Visiting My Childhood

On an impulse tonight I decided to visit my childhood home, the place where I grew up until I was about 10 years old.

It’s an old apartment complex near Wadsworth, OH and I hadn’t been at this place since I moved way back in July of 1999. 13 years has passed since I last set foot on this property.

It’s not a very big space. It probably has about 8 apartments all side by side, a parking lot, a backyard space, and it sits next to a church and behind an abandoned office building.

But going back reminded me of just how huge it seemed growing up. The field that separated us and the office building felt like it was a couple miles long, the trees were the biggest I had ever seen, my apartment felt like a huge mansion, the parking lot was a raceway where I discovered how fast I could go on my bike, and all the steps leading uphill seemed unconquerable.

Tonight I was flooded with memories, great and not so great ones from my early childhood.  Most of which I had forgotten, some by choice.

This slice of town was the world to me, and my only concern was playing with my toys and being with my family and friends. My only need was to be loved.

I have a lot of brokenness in my heart. I’m heavy with hurt and I mourn many things that have both happened to me and that were withheld from me. I need a lot of healing inside.

Tonight was helpful to that end. Because while there were many painful memories that came back from visiting my childhood, what I ultimately experienced was the reality of God’s fatherhood.

I looked back in my mind’s eye and saw God playing basketball with me, walking next to me as I rode my bike, laughing with me in the joyful moments, and comforting me in the sad.

I saw Jesus being a dad from the very beginning.

As I sat on a hillside tonight crying & praying, I got to the point where the only words I could utter was “I am a child who needs his daddy.”

Friends, I am a child who needs his daddy. I need my heavenly father in a way I cant even express. And I rediscovered tonight that I will do anything, I will give my life to see his love brought to people on this Earth.

I will do anything so that the fatherless and the hopeless and the suicidal and the hungry and the weak and the rich and the poor and everyone on this Earth knows the fullness of the love of God.

I will trust my Father. Because I am a child who needs his dad.