Yes, Daddy…not Heavenly Father, not God, not the LORD. Oh, of course, He is all of those things but more and more He is wooing me into calling him my Daddy. I’ve heard of others doing that and always thought it was great but it didn’t work for me. It didn’t sound “holy” enough. In reality, though, it was just too intimate…that was the real problem. If I make him my Daddy, then He is much closer. I have an earthly daddy that I love very much. Does God really love me the same way as my earthly daddy does? My earthly daddy wouldn’t let me miscarry…I just know it. My earthly daddy wouldn’t have let me go through so many years of begging him for something, crying out in agony and yet deny me of it. So, how can God love me like a daddy? I just couldn’t figure out how to get that truth to sink into my soul. Oh, I know that He loves me deeply…so deeply that he gave up his own little boy and let him die a horrendous death so that He could adopt me into His family. Now THAT is love with a capital L but it’s way deeper love than I can begin to comprehend, though, and so when it came to acts of love that I could comprehend, he seemed to fall short. In my head, I could make sense of it. He loves me so much that He lets me go through all of this for my ultimate good and purpose. I KNOW that. I couldn’t make my heart really feel it, though, that it could be done in a love that is more pure than my earthly father could ever give. I don’t know if any of this even begins to make sense to anyone but myself, but there is a voice deep within that has always been begging me to let him really love me and a part of myself deep down that was running from that. Not consciously, of course, but still running, nonetheless. Each broken-hearted moment has been an opportunity to draw closer to His love, but I’ve never really let it completely. If I could truly get His love for me in those darkest times, then I could surely embrace it in the mundane, ordinary times.

That quiet voice is getting louder, though. I’m more and more testing the waters on letting him in even deeper. When I allow myself to think about Him being my Daddy, it makes me a little giddy. Is that the joy that I’ve been missing? Can I really let him be Daddy?

Last Sunday, our message was about The Secret Place and becoming more intimate with God. He spoke clearly to me during that message and told me that my fear is that if I get any closer to Him I will find out that He doesn’t really love me. That is, indeed, a struggle that I have endured for many years. I grew up in church and accepted the LORD into my heart at the age of 8 but later abandoned the Faith and led a very lost life for several years. The Liar has tormented me ever since my return with thoughts of having gone way too far to ever return. I’ve come along way but it is still a struggle and the LORD made that apparent to me during the service last week. I felt at that moment He was challenging me to let go of that fear once and for all. Monday morning I had a chance to really sit down and spend some time with him in a deeper way than usual. To be perfectly honest, I don’t get those “quiet times” as much as I would like with kids that rise before the sun. My moments with God are more scattered throughout a day and more organic than a scheduled time every morning. I’m working on that, but Monday just blew my mind when He led me straight to this verse in Song of Solomon Chapter 2…

8 The voice of my beloved!
Behold, he comes
Leaping upon the mountains,
Skipping upon the hills.
9 My beloved is like a gazelle or a young stag.
Behold, he stands behind our wall;
He is looking through the windows,
Gazing through the lattice.
10 My beloved spoke, and said to me:

“ Rise up, my love, my fair one,
And come away.
11 For lo, the winter is past,
The rain is over and gone.
12 The flowers appear on the earth;
The time of singing has come,
And the voice of the turtledove
Is heard in our land.
13 The fig tree puts forth her green figs,
And the vines with the tender grapes
Give a good smell.
Rise up, my love, my fair one,
And come away!
14 “ O my dove, in the clefts of the rock,
In the secret places of the cliff,
Let me see your face,
Let me hear your voice;
For your voice is sweet,
And your face is lovely.”

Now, that’s love so deep for me that it makes me blush! Could He really love me like that??? Does He come leaping across the mountains when I sit down to meet with Him? Does He really want to see my face and hear my voice because He thinks that they are lovely? Me? Really? It’s just almost too much. I couldn’t believe it even said “secret places” in that passage. My heart just lept! He does love me! The roots of His great love in me is growing deeper and wider penetrating even the darkest places that refused to allow it and the peace that comes with that knowledge is so very comforting.

I’m now more excited than ever to meet with Him and allow Him to prove to me once and for all that I am His and He is mine, truly, deeply, madly…my Daddy.