I sat on a hot bus trying to catch a breeze through one of
the partially opened windows as we bumped down the dirt road. Outside the sky
was that perfect cloudless blue, perfectly contrasted by the lush green
foothills of the Andes Mountains in the distance. Everything was beautiful – except me. As I looked down at my arms I moaned and let
out an exhausted sigh. It was day 5 of our
mission trip to Valencia, Venezuela, and ever since we arrived I seemed to be
wearing an invisible sign that said “ALL YOU CAN EAT BUFFET FOR ALL
INSECTS.” The first night of my trip I
realized that my mattress was infested with teeny tiny bed bugs. The second day
I made the mistake of leaning against a tree that was crawling with ants (both
red and black). And then there were the mosquitos. Not normal good ol’ US of A
mosquitos, but super hulk South American mosquitos who thought the OFF bug
spray I was wearing merely added flavor to my skin and blood. I looked like I
had another outbreak of chickenpox. Even
when we went out into the villages to minister the people would ask, “What
happened to you?”
By the time we pulled into the mall where we were meeting up
with some of our other teams, this former MK had HAD IT. Itchy, stinging, and
feverish I searched frantically for the one person who I knew could fix it: my
dad. He was our group leader on the
trip, and at that moment I couldn’t have been more thankful for the fact. I spotted him coming down the escalator and
made a bee line, tears already beginning to flow. “What’s wrong, sweetie?” My father, always calm and cool tempered, I
don’t think always knew (knows) what to do with all the estrogen in our
family. Between my mom, me, my two
sisters, and his seven granddaughters there is constant stream of emotions. My
words came out jumbled in all the crying, “I…can…dis… more!!
Don…good..hurt…people…ugly!” I guess he has learned to translate more than just
Spanish, because he quickly found the closest pharmacy in the mall and marched
me up to the counter. After a few words
of exchange between the two, and the pharmacist’s quick examination of the
bites on my arm, we left with meds and itch cream. He took
me down to the food court and bought me a hot meal and sat with me since most
of my team had already finished their lunch. Within a day of taking the
medicine the bites were already beginning to heal, and I was able to enjoy the last couple days of our trip.
From then on whenever I went on a mission
trip with our church, I wanted to be on Dad’s team.
Growing up I never really felt abandoned by my birth mother.
I was just thankful she had made the decision not to abort me early on. But my
birth father I’ve always had a more difficult time with. I felt he had not only abandoned me, but my
birth mother especially. Soon after he learned of her pregnancy he fled the
scene. To this day I don’t even know his name.
Funny though. I’ve never really
had a desire to meet the man. What would
I say? “Thank you for being the loser who knocked up a 14 year old girl and
then left her to clean up the mess. BTW, I’m that mess.” That’s the best I can
come up with. I’ve heard and seen the
hurt in my birth mother’s voice when asked about him. It is too much for her to talk about, which
is why I never ask. However, I am a very
curious person. If I could just see a picture of him, just to know if we favor
each other in any way…
But physical appearance, I imagine, would be our only
similarity. All of my personality traits
and characteristics I got from my real father.
He is the one that made me independent, and taught me about airports, baseball,
and would take me to “our kind of movies” (aka anything sci-fi, action, or
super hero in nature). He is the one
that provided for me, and came to my honors days and graduations. He is the one
that fed me from God’s word, made sure I was grounded in my faith, and I still
text today and ask questions on complex topics like Calvinism and pretty much
any world religion in existence. He
showed me daily the love of the Father.
To all of you who are adoptive fathers I say God bless you,
and there are far too few of you. Not
many men would take in a child, who isn’t his, and love and provide for them
without seeing any difference in the adopted and the biological. These days
there aren’t even enough men who care for those kids that are theirs. You have loved with the love of our Heavenly
Father who has adopted us as His sons and daughters, even when it cost Him what
was most precious. For those of you wives who are married to these – you have
an honorable man and don’t forget it.
I would challenge you to research some of the statistics on
fatherless homes. It is quite astounding. Children from fatherless homes are
more likely to be involved in crime, perform worse academically, father and
abandon more children or get pregnant as teens. Boys need fathers to show them
how to be real godly men. Girls need fathers to show them their value as
women.
I can’t imagine how much different I would be if I didn’t
have my father. I am so grateful that God picked such a wonderful man for the
job. I work with a lot of pastors and
missionaries, and every time they ask me, “Who is your father? He sure did do a
good job raising you.” I am so happy to say “Bill Cashion.”
Happy Father’s Day
everyone.
KT
