Deeda

Ok, so I have decided after 2 years to come out of blog exile.  I have been reading some recent blogs from folks I know and don’t know and feel like I should add to the collective thought pool.  I learn so much more from life experience and from the experience of others.

Now, I fully acknowledge that I may be the only person who reads this, but then I guess it could be deemed healthy (or the opposite) self introspection.  Oh well, here goes.

I would like to start a petition for a word to be added to Webster’s list.  It is quite possibly the sweetest sound I have heard up to this point in my life.  It is one I am sure you have never heard of:

“Deeda” (emphasis on the last syllable)

It is the inverse of daddy and what Andrew has decided that I should be called.  Of course most of you know the battle we walked through to get him home.  Anytime I think of the pain, bitterness, and sadness that accompanied that journey, I recall deeda and I am reminded of providence.  Providence found only with the Father.

I know this post will sound pretty familiar to those written by hundreds of dads, but the last few months since we got home from Guatemala have been life-changing. Fatherhood has changed me, is changing me.  I cannot look at God the same.

He is my Father, my Deeda.  This is the God who looked upon His hurting people in Egypt, heard their cries, and rescued them.  This is so deeply intimate.  Later in Exodus, He calls us His treasured possession.  In Ephesians, we are His workmanship, His “poem”.  In Romans, we are His clay.  In Psalms, He is our seamster, sewing us together.

It gives me such great pleasure to love my son, to feed him, to gently rock him to sleep at night, to bathe him, to tickle him and hear his cackle, to dance and sing with him, to teach him and read him books, to giggle with him at his body sounds (sorry mom), to gaze at amazement at stuff in the world that used to be boring, to play with trains, to pray with him, and on and on.  Although it pains, me, I am committed to his discipline and pray for his soul daily.  I would die for him in an instant, give my lifeblood for his own.  He is my son and I am his deeda.

How much more does my deeda in heaven love me?  He is my deliverer, my provider, my constant, my protector, my Lord.

He is good and His will is perfect.  He gave His son for me while I was His bitter enemy.

I love you Jehovah Deeda