The Father Wound
This is the wound that affects our ability to receive affirmation and which most powerfully affects our relationship with Father God. When a father is not present to his child, the child will struggle with the world around her, particularly her identity—who she is as a person. She goes into adulthood unaffirmed. I cry as I write this because this was certainly my case. I had no father. Shortly after I turned eight, my mom left my dad. A year and a half later, he killed himself. But even before he was out of my life, he was very much an absent father. Lack of fathering affects our relationship with God. We find ourselves left in a place of wallowing, unsure of the issues and who we are.
Our fathers are also the portrayers to us of who God is. The way our fathers speak about God, behave towards God and behave towards us affect our view of God. For instance, the speaker’s father, an extremely conservative Christian pastor on another continent, used to switch his language to King James whenever he prayed. This taught his son that God was distant and not part of his reality. They church they belonged to emphasized the imminent return of Jesus and the rapture so the child lived in constant fear of being “left behind”. Further, this particular father put his family at about 5th or 6th on the scale of importance. This meant that the father was always unavailable to his child. The only way the child could get his father’s attention was to do special things and so this is how he related to God. He saw God as punitive, petty and demanding. He served a God in the image of his father.
I don’t recall my father talking about God at all. We lived with his parents when I was a preschooler and HIS father was rigid about “evening worship”. It happened every night, was very long and we children had to be utterly still and quiet. I remember wondering which way to kneel was more holy—sitting on my ankles, so to speak (which was far more comfortable and therefore probably not as righteous) or kneeling upright with my knees at a 90º angle. My grandfather was stern and did not tolerate any childish behaviour. I don’t remember getting his positive attention ever. I remember a few positive things from my dad but those were later, when I was 5, 6 and 7.
It was while we lived with my father’s parents, when I was a preschooler, that I had two dreams that I believe powerfully affected my view of God. I’ve probably mentioned them before. In one, I was in a long, narrow basement room on the day Jesus returns to the earth on his cloud, surrounded by all the angels. There’s a flight of steps to an outside door at the narrow end of the room and it was to this door that Jesus came looking for me. He looked at me sadly and walked away, leaving me behind. In the second dream (I don’t really remember which of the two came first), I was chased by a dragon who, at that tender age, I believed represented Satan. I ran and ran and ran. I’ve never wanted to be in his clutches and so did everything I could to stay out, even as a small child. I didn’t want to be rejected by Jesus either. Because my father and his father were stern and rigid disciplinarians, that’s how I saw God—someone whose every little law had to be obeyed or there was wrath.
An example is when I was 7 years old. I remember us sitting together at the kitchen table as a family eating our meals. The problem was that any little infraction of the rules sent my younger sister Susan and I to the corner. It seemed we spent most meals standing in the corner instead of eating. If I wanted my daddy to be pleased with me, I couldn’t just be me. I had to be perfect. But I never could be perfect. I sure tried though. I tried with God too. As a teenager I looked for every single rule I could obey so that I could please God more perfectly. I even made up rules such as giving up chocolate because God was displeased with the caffeine in it. I never understood that God loves me just because I’m me. I think I still struggle with that, but more on that later.
There are seven primary areas that our fathers need to take care of for us to have a healthy sense of our relationship with God.
When these aren’t in place in our lives through our fathers, we go into adulthood projecting onto God and developing some very weird notions about him. So we begin to internalize God as…
What happens is that God, and who he is, is missed and never realized. But who he is is really very simple and he fathers us the way earthly fathers should father:
God wants to be our father who will walk with us through the pain. As we allow God to do this, we experience God as a father who is affirming and this time it sticks. When Jesus spoke to the Father, he did it in the most intimate way. The Father is on the side of the prodigal. He desperately wants us to come back to him. He respects the freedom of his son/daugher but he patiently waits for his son/daughter to return.
As the teaching time ended, a time of ministry began. Those with father wounds were asked to come forward. As the teaching had progressed, I had found myself getting angrier and angrier. I wanted to act out in violence. At the very least, I had my eye on a pillar not far from where I sat which I wanted to punch. Aside from the anger, I felt very disassociated with the whole father talk. I knew in head that I have father issues. Who wouldn’t, when they lost their father so young? But I couldn’t seem to tap them with my emotions. Nevertheless I went forward for ministry because I knew I fit the criterion they called for.
I was kneeling on the floor when a man came to pray for me. His prayers were silent but just the simple act of his hand on my back and knowing he was praying dissolved me into tears and I began to realize that what someone at church and others have said is true. I don’t have any understanding in my heart about God’s love. I know it all in my head but the message hasn’t gotten to my heart. As the man prayed, I asked God for a hug—a man’s hug. I thought the man praying might offer that hug but he walked away.
The ministry time ended and I sat down on my chair again, not any better than before I went for prayer. My small group leader walked by and simply touched my shoulder as she did so. I burst into tears again. The man who had prayed for me happened to be standing nearby when he saw this and came to pray again. And then he asked, “May I give you a hug?” I sobbed and sobbed and sobbed in his arms. God had answered my prayers and yet I found myself unable to grasp the love I know he has for me.
