letters to Father

24 A dispute also arose among them as to which of them was considered to be greatest. 25 Jesus said to them, “The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them; and those who exercise authority over them call themselves Benefactors. 26 But you are not to be like that. Instead, the greatest among you should be like the youngest, and the one who rules like the one who serves. 27 For who is greater, the one who is at the table or the one who serves? Is it not the one who is at the table? But I am among you as one who serves. 28 You are those who have stood by me in my trials. 29 And I confer on you a kingdom, just as my Father conferred one on me, 30 so that you may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom and sit on thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.

Luke 22:24-30

Thank You for annihilating that lie with the revealing light of Christ. He exposed the hypocrisy of the leaders and people then. And He exposed the darkness within me in my time here.

Thank You for this painful open surgery. I shall leave out all that is of this world, Father, as I grow to the stature of Your Son and become perfect in Love.
Amen.

-w

@letterstoFather

(Letter 24: Ugly)

6/1/18
Father,

I think I know why I like The Black Key’s cover of Robert Pete William’s Grown So Ugly so much. First of all, I really like the electric guitar. I’m really grateful to exist in a time when this particular instrument had been around for a while.

But this song also brings something familiar to mind. It’s the numbing realization that I was losing my ‘innocence’ and getting filled up with carnal stuff for years. I thought that to survive this world, I had to be filled with the substance of it. I had to consume enough shit to overcome shit. I had to grow ugly. So, I really started identifying with Robert Pete’s lyrics.

‘Baby, this ain’t me, baby this ain’t me
Grown so ugly, grown so ugly
Don’t even know myself. Don’t even know myself’

I hadn’t been locked up in an earthly prison as the writer of this song had, but I’d been in a prison alright. It was a bigger, more notorious prison. The worst part about that prison was that I did not know I was in it at all. I just had the feeling that I was trapped, and that I wanted a way out.
Even looking at the best case scenario of my future made me feel claustrophobic. Was the only way out a plunge into death or madness? If I don’t leave, I thought that I had to be accustomed to the ways of this world.

I knew that I would either have to become ugly or the ugly would consume me. Bob Dylan sings about this in his song All Along the Watchtower: is there a way out of here?

I never knew the exit route would look like this though. I had no idea that taking that path meant that I had to leave the weight of my old self and ego behind me. Who would have guessed that a God would take the form of the creatures He made to break them out of a prison of their own making?
And at first listen, this story sounds like too much unnecessary drama. I remember an episode of a show called Louie when a young Louie is shown to be going to Catholic school.
A nun was explaining to him and his friends that Christ had died on a cross for their sins and that every sin counts. Then, she brought in a medical expert to explain to them the physical pain Jesus went through in the latter parts of his existence here on Earth.
The expert described how his bones were crushed when His hands and feet were nailed to the wood. He explained the process of His slow death and the kind of pressure on His bleeding feet when His entire body’s weight rested on them. Louie remembered reading pornography and stealing from a store, among other things, and he remembered their words all day. He felt like Christ’s suffering was His fault too.

In the end, Louie ran to the church at night and put down the sculpture of Jesus which the medical expert had used for demonstration. He took all of the nails out of his hands and feet and kept apologizing for what he’d done.

He really felt sorry for Jesus. The next day, the nun told his non-believing mother about what her son had done. That made the mother decide to pull him out of the nun’s negative influence. In the end, they showed a tiny story that probably captures Louie's character’s idea of Christianity in the simplest way possible. They made it appear like Jesus didn’t have to do what He did. It’s like the whole thing was something He orchestrated to make people feel obligated to follow Him out of guilt.

I used to have a similar sentiment during my time in Saudi Arabia. I remember the dramatic torture scenes in the movies they showed of Christ and wondered whether any of it was necessary.
But in order to appreciate the cost of a cure, one has to understand the severity of the disease.

And the disease within humanity is so pervasive, it normalized itself over the generations. We have a semblance of Your beauty left in us which seems to make us long for true beauty. That longing contradicts our animalistic survival instincts.
But while we plunged into varying depths of sophistication and denial while we built our empires, our lies kept on getting better.

