lenten journey, day 26 — a prayer for the fatherless

I spent the first 28 years of my life proclaiming variations on this theme: “Who needs a father, anyway?” And I meant it. At least until my son was born, and I saw for the first time in my life what a father actually brings to a family: fierce love, strong protection, selfless provision, and…well…exuberant play.

Sure, I could give boo-boo-all-better kisses and spoon mushy orange food into wide open mouths all day long. But the whole "sit-on-my- shoulders-while-we-pointlessly-chase-the-dog-around-the-house" thing was just not one of my gifts. Yet it was a gift my children desperately needed.

You know what else I couldn’t do? I couldn’t break up concrete with a sledgehammer, or lay on my back under a car for an hour while oil dripped on my face, or answer the door in the middle of the night with a gruff “What do you want?”

I wasn’t very good at turning a box into a pirate ship, or turning a boy into a man. I couldn’t demonstrate to my daughters what a true hero looks like so that they’d know one when they met one. And I sure couldn’t give them the fatherly love that would enable them to just skip right over the whole “Fatherless Daughter Game” that has one simple—but dangerous—rule: “Date lots of boys and get them to love you, because you’ve never actually had a male-type person love you before, and it sure makes you feel secure when they do.”

Yep, children need fathers. But the reality is that fathers are kind of scarce these days, and a fatherless home is an at-risk home. 85% of children with behavior disorders, 75% of all adolescent patients in chemical abuse centers, and 85% of all youths in prison come from fatherless homes. 63% of young people committing suicide are fatherless.

I think this is why God speaks so protectively of the fatherless in scripture; He knows that what they really need more than anything else is a daddy. And our gracious Father in Heaven says, in that loving and protective way a daddy says such things, “I’ll do it if you let me. I’ve got your back!”

If growing up without an earthly father was an incomplete way for me to grow up, it was also a way to learn more quickly and more wholly what it might take others a lifetime to discover: God is an awesome Father. And His love will never abandon, move on, find another family he likes better, or forget what my middle name is. I am truly blessed to call him Abba.

Father, thank you that you invite us to call you our Father. Thank you that you have demonstrated over and over again that your heart is for the fatherless and for the broken. Thank you that you have graciously given my own children an amazing earthly father. Please help more men to be the fathers their children deserve. Would you place a burning ember in the hearts of men who are strong, stable fathers to become involved as mentors and role models for young boys who have never known a father’s influence? And would you give each single mom a plentiful daily supply of “oil for her lamp” so that the flame of love and care for her children will never go out? God, you love us more passionately and completely than any earthly parent ever could. May I honor you, my Father, with everything I am. Yes, and amen.

”How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!…” — 1 John 3:1

”But you, O God, do see trouble and grief; you consider it to take it in hand. The victim commits himself to you; you are the helper of the fatherless.” — Psalm 10:14