I think part of what was happening was that for the first time, God was giving me a glimpse into the gap between my head and heart, starting to show me how wounded I am in this area. I continued to be in great turmoil and unsure of what to do with it all. Snacks were always offered at the end of the evening session and tonight they were cinnamon buns. I took one and, unable to really focus, was about to leave the building for my room when I was stopped by a painting of the face of Jesus. I sat on the steps, holding my sticky bun, and gazed at that picture, hoping somehow some answers would come to me. Everything was in question.
One of the men from the leadership team saw me there and came sat beside me, gently asking questions. I wasn’t terribly responsive, simply nodding or shaking my head. Finally I told him how I wanted to hit the walls. We kind of joked about that, me laughing in the midst of my tears and confusion and he suggested I take my pillow, find a private place and punch it. I had a roommate. That wouldn’t work. The next day he asked me my favourite colours. Later that same day, he asked me how I was doing and then confessed that he was trying to get me a whiffle bat so I could have a safe way to get rid of that anger. I didn’t have a clue what a whiffle bat was. Apparently it’s made by Nerf, so it’s not going to do any damage when you use it to hit things.
While I was sitting there talking to him one of the Winnipeg women on the leadership team came and talked. Her questions were far more probing than the man’s and so I told her of my struggle with God as Father and cried some more. She suggested that a good night’s sleep might be very helpful at this point and offered to walk me to me room. She walked all the way with me up to my third floor door before returning to wherever she was staying. How loving! I was so moved.
Our fathers are also the portrayers to us of who God is. The way our fathers speak about God, behave towards God and behave towards us affect our view of God. For instance, the speaker’s father, an extremely conservative Christian pastor on another continent, used to switch his language to King James whenever he prayed. This taught his son that God was distant and not part of his reality. They church they belonged to emphasized the imminent return of Jesus and the rapture so the child lived in constant fear of being “left behind”. Further, this particular father put his family at about 5th or 6th on the scale of importance. This meant that the father was always unavailable to his child. The only way the child could get his father’s attention was to do special things and so this is how he related to God. He saw God as punitive, petty and demanding. He served a God in the image of his father.
I don’t recall my father talking about God at all. We lived with his parents when I was a preschooler and HIS father was rigid about “evening worship”. It happened every night, was very long and we children had to be utterly still and quiet. I remember wondering which way to kneel was more holy—sitting on my ankles, so to speak (which was far more comfortable and therefore probably not as righteous) or kneeling upright with my knees at a 90º angle. My grandfather was stern and did not tolerate any childish behaviour. I don’t remember getting his positive attention ever. I remember a few positive things from my dad but those were later, when I was 5, 6 and 7.
It was while we lived with my father’s parents, when I was a preschooler, that I had two dreams that I believe powerfully affected my view of God. I’ve probably mentioned them before. In one, I was in a long, narrow basement room on the day Jesus returns to the earth on his cloud, surrounded by all the angels. There’s a flight of steps to an outside door at the narrow end of the room and it was to this door that Jesus came looking for me. He looked at me sadly and walked away, leaving me behind. In the second dream (I don’t really remember which of the two came first), I was chased by a dragon who, at that tender age, I believed represented Satan. I ran and ran and ran. I’ve never wanted to be in his clutches and so did everything I could to stay out, even as a small child. I didn’t want to be rejected by Jesus either. Because my father and his father were stern and rigid disciplinarians, that’s how I saw God—someone whose every little law had to be obeyed or there was wrath.
An example is when I was 7 years old. I remember us sitting together at the kitchen table as a family eating our meals. The problem was that any little infraction of the rules sent my younger sister Susan and I to the corner. It seemed we spent most meals standing in the corner instead of eating. If I wanted my daddy to be pleased with me, I couldn’t just be me. I had to be perfect. But I never could be perfect. I sure tried though. I tried with God too. As a teenager I looked for every single rule I could obey so that I could please God more perfectly. I even made up rules such as giving up chocolate because God was displeased with the caffeine in it. I never understood that God loves me just because I’m me. I think I still struggle with that, but more on that later.
There are seven primary areas that our fathers need to take care of for us to have a healthy sense of our relationship with God.
- Authority. If our fathers abused their authority by suppressing us or being malicious rather than benevolent, we see God’s authority as bad.
- Reliability. Many dads aren’t reliable or faithful. They break their promises. My father killed himself instead of being there for me as I grew up.
- Benevolence. Were our fathers kind and generous or stingy? Did they value things more than their kids? Where they stingy with their time, attention, things? My dad was the latter. He had bought children’s records for us that we loved to listen to but even my mom wasn’t allowed to use the record player. Only my dad could. My dad preferred foods that we couldn’t really afford so, to make them last longer for him, we weren’t allowed to have his Clover Crest honey or his gooseberry jam (and probably other things too). We were allowed to show our bread to the butter but that was about it. Our Christmas gift one year was to have as much butter on our bread that one day as we wanted--something negotiated by my mother. Everything of my dad’s was special and untouchable. I do remember some good things. He took us to the Sunday Pop Concerts during the year I was 7 (the same year the other examples come from) and he spent time teaching us to “walk” to Franz Lists’ Hungarian Rhapsodies Numbers 2 and 14. I have a teacup he gave me after my mom left him (why is a father giving a teacup to his 8-year-old daughter, especially when tea is a “forbidden drink”—it’s the only gift I have from him). These are the only positive memories I have. Oh! And the surprise, the morning my mom went to the hospital to have my baby sister, that my father could actually cook. Because of my incessant questions, he taught me that morning (I was 5) how to cook the perfect sunnyside up egg.
