My Dad vs GOD

Why is it that our fathers affect us so much? Why do they have the power to keep us going through the hardest times of life and also make us enjoy the best times? Why do they hold the power destroy us and also make us into the people we’ve always wanted? Why do they have more of this power than our mothers?
I have issues with my dad that never really bothered me until I got married and had kids of my own. I always thought I was so lucky to have the relationship with my dad that I did. Looking back I can see how off it was. No dad is perfect; we all know that, but some dads just really know how to connect with their kids better than others. The way of life in my home growing up was that if you weren’t playing a video game with my dad or at least watching him play a video game, then you wouldn’t get the time of day no matter how hard you tried. My dad had a one way brain and it was always focused on the television. I loved my dad, so I learned how to play video games. Unfortunately I could never be as good as my brother Glenn and my dad made sure I knew that. He didn’t do it on purpose I don’t think, and he didn’t do it to hurt me either. It didn’t back then, but now when I think about it, it really does hurt. Only because as I grew up I was always told about how someone was always better than me at whatever I attempted. Glenn was better at video games, "Cousin Gloria" was better at piano...etc. I was really good at drawing and when I drew I shaded my work. Dad taught me how to do it and I was very proud of myself...until Glenn started to pass me in talent and then it was all about his artwork. At least I still had my poetry. I write poetry and that is the one thing no one has been able to take from me. But then as I got older and more interested in boys, I searched for my dad and his answers. I wanted to know what kind of guy would prove to deserve me. I was searching for someone to set a standard. I looked for my dad to show me. He showed me the back of his head as it stared at the television. I looked at my brother. He also showed me the back of his head and frequently the back of his fist too. I began to get angry and rebellious. I was “grounded” every weekend but it never stopped me from leaving the house and running away. I knew my dad couldn’t really catch me if his hands were glued to the controller for the latest video game he was playing, so I did whatever I wanted. I got into a lot of trouble and ended up with a lot of guys at a very young age that I should have stayed far away from. I didn’t really know better. The boys at school teased me and some threw rocks at me while I waited for the bus to go home. The male teachers didn’t do anything if I told them what happened to me. And when I came home bawling my eyes out from the amount of abuse I had to endure at school, my dad would continue doing what he did best: ignoring me. I look back and know that the only reason I ran away so often was so that maybe one day my dad would come after me. That he would find me and rescue me from all the men that took advantage of his little girl. That he would grab me and hold me in his arms and cry because he couldn’t stand to lose his little girl. It never happened. Only once did my dad actually come after me but that was only because my brother found out I was meeting a guy MUCH older than me and told on me. They found me at a train station about an hour later. I don’t feel any resentment towards him for that. He bought me and my brother Subway Subs for dinner on the way home.
However, the time where a girl needs her parents the most is when entering the teenage years. My parents divorced just after I turned 14. I ended up on Paxil and some anti-psychotic and in group therapy. The Paxil made me so sick I missed a lot of school. The anti-psychotic made me sleep until my body got used to it so I somehow managed to get a higher dose and I quit group therapy because all they did was gossip about people they went to school with. I was so wrecked from being split up between my mom, my dad and my brother that I just couldn’t handle it. If I went to visit my dad and brother my mom made me feel like a terrible person. When I got to my dad’s I had to fend for myself because what was my dad doing? PLAYING VIDEO GAMES!!!

