A Will to Love My journey to learning to love my father... By a Sister in Christ Hurry up!" Dad beckoned to me. I tried to hurry with the chore I was asked to do, but fumbled and didn’t do it as quickly as he would’ve liked. “Not like that,” he reproved harshly, “like this! Didn’t you ever do this before?” I shook my head wordlessly and kept my eyes down while fighting back tears. As he roughly continued to correct me, I stiffened myself. All morning while I was helping him he had been on edge. Now it was all catching up with me. How much more was I supposed to take? As soon as I was alone, I dissolved into sobs and tears. “Why does Dad have to be so mean? Why do I have to go through this? I’m just a girl; I’m still learning; do I have to do everything perfect?” I’d been through this before, I should’ve been used to Dad’s ways by now, shouldn’t I? But I wasn’t. Each time it hurt me, and each time I built the wall around me a little bigger. The next day I overheard Dad angrily yelling at my sister, Carrie, for something she didn’t do right. That hurt me, too. I knew what it was like, and even though Carrie and I often fought, I still sided with her. She really didn’t deserve that treatment either. Later I comforted her about her “word thrashing” and hardened myself a little more against Dad. I didn’t realize it at the time, but it was a wall I was building around myself and between my dad and me. I was being hurt, so to prevent myself from further hurts, I hardened my heart. By doing this, I was training myself to not respond to my dad, his reproofs, criticism, and even love. It was an ugly, thick wall that I would add bricks to every time I was hurt. Rarely would I take a piece of the wall down because I never found a good reason to. I became colder and harder towards my dad. I would usually respond to him with short answers in a monotone voice. Then there were the times when I would add bricks to the wall in large quantities at a time. This often happened when Dad got upset with my mom. Mom is a wonderful, sensitive mother. It is easier to love her. And I usually wanted to obey and please her. That’s probably why it hurt so much to see Dad get angry with her. On one occasion she misunderstood Dad’s instructions and did something that really upset him. Carrie and I were with Mom at the time. When Dad started to reprove her, I started to stiffen. In loud, angry words he yelled at her. She calmly tried to explain to him why she did what she did. As he raved on, Carrie and I started to cry. Resentment towards him grew within me. This was his wife- wasn’t he supposed to love her and cherish her? I didn’t think, as a husband, he had the right to reprove and correct her the same way he did with us children. When Dad noticed we were crying, he turned to us and forcefully told us that since he was head over Mom he had the right to reprove her, didn’t he? We didn’t answer. Didn’t he? He asked again. We still didn’t answer because neither of us was going to give him any reason to think we approved of what he was doing. As soon as I was alone, I let myself well up with bitterness, resentment, and anger towards Dad. “He had no right to treat Mom that way. Is that the way husbands are to treat their wives? That wasn’t showing love. Isn’t Mom supposed to be Dad’s best friend? Why didn’t he treat her like he loved her? He can do everything else so ‘right’ it seems, except handle his anger.” These things all jumbled together in my mind as I sobbed and nurtured my hurting heart. There were a few occasions when Dad came back to us children and asked for forgiveness for his actions in a situation, but that didn’t heal the hurts he left. As I grew older I realized that the bitterness in my life was wrong. It was not pleasing to God. There were times I was strongly convicted to do something about it, but I knew it would take humbleness. I knew I should go to my Dad and ask for his forgiveness. Through the years, as I struggled not to get angry at Dad, I was realizing “I’m not responsible for Dad’s actions, but I’m responsible to God for my response to him.” So many times I really wanted to go to him and make things right so we could have an open relationship, but I just couldn’t get up enough nerve to do it. Our communication was at the very minimum. He seemed to be making an effort to communicate with my sisters and me, but we weren’t responsive. In my heart I had long ago decided I would never marry a man like my father. I would stay single before I’d marry a man who gets angry, upset, and doesn’t show much love. I always hoped that I could walk down my wedding aisle and be at peace with Dad, but it didn’t look like it would happen. I was prepared to accept having a strained relationship the rest of my life. I still prayed for a love for Dad, but it didn’t seem to come. I went to a Bible School when I was 18. That’s when I let God really work in my life; I drew closer to Him. I was finding more and more peace. Yet there was one area, one room in my heart I was not ready to face. I worked on every other area but that one. I didn’t have total peace in my heart and I was really starting to desire that total peace with God and man. Then at age 19, I went to Bible School again. There I was bombarded with so much emphasis on having a good father-daughter relationship. It seemed like God was really trying to get a message across to me. I was shown how important my relationship with Dad was. It was more than