not creative enough to do this, but I so much enjoyed walking through the room seeing their beautiful artwork during the "Tour of Tables." Music played and the mood was festive. Then we had a lovely lunch, heard a speaker, played a silly game (Helen won!) and sang Christmas carols together at the end. A highlight was when I was able to introduce Helen to a single mom who has been blessed by Helen's generosity for years as she has shared her daughters' outgrown clothes with this mom who also has little girls. These two had never met and I was so glad to see them together for the first time. More than anything, this morning meant I was able to spend time with my friend and catch up with her. How can we be too busy for people we care so much about?

Helen says she knows how to decorate and we decided to do our own table next year! What about "I-can't-be-bothered"? Well, I'd forgotten that when women get together like this, there is joy. There is healing in connecting with other women, each of us with our own stories of happy times and heartbreak. We need each other.

I've just figured out what my real problem is, this sickness I have. It's called selfishness. We are not meant to live in seclusion and hoard our lives to ourselves. I hope to do better.