A Father To The Fatherless

When I was young in the Lord, I never heard the terms, “spiritual mothers and fathers.” I always did have certain people that I looked up to, but I’ve realized they were more like stepping stones in my walk with God. I looked at their life and said, ” Lord I want to be as wise as this person, or worship relentless like this person.” I’ve always looked at a situation and said, ” If they can do it why can’t I?” Which in my case wasn’t always a bad thing but you do have to be very careful with it that you don’t get wrapped up in the person or the gift, but get wrapped up in the fact that If God can teach this person wisdom, then He can teach you too.

As years went by, I met some awesome people and they kept mentioning who their spiritual mothers were or who their spiritual fathers were and at the time I felt I had no one. I felt like a lost pup taken away from its mother prematurely and in search of some nurturing. I desired to have what they had. The more I sought for it, the less I found it. The less I found It, the more hurt I became and my anxiety started rising up again and I started listening to the lie of the devil. He kept saying, ” Nobody wants you. Nobody likes you. Those friends, they don’t actually want you around? They are rejecting you just like everyone else did in your past.” He was saying so many things that I fed into because I looked at my friends as my help rather than the one who knows me through and through. I got wrapped up in wanting my friends to mentor me rather than the one who said follow me in my foot steps.

Now I’m not saying that everyone does not need a spiritual mother or father because there was times I myself needed some guidance when I was being hard headed and wouldn’t stop long enough to listen to God. There are people that God sets up in our lives to help guide us along the way. I am so thankful for those people God has and had set up for me to bring me right where I am at, at this very moment. Just like our natural schooling system, You have a different teacher year by year. You remember their teachings and are thankful for them but as times changes and you come upon a new season you may need a higher grade of teacher.

One night after dealing with this thing that felt like rejection and separation, I told God I just did not understand why I was feeling this. broken and worried I began to ask God for clarity. I had contacted a great man of God and asked him to pray for me then as I was about to fall asleep, my husband turned and said, ” I don’t no what to tell you on this one, but I’m praying that God would give you some clarity.” I knew then that everything was going to be okay and that I would get the clarity that I needed.

The next night we were at a close friends house around the fire singing praises to God. Out of nowhere God reminds me of another group of people that had no spiritual father but Jesus asked them to follow Him. That’s when It all made sense to me what was going on. He reminded me of how the schooling was In the bible days. The first so many years of their lives they studied the first five books of the bible until they could read scripture word for word. Then around the early teenage years, the boys went on to see if they qualified to study under a Rabbi. If they passed reading word for word the Torah then they qualified to choose their Rabbi that they wanted to study under. It was someone they saw as a father figure. As for these twelve, they may have not qualified to go on further. So they had to continue in their fathers trade, but Jesus chose them anyway even though they weren’t deemed fit to be under a Rabbi.

There are those that will follow the very steps that other preachers, evangelists, and teachers have walked. Then there are those that are only taught by God. They have no spiritual mothers or fathers to look up to but God himself. When It feels like we are being rejected or “unqualified” to be under someone’s teachings, I found that It’s not really rejection but It is actually God saying He wants no man to teach you but Him. In this I have seen the fatherless or motherless be raised by God into a powerful spiritual mother and father themselves. In Psalm 68: 5-6 it says that God would be a father to the fatherless and a judge for the widows, Is God in His holy habitation. God makes a home for the lonely; 6. He leads out the prisoners into prosperity, Only the rebellious dwell in a parched land.