just having peace and being free from bitterness. He could be my protector and friend if I let him. I could go to him with all my problems, and he could comfort me and love me. “Dad- understand my problems? No way! We don’t even communicate. How could he understand what me a girl- is struggling with?” But God was saying “Trust me. Let me show you.” “Okay, God,” I said, “I don’t know about this, but I really need and want a relationship with Dad, so I’ll give you a chance.” There was an issue in my life that I was really confused about; I was about at my wits end about what to do, so I wrote my Dad about it. In the letter I tried to portray the humble, loving spirit I knew I should have. My friends were praying for my dad and me, too. Some of them were struggling with the same thing. A couple weeks later my dad wrote me back with his counsel. I was devastated. It wasn’t at all what I wanted to hear, yet I knew he was right. It was God speaking to my through Dad. As I started to work with him through the mail and by phone, things started to open up. I also started sharing with a teacher and was encouraged to do everything I could to open up our relationship. Finally I had the courage to go to Dad and ask for forgiveness for having wrong attitudes and for not supporting him in being my authority by being submissive in spirit. I did this over the phone, which was a little easier than doing in person. Dad willingly gave his forgiveness and expressed his desire for an open relationship, too. The forgiveness I felt was so refreshing. I saw hope for us, that I might someday really love Dad and be able to communicate with him. I had a desire to open up communication. At the same time I was taking a counseling class which God was using to speak to me, too, about Dad. It involved biblically understanding forgiveness of sin, my bondage to sin, finding deliverance and repentance. This class was a big step towards change in my life. I learned that “Confusion is a step towards change.” Oh- and I was very confused at times! As I looked back on my life, I saw what a hard heart I had come to have. That hard heart had been keeping me from enjoying so many things in life, like open, honest friendships that could really be an enjoyment. How did my heart become so hard? I had callused it over the years as emotional hurts came at me so I wouldn’t be hurt again. It makes a lot of sense, logically thinking: If someone keeps hurting you and hurting you, you’re going to want to protect yourself, so by building a fortress wall or a thick callus you won’t be as affected by their attacks. But in relationships, this self-protection is dangerous. Yes - especially in my life. I was becoming aware of many areas and problems that stemmed back to my hardness of heart. There was a light coming on in my life as I saw what I was letting my bitterness towards Dad, do to me. Love in a relationship is giving, as well as receiving. To love, I learned, is to be vulnerable. “Vulnerable? That means allowing yourself to be hurt,” I thought. “Why would I let myself be hurt by Dad. I’m supposed to be loving him. How am I going to love him when I’m letting him hurt me?” “Let me show you,” God told me again. I was already struggling to forgive Dad of the past hurts he caused, now I was being asked to forgive them and let him continue to hurt me. That sounded harsh and unfair. But I wasn’t finished learning yet. It was like I had my fist clenched shut, not letting myself be loved or giving love to Dad. You see, by unclenching my fist and opening up my hand, I was making myself vulnerable but also opening myself up to be loved, to accept love from Dad. This way I could offer him my love, and in return he could give love to me in my hand. Because he could also put pain into my open hand, living this way could be more painful than having a closed fist where I accepted neither love nor pain. Forgiving and loving Dad is one of the hardest things I’ve tried to accomplish. Love is a decision, not always an emotion. It’s not something I can do on my own, especially the times I don’t feel like it. Instead I petition to God daily. Now that I’m home from Bible School, I’m finding many challenges in relating to Dad again. It takes a will to love. I still struggle to forgive him because healing and forgiveness is a process. It’s a lifetime of hurts, it’s not something that I can cover over in a day or even a week. I struggle to love when Dad is “unlovely”, and I am feeling threatened. I feel I need to endure this pain, take it in and be vulnerable as I work to love Dad and get close to him. I really like the verse in Philippians 1:6 that says “Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ.” To those of you who struggle in loving your fathers, I pray that this article will minister to you, encourage you, and point you in the right direction. This idea of loving and being vulnerable may be new to you; letting yourself be hurt is contrary to your old nature. But remember- you are a new creature in Christ, so you no longer live by your old nature. There is hope for damaged emotions! Ephesians 3:30 “Now unto Him that is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask of think, according to the power that worketh in us”. I haven’t accomplished nearly everything I want to, yet, but I can assure you God is working in my life to change me into what He wants me to be and give me new peace and joy. -- By A Sister in Christ YWSH Main Page