James 3
1
Not many of you should presume to be teachers, my brothers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly.
2
We all stumble in many ways. If anyone is never at fault in what he says, he is a perfect man, able to keep his whole body in check.
3
When we put bits into the mouths of horses to make them obey us, we can turn the whole animal.
4
Or take ships as an example. Although they are so large and are driven by strong winds, they are steered by a very small rudder wherever the pilot wants to go.
5
Likewise the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark.
6
The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole person, sets the whole course of his life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell.
7
All kinds of animals, birds, reptiles and creatures of the sea are being tamed and have been tamed by man,
8
but no man can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison.
9
With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in God's likeness.
10
Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers, this should not be.
11
Can both fresh water and salt [1] water flow from the same spring?

Letter 23 (Perfect)

25/1/18
Father,

Perfect. This is perfect. It's not perfect the way You Are, or the way we will all be when the spiritual gifts had ceased and everything we see had come to pass.

But sometimes I see perfection in moments. For one, I think this morning was perfect.

My real birth is my birth in Your Spirit. But this carnal being is the one my family knows and I don’t mind having two birthdays: an ‘Adamic’ one and a ‘second Adamic’ one. So, my little sister baked me a cake for today and I got my dad’s phone call at 12:00 a.m. I am so grateful that he carefully watches the clock at midnight for his daughters’ sake.

Although I don’t care about the exact day of my birth-or Jesus’ for that matter-I’m glad that I was born after Him. I’m so glad that I wasn't born on an Earth that was anticipating Jesus. I came into a planet which had already received and expelled Him.

Thank You, Father, for my new birth last year. For all the people who guided me towards You; Philemon and Eden and Eyob and Ruth and the lady who gave me a lift from the British council to home.

Bless their hearts always.

Love,

-w
By: @letterstoFather

it's been a year since this one

(71)
Creative

23/2/18
Father,
I love you! I don't want to cry, and I'm about to. But I really, really, really like You.
Does it make a difference to You if I am writing to You sitting on my bed with this pink blanket on me or if I’m talking to You, on my knees, in front of one of my room’s walls? I feel better worshiping on the floor though. Curling up into a fetal position makes it less embarrassing for me while I do this funny laugh-cry thing I do when I encounter You, I guess.

Oh, and Father, I love braces.

I got a set for my upper teeth today. During the process, the doctor told me that UV rays and strong glue were used to stick the metal studs to my teeth. Despite learning such cool facts, the process itself was not fun. There was a plastic bracket thing that was used to keep my mouth open and that thing hurt.

But Father, the idea of strong electromagnetic fields scares me a little now. I have little metal pieces glued to my mouth so, I will not be able to pass through metal detectors without making them beep. The dentist told me that when the time comes, security guards would let me pass if I flash them a smile.
I have pure stainless steel in me now and I find that so cool. Now, I am thinking about really strong magnetic fields. I was just telling dad over the phone that if I go under one of the big machines they use to pick up metal stuff from dumpsters, I’d float right up once someone switches the machine on. Dad told me not to worry about that because such technology does not exist here. My sister thinks my theory is ridiculous, but I’m pretty sure it’s possible.

This whole thing still feels like a real-estate renovation project, though. The land is my mouth, my body the country, my teeth the old, clustered houses and the dentist the architect, urban planner, construction worker, site surveyor, and everything else.
I determine the most important decisions, like whether he can fix some structures or whether I want them to remain there as old, valuable relics. I determine whether he can knock down some structures or not. He wouldn’t even be working on this ‘living land’ if I did not want to develop it.

Actually, there were other factors involved. My parents, bless their hearts, had influenced the land-owner to renovate her land and they’re generously funding the entire project. The tools the dentist uses look like Medieval European torture weapons. I wish I could change how they look. But I guess the landowner can't choose everything.

Perhaps the building analogy came so easily to me because I'm learning about buildings in college.

And Father, we build in a small-scale. It will take the dentist a year and a half to finish this project. It takes me weeks-or months-to finish a virtual building on my computer. You build on a large scale. There’s what You did in the beginning. Then, there’s what Isaiah said about how You will create new heavens and a new earth. Isaiah prophecies about Jesus had come to pass some time ago, so I can count on his other prophecies too.