Around this time my dad starting hanging out with a woman he knew from his bus route named Trisha. She had a daughter who was a few years younger than me. The only thing I remember from my dad’s relationship with her was that he would always tell me how beautiful Trisha was and how beautiful her daughter Chelsea was. THEN dear Chelsea started to DRAW for my dad and dad had to report to me how great of an artist Chelsea was, and did he forget to mention she was beautiful?? Day in and day out it was all about Trisha, Chelsea and video game jargon. I never once heard how beautiful I was. Sure, I was really geeky and SKINNY and I had bucked teeth, but even if I am the ugliest girl in the world, you still need to tell me that I am the most beautiful. I didn’t hear it from any male in my life. Not. One. This has affected me so deeply today. I have a really hard time believing Damien when he tells me I am beautiful but deep down it’s all I want to hear over and over. I wanted to hear from my DAD how beautiful I was, how talented I was and that he is so proud of me. I just...don’t know why he didn’t. I was the only kid out of my brother Glenn and my sister Marian who graduated High School. I waited until AFTER I was married to have kids and I married an amazing Christian man. I fell in love with the concept of the Bass Guitar and purchased one. I don’t play it often anymore because I am terrified of my dad’s criticism. Every time I begin to play he runs upstairs and starts bragging to me about Jeff Beck’s Bass player who is a woman and how amazingly talented she is and so on. I don’t sing much anymore...at least not while dad is around...or even Damien. Every time I sing in front of dad he laughs as though he is embarrassed. Also he has to point out how my music is not music. Only the music of HIS generation is music. If I show an interest in one of dad’s favourite bands he acts as though that is expected of me. But there is ALWAYS someone he knows who is better at me in everything. As I grow spiritually, my poetry grows and is more focused on spiritual things. I don’t read them to my Dad anymore because he doesn’t understand. He made fun of me one time for believing that prophecy still exists. I don’t sing for him anymore because the songs that make me alive are about Jesus. And I don’t play the piano anymore at all because I have to hear an hour long lecture about “cousin Gloria” who can play ANYTHING on her fantastic grand piano.
I guess what I am getting at here is that I’ve just always felt second...or third best. Not once has my dad ever made me feel like I am his most prized jewel. When a woman wants to be loved, she wants her daddy to love her first unconditionally and then her husband has to take over and love her even more.

This is why I have a hard time relating to God as my father. I don’t know how to explain this but God is WAY MORE than my father ever could be. My Jesus is more to me than that. A father to me is just someone else in the world. God; Jesus; is the almighty King that reigns far above and beyond anything I can comprehend. For me to call God my father would be for me to demean Him. It would be making Him less than what He is to me. God takes care of me more than I ask for. He tells me I am His “Little Erin” and whenever someone says something to me that they believe is from God, I know it’s Him when they begin by telling me that I am a “Jewel” or a “treasure”. He tells me that I am HIS jewel and HIS treasure. My dad wouldn’t even think of words like that. God protects me and stands up for me. My dad was always too chicken. Parents are supposed to be “God” to their children. We are supposed to represent who God IS to our kids. My mom tried. She still tries. Even with her issues and past afflictions. My dad is just a guy who happens to be my father. But my King is Jesus and I am loyal to him first before anyone. Out of every single person on this earth, I can truly say that Jesus is the only one who has ever loved me unconditionally. I mean that I can feel His unconditional love. Everyone else has standards that I can’t live up to; ever. Not God. I KNOW He loves me because He proves it to me all the time. No one else does what He does. No one else goes to the lengths that He does. And for this I am so thankful.
On earth I hurt because of how my dad has damaged me. But I know without a doubt that when I walk into the presence of GOD, that because it means so much to me, He will wrap me in his arms, hold me so tight and tell me everything my dad never did. He’s going to tell me that I AM beautiful because He made me that way. He is going to tell me that I AM SO talented because He wanted me to make Him proud. And He’ll tell me that He IS proud of me for everything I accomplished and everything I attempted but failed at. He is going to tell me that those rocks the boys threw at me mean nothing now, that the things that men did to me when I was just a child were wrong but that they don’t matter anymore because I am restored. He’ll tell me that He is honoured to be the one to affirm me finally and fill my heart to the point of bursting. He’ll make me look in his eyes that brim with tears so that I’ll know without a doubt that He is telling the truth. He’ll tell me that it is okay now; that I am safe now; that no one will ever hurt me again. And I will spend forever in eternity with that unconditional love that always came to my rescue on earth.

I love Jesus. He’s bigger and better than any man ever could be.
And now He’s assuring me He’ll be there when I am done ranting about my dad and decide to let go of the resentment and forgive him.