Visits to my biological father’s home grew shorter and shorter. It was not that he was unloving toward me. He did all he could to make me feel welcome; the truth is I simply didn’t want to be there. The nightmares became less frequent, but the fear that I wouldn’t get my new last name made my Saturday visits very anxious. I couldn’t stand to be away from my mom and dad even for brief periods of time. My normal visitation day would barely last an hour before I would ask to call mom to come pick me up, often within moments of being dropped off. Eventually the writing was on the wall, and it was clear to everyone I did not want anything more to do with these proceedings, and the only thing that would bring peace to my little heart was for the court system to give validation to my new family and make it legal. In a conversation that my mother recounted to me decades later, my biological father told her that she should come to pick me up because I didn’t want to be there, and that he would be willing to sign over his parental rights in an effort to give me what I truly wanted. It was the most loving thing he had ever done for me and I’m indebted to him for it.
In the Summer before my second grade year of school the adoption was finalized. I would enter the second grade as Jeremy Powell, leaving behind an old name and an old identity. No longer would I bear the name of my biological father, and no longer would I bear the label of unwanted or abandoned. When the adoption was made official my dad’s parents, brothers and sister and all of my brand new cousins gathered together at my grandparents home and threw a party. They made me a plaque with my new name etched into it and we had a cake. The house was filled with smiles, laughter, and some amazing food per my Grandmother. We celebrated how the court system had succeeded in making me the newest member of the family.
Jesus would tell us that when one person who is lost finds his way home heaven throws a party, you get a new name, and I’ll bet that there is a cake. In describing God to the nation of Israel, David would say He:
A father to the fatherless, a defender of widows, is God in his holy dwelling. God sets the lonely in families, he leads out the prisoners with singing…
Psalm 68:4-6
Twelve years after the judges gavel dropped on my adoption, I would begin to study Biology at Samford University. In my genetics class, I learned that the genes found in every one of our cells determine everything about us. Our height, hair and eye color, even things like predisposition to disease and mannerisms are related to the DNA we inherit from our parents. I also learned that scientists have long debated whether nature (your genetic makeup) or nurture play a larger role in making you who you are.
There were a number of times along the way I found myself acting like my dad. I never had any pointy toed boots, but as I got older, I found myself beginning to dress like him.
We would stand the same way and even tap our back pockets with our thumbs just to make sure our wallets were still there. I found myself saying things I had heard him say, and finding joy in the same things in which he found joy. It seemed like the more time we spent around each other, the more I began to reflect his nature. From time to time we would even have people comment on how I looked like my dad. Every time it happened I would smile inside, knowing the secret that it was’t his DNA that flowed through my veins but his likeness that I was growing into.
But that’s what happens when you become a part of a new family. The more time you spend with them, the more you begin to take on their characteristics. The same is true when you are adopted into the family of God. John wrote about it this way:
Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. All who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure.
1 John 1:2-3
When God brings us into His family and we begin to spend time with Him, we begin to take on His characteristics. Before long, we begin to look and act like Jesus, becoming a reflection of his character and nature.
When I read about Jesus in the gospels one thing stands out to me. People were drawn to him. People saw the way he taught, the way he healed, and the way he loved. Piqued by curiosity they wanted to see what he was all about and flocked to him in droves. In the words of one preacher, people that were nothing like Jesus tended to like Jesus, and he tended to like them back. The sad fact is that when I look at followers of Jesus today people aren’t drawn to them like they were drawn to Jesus. It makes me wonder if people who claim to have a relationship with Jesus actually spend any time with him, because I think they may look a little more like him if they did. Then perhaps people would be drawn to places like church because that’s where all the people who are like Jesus hang out rather than dropping out at an alarming rate.
It makes me wonder if people who claim to have a relationship with Jesus actually spend any time with him, because I think they may look a little more like him if they did. Then perhaps people would be drawn to places like church because that’s where all the people who are like Jesus hang out rather than dropping out at an alarming rate.
But wait, there’s more.
Twenty years after my mom and dad got married, they decided to get divorced. I was 24 years old, grown and married, and building a life and family of my own. Once the divorce was finalized, I made a trip home to see my dad and check in on him. I don’t want to put words in his mouth or claim to know what was going on inside of his head, but I can tell you what was going on in mine. Though legally I was his, what would our future relationship look like now that the marriage that brought us together was over. Late one night sitting in the basement of the home I grew up in, we had a very personal, very serious heart to heart talk. I won’t share with you all that was said, as that conversation was between me and my daddy, but I will tell you that I walked away from our talk understanding this fact: when he chose to be my dad, he chose me because of me, not because of who my mother was. He chose to be my father, and nothing would ever change that.
He never stopped being my dad. Even decades later when I found myself stricken with fungal meningitis and on the verge of death, he (and countless others, I just happen to be writing about him right now) would be there every step of the way.
Even this week, dad made the journey to my house to help me with some home repairs as we prepare to move back to Alabama. Seems like you never outgrow needing your daddy. But that’s the thing about dads. They don’t just leave. They stick around. They are always there when you need them. There were many times when I had opportunities to walk away from a relationship legalized before I even left grammar school, and there were times when he had opportunities to pull away avoid awkward situations. But neither of us did. Real dads don’t leave.
Maybe that hasn’t been your experience. Maybe you had a dad that left, or one who would have rather been anywhere else other than in your presence. But our heavenly father isn’t like that. In talking about those who would be adopted into the family of God, Jesus put it this way:
My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all ; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand.
John 10:27-29
He chose you. You’re his. No one and no thing is going to take you away from him. He loves you that much. He’s got you. You’re his.
The more I spent time with my dad the more I looked and acted like him, and the more time we spend with our father in heaven the more we come to reflect Him as well. We learn to love as He loves, show grace as He has shown grace and forgive as He has forgiven. It would take another 20 years before I would find out what forgiveness truly looked like.
Jeremy Powell 