I have written about everything from code switching to self-love. Whenever I reread my past posts – yes, I do that – I always find a common thread in most, if not all of them and that is a connection to my father. I’ve been impacted by many things and people, but not nearly as much as my father.There’s so many things he has taught me in my twenty years but he’s taught me more about myself than any other subject. Just when I think I know something, he’s always there to reassure me when my interpretation is just out of focus.
As a person, I am extremely communicative, attentive and affectionate. I’m the friend that does random check-ins, sends the paragraph-long birthday messages and that answers texts as soon as I see them. I remember talking to my mother about how I felt under appreciated because, despite my efforts, none of my friends did the same for me and I took it to mean I cared and they didn’t care at all. Basically, I was putting more in than I was getting out. I was on the verge of tears and borderline anger believing that I had been wronged. Later, my father asked me why I was crying.
He asked me another question. Whose love is more unreciprocated than God’s? Now, I was stumped and the tears stopped. Just think, God sacrificed His only Son to restore peace and communication between us and Him. It is a fact that is, grossly, taken for granted. In addition to His sacrifice, He continues to love and bless us even when we go astray. The even more remarkable thing about God is that despite the fact that he never sleeps nor slumbers and is the creator of the Heavens and the Earth, He never wants to force us to love him.
There is no spell that forces the creation to love its creator. If God is capable of all of those things and more, and even He doesn’t demand or receive reciprocity from everyone, how, on Earth, did I have the audacity to expect it myself? The final thing I learned is that the ability to love is no small feat.
Everyone isn’t capable of it, and being able to love makes us more like who God created us to be. Of course, people convey love differently, which is another lesson entirely, but if you’re like me – the friend that can’t help but care – it’s not a weakness or a punishment. In fact, for me, after having it put in perspective by my father, it’s become my pride and joy, no longer a burden or betrayal like I used to perceived it to be. Finally, if you are that friend, you are special because God placed that nurturing heart in you so that you could be a blessing to others. Remember, everything happens for a reason and nothing by accident.