Now You, Creator, are beyond creative and I'm so happy that humans were made in Your image. I stumble into the topic of creativity quite often lately. Yesterday, I read Bill Johnson’s interpretation of Zechariah 1:19-21 and it inspired me so much I did a silly little ‘drawing interpretation’ of it. So, Johnson was talking about the vision Zechariah had of four craftsmen who went to war. They weren’t actual warriors on horses. They were craftsmen who had been sent to fight a spiritual battle. It was a lovely display of the value of creativity in my walk with You, Father. You are Love, and Love creates. It’s fun to even try to emulate that in little ways. Thank You for having us made in Your image, Creative Father.

Thank You.

Love,
-w

@letterstoFather

Instagram: @letterstoFather

Letter 21
Two masters
6/2/18

Father,

It’s 3 a.m and here I am surfing the internet again. I’m looking up Taylor Swift mostly. In one of her songs, she calls out to You, Lord. And I remember You. I keep remembering You, but in a slow humming manner in me.

Then I felt like Your absence hurt. So here I am addressing You again. I was lost, found and relieved to be found. And You won’t keep me trapped in Your hands. You won’t stop me from straying if I wanted to. And I’m sorry for choosing hell every day, in so many little ways. I keep thinking that I won’t go in too deep and that I already have it too good to revert to my old ways. I have it good. And I know that my sin doesn’t change You at all: it changes me. It’s not a bad snack that hurts my tummy for a while. No. it slowly eats me up.

Now, I have two tabs beside each other on my computer screen. AC/DC’s Highway to Hell, and C.S. Lewis’ Made for heaven. It is written that one can’t serve two masters at once. And, here I am.

The former I opened today while looking for the guitar strum tutorials. I love their guitar riffs, Father. But then, I ended up singing along with the song, and then, I say, ‘I’m on a highway to hell’. When I sing along to that chorus, I feel like I’m uttering something ridiculously untrue and ironic. It feels like screaming, ‘my cooking is great’. It just isn’t.

Someone in the comments section of the Highway to Hell music video said that Satan will be waiting for one of the recently deceased band members with an ace. I don’t know if he is serious. I don’t know whether the people who came up with those song lyrics were serious either. I don’t think anybody says these things-or sins, for that matter-with all seriousness. I think that’s the slickest part of the devil’s game. Gossip, cheating, lying; none of these things usually sound like they have serious consequences. Being a believer who sings along to a comic Highway to Hell chorus doesn’t sound serious either.

But a lot of things that I look back upon with regret had only started off as cute, little suggestions. There’s the underlying suggestion that if nobody finds out, your mistake could be your memory to take with you to the grave. But every action I made had either built me up, taken something from me or hardened my heart. That changes me for better or for worse during my next interaction with a precious human being. Even before meeting You, I learned several lessons by simply being stupid.

But Father, thanks to Your wisdom, I don’t have to bump my head against every wall. I’ve avoided wasting so much energy and time simply by letting Your Spirit still my heart. But I am sorry for every time I made an unbeneficial decision while knowing better. You’re the cornerstone on which my faith stands. May I always remember that and be the best human I can be in all of my interactions.

-w

@letterstoFather

Letter 20: Fraud

4/5/19
Father,

Thank You for offering to stay with me through my good, ugly and insecure moments and for giving me the comfort that is beyond moments and time. Thank You for the depth and height of the Love of Christ which doesn't change.

Thank You for reminding me that I am a complete creature in Your family, even when I feel like a fraud who’d didn't at least go far enough to fail well or that I will never tie up all of the loose strings of the things I’ve started. I’m made of a substance that none of my accomplishments on this planet can ever compete with. May I never forget that. Help me share the essence of this substance with everything I say or do, Father.

But I still feel simple things sometimes. A casual behavioral remark that a friend gave about me some time ago made me feel defensive. I thought that my worst suspicions about how others perceive me had been confirmed.
I felt like I’m on the bad side of mediocre, and like I’m inadequate and too much to handle at once. I wondered how people even tolerate me. I love them either way, Father. But apparently, I do really care about what others think of me. And ultimately, what people think about me is determined by what I do or don’t do in general. Now, thank You for the love that doesn't change.