- Affection. None.
- Interest. Is God really attentive to me? If my father wasn’t, will I believe God is?
- Comfort. Do I believe God comforts me?
- Acceptance. Am I accepted, truly accepted by God?
When these aren’t in place in our lives through our fathers, we go into adulthood projecting onto God and developing some very weird notions about him. So we begin to internalize God as…
- cruel, capricious and emotionally neglectful. We find Scripture that is condemning, not comforting. He’s going to “get” us.
- unforgiving and demanding. Perfectionistic fathers result in children who grow up to be performers for God.
- selective and unfair. We see God this way because we didn’t get the attention we needed.
- distant and unavailable. God isn’t present for us.
- kind, but confused. Our fathers were unable to bring about any sense of order. We think, “Yes, God, I can pray but you can’t really do anything.”
What happens is that God, and who he is, is missed and never realized. But who he is is really very simple and he fathers us the way earthly fathers should father:
- God is not mad at me, nor is he in a perpetual bad mood.
- God’s always good in what he does. A good God may allow things that aren’t always nice (like a good father who insists his sick child take the icky tasting medicine).
- This is worth repeating. A good God isn’t always nice. We prefer God to do things that are nice and happy. Instead, he chooses to do what is good.
- God knows a heck of a lot more than I do. God is like a father who is moved by our cries but knows something we don’t know and because of that he can’t respond as he might like to.
- God’s completely committed to my healing journey.
God wants to be our father who will walk with us through the pain. As we allow God to do this, we experience God as a father who is affirming and this time it sticks. When Jesus spoke to the Father, he did it in the most intimate way. The Father is on the side of the prodigal. He desperately wants us to come back to him. He respects the freedom of his son/daugher but he patiently waits for his son/daughter to return.
As the teaching time ended, a time of ministry began. Those with father wounds were asked to come forward. As the teaching had progressed, I had found myself getting angrier and angrier. I wanted to act out in violence. At the very least, I had my eye on a pillar not far from where I sat which I wanted to punch. Aside from the anger, I felt very disassociated with the whole father talk. I knew in head that I have father issues. Who wouldn’t, when they lost their father so young? But I couldn’t seem to tap them with my emotions. Nevertheless I went forward for ministry because I knew I fit the criterion they called for.
I was kneeling on the floor when a man came to pray for me. His prayers were silent but just the simple act of his hand on my back and knowing he was praying dissolved me into tears and I began to realize that what someone at church and others have said is true. I don’t have any understanding in my heart about God’s love. I know it all in my head but the message hasn’t gotten to my heart. As the man prayed, I asked God for a hug—a man’s hug. I thought the man praying might offer that hug but he walked away.
The ministry time ended and I sat down on my chair again, not any better than before I went for prayer. My small group leader walked by and simply touched my shoulder as she did so. I burst into tears again. The man who had prayed for me happened to be standing nearby when he saw this and came to pray again. And then he asked, “May I give you a hug?” I sobbed and sobbed and sobbed in his arms. God had answered my prayers and yet I found myself unable to grasp the love I know he has for me.
I think part of what was happening was that for the first time, God was giving me a glimpse into the gap between my head and heart, starting to show me how wounded I am in this area. I continued to be in great turmoil and unsure of what to do with it all. Snacks were always offered at the end of the evening session and tonight they were cinnamon buns. I took one and, unable to really focus, was about to leave the building for my room when I was stopped by a painting of the face of Jesus. I sat on the steps, holding my sticky bun, and gazed at that picture, hoping somehow some answers would come to me. Everything was in question.
One of the men from the leadership team saw me there and came sat beside me, gently asking questions. I wasn’t terribly responsive, simply nodding or shaking my head. Finally I told him how I wanted to hit the walls. We kind of joked about that, me laughing in the midst of my tears and confusion and he suggested I take my pillow, find a private place and punch it. I had a roommate. That wouldn’t work. The next day he asked me my favourite colours. Later that same day, he asked me how I was doing and then confessed that he was trying to get me a whiffle bat so I could have a safe way to get rid of that anger. I didn’t have a clue what a whiffle bat was. Apparently it’s made by Nerf, so it’s not going to do any damage when you use it to hit things.
While I was sitting there talking to him one of the Winnipeg women on the leadership team came and talked. Her questions were far more probing than the man’s and so I told her of my struggle with God as Father and cried some more. She suggested that a good night’s sleep might be very helpful at this point and offered to walk me to me room. She walked all the way with me up to my third floor door before returning to wherever she was staying. How loving! I was so moved.
posted by Magdaleine at 9:33 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home