As we are raised by our parents and grow up to be adults of our own, there are certain things we look forward to, to build a life and a legacy of our own, such as, love, getting married, having a family and growing old with our life’s mate that God has chosen for us. Considering I was raised in a single parent home, not like most, my home was split up due to unexpected tragedy where my mother died at a very young age. I was too young, seven (7) years old, to fully understand the circumstances behind it but I was thrust into that world. My family at that time consisted of two (2) older brothers and a younger sister, all the boys are two (2) years apart in age while my sister and I is only one (1) year apart. Throughout the years I have had great role models with my grandparents enduring the ups and downs of life. So, as I was entering adulthood my choices were reckless with no regard for life and the people around me. I had many relationships, most of them I was responsible for destroying because of my pain. It all started when I started having sex not being responsible, using a condom or just not engaging in it at all. As a result, through the years, I am responsible for three (3) different women having abortions and another having two (2) miscarriages. It was many years later that all my actions caught up with me and the emotions of all that loss was too much for me to bare alone. I forward my life to the time when God got a hold of me, it was in 2009, God showed me my mistakes, led me to volunteer at a place where kids had to make grown up decisions as to having a child, giving it up for adoption or aborting the child. These young teenagers went through classes on parenting, how to deal with their emotion, their partner and family, plus they were taught that the fetus inside them were living and breathing human beings. This is where God gave me closure to the atrocities I had inflicted on my own innocent children with no thought to the plans God had for my children. Then in 2010, God put me in a church where over time I had an opportunity to be a father-figure to some teenagers that had similar experiences, being raised in a single parent home, over the years and building bridges with these amazing young people. Once again I had an opportunity to lead or destroy, I chose to lead from the pain that I had felt during my formative years, but these teens had me beat in maturity when I was their age. I, well God, had me be a mentor to them to help them avoid the pitfalls that are out there and most importantly be someone they can count on and rely on in the tough time. This gave me purpose and understand that you don’t have to have children to father them, you father them by listening, crying, laughing and sharing your vast experience due to living longer along with the wisdom God gives us as we mature. Our God is a redemptive God just not in the ways we expect, He is full of wonderful surprises only if we are open to them.
Joy In The Journey 