I’ve struggled with the concept of God as a father for a long time. If God is indeed the most loving being in the universe, wouldn’t He make the ultimate dad? Wouldn’t He sit and talk with me or take me on adventures? Wouldn’t He carry me to bed in his arms after a long day? Wouldn’t He be able to protect me and comfort me and teach me what I need to know?
At one point in my life He might have been just that. When I was very young with a great imagination I would imagine Him talking to me and coming on adventures in the woods with me and comforting me when I was hurt or upset.
And then slowly His voice seemed to fade. I was confronted with a thought: what if God really isn’t there and I’m just making this all up? What most would consider reality hit me like a ton of bricks and from then on I doubted the presence of God in my life.
There was a silence that I could not understand. It made me lonely and it made me slowly fall into depression. I still prayed every day, as I did when I was young, but I refused to come up with answers in my mind. So I heard nothing. Even when I went through the darkest year of my life I called out to God and He never seemed to answer.
I wondered: if God is our father, if He is all-powerful, all good and He can see everything, why doesn’t He stop His children from hurting? Why doesn’t He prevent rape? Why doesn’t He come out on the porch with His rifle and threaten away all the creeps? Why doesn’t He hug us? Why can’t He at least be as good as an earthly father and give us a little advice when we need it? I felt as though God as a father just didn’t make sense because a good father takes care of his children. A good father is not silent.
But this is not who God is, this is not what God is. The concept of God as our father is not gospel, it is a metaphor. And like all metaphors, they should not be taken to the extreme. Just because I say a chair is black and white like a cow does not mean it has an udder. Other metaphors just don’t work for people. Well, this one doesn’t work for me.
God, as I have come to know, is not an absentee father. God is the Church. We are the body of Christ, we are the hands and feet of Christ and God works through us to carry out good in the world and protect each other. The spirit of God dwells in each of us and so if one of our own goes through something, we have only sin to blame for it.
I came to realize that all the people reaching out to me in my life is God reaching out to me. A hug from a sister in Christ is a hug from the savior, a smile from a brother in Christ is the smile of the savior. Even our earthly father is an instrument of God to help us when we need it. And through all of this, even if we cry to God and He doesn’t seem to answer, there is always someone you can go to for help. You are not alone. There is always someone who has gone through something similar that you are going through.
I found there is no purpose in life without God. During the time I ignored God, I studied, I did yoga, I exercised daily and worked on improving myself as a whole. Basically all I did for a summer of my life was try to make myself a better human being.
But it doesn’t work without God. You see, while I was supposed to be becoming some wonderful and educated person, I was losing the part of myself that was truly good. I stopped caring about other people because I was so focused on myself. But I blindly kept reaching to play God’s role and I failed over and over.
This led to self-hatred, and that is when I needed God more than ever. At rock bottom I discovered God in my fellow brothers and sisters in Christ. Self-esteem is still a struggle of mine, and might always be. But with His forgiveness – the forgiveness of all my brothers and sisters in Christ – I realize that no one on this earth sees me in the horrible way I saw myself as a 15-year-old. And even when I do not love myself, my family and friends love me unconditionally.
The only answer is God. There is no other. You can’t give yourself purpose in life and you cannot be a good person without focusing on others. And while you may think that God will never answer your call for help, He’s probably sitting right across from you, looking through the eyes of a brother or sister in Christ.
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