Girl to Disciple Ministries International

Who is really our father? Well, to answer that question, I would like to take you down my road because it also took me years of searching and brokenness until I found out the answer to it. I am 30 years now, to be specific. My father died at the age of 3. I do have blurry memories of him, and that’s all there is to him. After his demise, we never talked about him at all. It was like the unspoken rule, so I and my siblings completely got him out of our minds, at least kind of. So, to be kind of sincere, his demise was the end of him in our lives. My mum took on the role of mum and dad from that day on, and to be kind of honest, she really carried that cross so well even to this very day, and I am so grateful to Jesus for my mum, the vessel he used to bring me into this world. You know when Jesus encourages us to be childlike in Matthew 18:3, well that scripture depicts how my childhood was like. I never really cared about having a father in my life; my mother was enough. Yes, I used to see my agemates play with their fathers, but it never affected me so much. Like I said, my mum did so much for me that I never really missed my father. To be kind of honest, age 3 is really too young to grasp, so I could not really miss someone I actually never fully knew, if that makes sense. But even though my mum did a great job of filling for both mum and dad, the shells started cracking as I reached my teen years. Seeing all my girlfriends being loved and cared for by their fathers aroused a longing in me. In my secondary school, I had this best friend of mine who had such a wonderful relationship with her father. All she could talk about was her father, of how he treated her, how he did this and that for her. It was really a beautiful thing to witness, but it left emptiness and questions that had no answers. As I grew even older, the longing and the void grew even much more than I expected. This void created a wave of low self-esteem and confidence because I felt like I was never enough. So, in order to fill that void, I started looking for that love of a father in the world. Because of life uncertainties, I grew up in different homes, and that would define my life in ways I cannot even imagine. So in every family I lived, as long as there was a fatherly figure, I would do everything for them to love me. I desperately wanted that fatherly love that I sincerely enslaved myself in my mind. I am talking about doing all the chores at homes, performing well in school, etc., because I thought that if I did all this, they would love me as their daughter. But even though I did all these things, in the end, it all led to disappointments and heartbreaks. Then I had hatred for these people, but as now I know better because I think it’s a hard task being a father to your own kids, but it’s even a harder one being a father to the children you did not give birth to. Secondly, I also did not know what I was looking for because, remember, I had never experienced what a fatherly love was, so there was a possibility that they loved me, but I could not feel it. So today I show them mercy and am thankful that they took me in when they did not have to. God bless their souls. This was the story of my life that even in my friendships, I felt I had to do more in order to prove my love for them. This cycle went on and on and would eventually lead me into toxic relationships and friendships that I sincerely had no business partaking in, and eventually that left brokenness, low self-confidence, and low self-esteem, and years of thinking I was not enough and thinking no one could love me. To take you back in time, I gave my life at the age of 7 to Jesus Christ, so I grew up knowing Him as my Lord and personal Savior. You might be asking yourself how this connects with the whole story you just read; well, that’s the whole point. JESUS CHRIST, the alpha and omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last, and the distance in between, our heavenly father. So let me explain. After years of trying to find myself an earthly father, I came to a realization it was never going to happen. So I gave up the search, but the void never goes away even if you try to suppress it. So like I said, I knew Jesus earlier on in my life, but it was on a lukewarm level. I ran into Him when I needed Him, so He was basically like my ATM. So, to be honest, I never fully embraced Jesus in my life or never really believed that He could be everything for me. Early last year, as my life was in shambles, I went into a search for Jesus as He was the only one who could save me. In Jeremiah 29:13, He says, “You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.” Hear, children of God, every word in the Bible is so true, but for me, that scripture lives rent-free in my mind not only because it’s true but because I have lived it. As I went deeper and deeper, Jesus came closer and closer and revealed Himself to me in ways I never knew were even possible. Young me had some doubts of His existence, but the me now knows 100% that there is a living, true God, and a good one for that matter. Now that I think about my problems, they were an invitation, and I am grateful for them because they led me to a journey of discovering new profound dimensions of Jesus Christ, and to be honest, I am still on that journey. And on that journey, through the teaching of the Holy Spirit, I got to know that Jesus Christ is our heavenly father. In Matthew 6:9–13, He says, “and call no man on earth your father, for you have a father in heaven,” or in 2 Corinthians 6:18, “and I will be your father and you will be my sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty.” I could tell you of many other scriptures of God where Jesus Christ is saying that He is our father. But why does Jesus say that He is our father, and what does that mean for our earthly fathers? Well, through the profound teaching of the Holy Spirit, I got an understanding that our earthly parents are just the vessels that God uses to bring us into this world. Every parent is just a steward of their children, just like guardians, but our father is in heaven. Take a look at an example of Jesus Christ coming into this world; God used Mary as the vessel through the Holy Spirit, depicting God as the father. But does that mean we should stop being considerate to our parents? Absolutely not, for the Bible says in Exodus 20:12, “Honour your father and mother so that your days may be long.” Even Jesus Christ of Nazareth set that example for us during His time on earth. So God being our ultimate father does not give us a license to dishonor our parents. So in this revelation, through the teaching of the Holy Spirit, it began to slowly sink in that God was my father. But to be honest, this statement was not new to my ears, as for a long time I had one of my favourite preachers of the gospel, a woman of God whose teachings have been profound in my life, continuously say that she grew up knowing God as her father. She has never really detailed that and how that shaped her life, but there is always a question mark in me every time she said that. For the last dot to that revelation, when it finally hit home that I am not an orphan and never was to begin with, and that Jesus Christ was my father, was when I was watching a movie and suddenly an advertisement came on. It was an advert for powdered milk, and in this advert a baby was running to the father, and the father held the child, sprung him up in the air, and back in his hands. It was a beautiful scenery. So remember I told you earlier that even though I had given up on the quest to that search, the void was still there. So when I saw that advert, I remember saying in my mind, “how I wish I experienced that, it must be nice.” Immediately after I said that, the Holy Spirit taught and revealed to me something that would change my life in such a positive way. In a calm, positive voice, the Holy Spirit said, “Patricia, you see how that father sprung that child in the air, there is a very high possibility that the child could fall down, but the father is human. But Jesus Christ, as your father, will spring you in the air and you will never be worried about falling down.” That statement cemented every doubt in me, and I fully embraced the love of my heavenly father, our Lord Jesus Christ. And honestly, from that moment, Jesus completely took that emptiness away, the void is gone, He restored my self-esteem and confidence. The longing is gone, for now I know for sure I have a father. For me, He feels even more real than a physical father would be, for when I am sad I run to Him, and when I am happy I run to Him, and He restores my soul every time. With Jesus as my father, I do not need to prove my love or labour for His love, for He truly loves me the way I am. Jesus does not just give love, He is love. 1 John 3:1: “See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God!” And that is what we are. Oh, I truly love the way He fathers me. It is a feeling that is so good that every girl or even boy should experience.

So every girl, woman who has had similar experiences or even worse, characterised by a series of brokenness, emptiness, trauma, and feeling like an orphan, just know you are not, you never were, as God is your father. As you read this, let it be an invitation to Jesus as a father—give Him a try today, for He says in Psalms 34:8, “Oh taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the man who trusts in Him.” Remember, dear disciples of Christ, Jesus can handle our brokenness, for He wants us whole. God bless you all.

if this spoke to you, feel free to share or leave a comment i would love to hear your story too

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