Yesterday, when I was going to my campus at night to get a charger that I'd forgotten there, I hopped on a minibus that would travel a longer distance than most of the minibusses there. Halfway through the ride, the driver and redaat changed their minds and decided to drop us off halfway through the journey. You saw how I let out a heavy sigh and tried to resist snapping at the passenger who was trying to console me, telling me about the minibus I can take once I drop off. I told the nice guy that I know where the next station is. I tried to say that annoyingly long Amharic word for thanks. At some point, I thought: thank you for your nice words but can they carry me all the way to Mexico? Exactly, Mr. Nice.’

As I feared, there wasn’t another empty Mexico minibus there until abound twenty minutes had passed. But, Father I met an older Muslim woman who made the wait more tolerable. She got in the minibus with me, blessed me and insisted on paying for my ride, saying that it was sadaqa. But Mr. Nice only got salt from me. St. Paul wrote in his letter to the Corinthians that the kind of love You Are does not get provoked, never fails, bears all things and endures all things.

I really want to get there, Father. I know that I can never get close to that without You, so keep me in Your palm so that I’m not just an indifferent rock that endures and endures without exploding.
No. Help me exude all of the qualities that You’ve given me when You called me Your own. If I get any hatred or betrayal, may I absorb it like the ground absorbs cold hail. And may I only sprout lovely fruit in return. May all of my reactions be driven by love, always.

That’s the substance You made me out of. That’s what I shall grow into, in Christ’s name.

Thank You.
Love,

-w

By: @letterstoFather

I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.


Ephesians 3:16 - 19 NIV

10/5/19 (I don’t know)

Father

I hadn’t been writing to You in a while now. But then again, thank You for the fact that I can write. Bless every person-dead or alive-who had contributed to teaching me how to put words together.
Sometimes, I think that this should be all I ever do for the rest of my time on this planet. Maybe I should just write. I mean, I don’t have the time to get good at playing the guitar, designing stuff and drawing with sand. So, maybe I should stick with just one thing. Right?

Whenever I begin obsessing with the question of what I should be doing with the bulk of my time, I get the sense that I am not in a very good place in my relationship with You. You told us to be anxious about nothing. But a lot had been changing lately, Father.

For one, is it just me or is this city slowly getting wilder? Every long-distance commute to my university and back comes with a stimulation overdose. There are young mothers with their children on the street, people with missing body parts, young men sneaking out devices from their momentarily distracted owners; there’s so much happening everywhere and so little I can do about most of it. That is very humbling and numbing at once.

None of this is new to me anymore. I find me annoying for even talking about it. But sometimes, it kind of hits me in a new way, Father.
Also, my classmates had been dropping out like dominos on the fourth year of our five-year academic marathon. I don’t feel like I’m learning enough. But I also feel like I’m being fed too much. Everybody looks exhausted too.

After several years, when we look back at our early twenties, what will come to our minds? Will we regret the number of hours we spent on campus? Will we remember each others’ sleeping faces when we dozed off on our studio tables at night? Will we recall who walked around campus with blankets on because it was cold outside and we still had a lot of work to do?

From the sound of it, not many of my classmates want to be architects anymore. Some of them are already designing clothes and logos for their clients. So, we will probably throw away the courses that made us come to campus in the first place and remember everything that happened in between instead.

I know that this sounds like a very boring thing to talk about, Father. But I seem to be fixated on it, so I wanted to let it out. Again, thank You for lifting me up to a place where I can see all of these experiences as two-dimensional pages of a storybook which has to come to an end. Let me keep my eyes fixed where You are. May the possibilities and uncertainties ahead of me never overwhelm me again. May I stay grounded and rooted in the love of Christ which passes all knowledge.

May the earthly knowledge that I acquire make me better at serving fellow humans with everything I have and all the love you share with me.

Bless all of my friends, classmates, fellow minibus passengers, redaats, drivers, lecturers, and family. We may never know exactly what we’re doing. I don’t know why I do a whole lot of things, Father.

But talking to You makes feel better about that.
I love You too. Thank You for being awesome, for every day, and for tea.

Love,
-w

@letterstoFather