Once, when I was about fifteen, I went to a party. It was mostly older kids, drinking, smoking weed, etc. I joined in, unaware of the effects. I got scared and I called my parents to come and get me. I told them everything, I was truly sorry. I hated how I felt and never did it again. It was to late. If I forgot to give a phone message or got a low grade on my schoolwork, it was because I was a “druggie”. Once, in front of a team of my piers, when I couldn’t find his car keys, my father told me that “if I wasn’t such a pothead, I might have a brain cell and remember where his keys were!” I needed my Mom to hold me. I needed my Daddy to make it all better. Where is the love?
I loved him so much. I married him. He said I made him happy. He said he loved me. I didn’t know he loved someone else , too. I didn’t know that my bruises and my humiliation made him happy, not me. My family said , “try harder!” We started a family. My belly just embarrassed him. Our daughter, not a son, was a disgrace to him. I came home from her first check up one day to find he and everything we owned, even her crib, was gone. And so we sat alone in our empty home wondering, where is the love?
I went to the big, beautiful church. They invited us in and taught us about Jesus. They were so nice. There must be love here. “You can come to our services, come to our classes, make sure you pay your tithes, “ they said, “but please understand, you don’t have much money and your child has no father. God cannot use you, so you can watch but you cannot participate.” Where is the love?
I laid in my bed, broken and weary. Where is the love? Then as if in a dream, God said to me, “ You love your daughter and she loves you. I love you both more than you will ever know. You are my child, I am your father. Remember this, and your home will be a happy home, and there is the love.”
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