Delivered From Hate
By Brenda Mitchell
As I was growing up there were a few incidents that involved my father that caused me to decide that I hated him, none of which should have been worthy of hate. My father loved me, but he also loved to drink and party with other adults. His drinking caused him to not think wisely; he would always come home angry because he felt guilty for spending the family's money on beer and enjoying the party life. He was very short and rude with my mother and usually overreacted harshly to our childish ways.
Being a child, I did not understand why my father was easily angered. I did not know that unless he sought strength from Yahweh (God), he was too weak to stop what he was doing. He could only be and act who he was on the inside.
I found myself wishing that my father was dead and imagining a happy life without him. As a child, I decided that I did not like him, and I did not want to like him. If he tried to do anything nice, I felt that he didn't really mean it, and I did not respond in love toward him. I had no love for him so I could not help him to reach out for Yahweh to get the help he needed.
By the time I became a teenager my father quit drinking; however, he was still quick tempered and I was afraid of him. I loved Yahweh, but my hate grew as I went into adulthood. All I could remember about my father was a few memories of his unfairness, impatience, and quick temper. I could not remember all the good and sweet things he had done for me because the hatred in my heart shielded me from his love.
After I married I began to realize how the hate I carried inside me affected my relationship with my own family. I, too, was quick tempered. One day, I was discussing this with my sister and she advised me to sit down and write all the good things I could remember about Dad when I was a child. To my amazement, I could not remember any. There were only a few memories in my mind of him, and they were of him being angry over one thing or another. When he was angry, he became physically abusive and loud and that was all I could remember.
My sisters and I talked about the things we had done in the five years we lived in California, which was the time that we had developed much of our hate. We remembered going to Knotts Berry Farm twice, San Diego Zoo three times, Pacific Ocean Park twice, and sight seeing up in the mountains several times. We had fun and couldn’t remember any upsetting experiences along the way. Daddy drove but was invisible to me. Each time, he took the whole day to be with his wife and six children and all the chaos and expense that comes with children.
I began to analyze my hate and bring to my memory all the reasons why I hated Dad. I knew I had to have had more involvement with him than just those few bad incidents. When Dad got angry he would hit Mom or any one of us kids without reason and say hurtful things to us. We were never hurt so bad that we had to see a doctor, but the emotional damage we received would take the supernatural power of the Holy Spirit to heal.
The time had come for me to look through my father’s eyes, feel with his heart, and think accordingly. I began to think of a young man raised in a family with all boys. He was abused by his father, and he watched him abuse his mother. His father was a very self-centered man that had no respect for his wife.
I think of Dad leaving home to join the Marines to fight in World War II. I can just hear it being drilled into him, just like all soldiers, to be aggressive and demanding against their enemies, reinforcing what his father had pounded into him as a child.
I cannot even imagine his pain when he learned that his baby daughter by his first wife had died, or the sorrow and helplessness that he must have felt when he was told that his son would not live long because he had cerebral palsy. In those days, men were taught that they should not cry. Then how was he to release his sorrow and pain? He did not have eyes to see his Heavenly Father nor an appetite for his ways. He was not drawn to him so he could be delivered from his sorrow and weaknesses.
It does not surprise me that Dad's first marriage at age sixteen did not last, but I’m sure it had to be a disappointment to him. No doubt it set the stage for the next marriage to my mother. I’m sure he did not plan to make the same mistakes twice, but I’m just as sure that he had not matured enough mentally to know what to do except to live, act, and learn as he went.
I can visualize Dad sitting on his bunk overseas when he got his letter from Mom telling him his daughter was born without him being there. After finally getting home over a year later, he finds his daughter distant and jealous of him.
While Dad worked in the Arizona mines, he lost his youngest brother when the mine caved in on him. Drinking and strange friends comforted him while Mom stayed home with his sick son (by his first wife) and a daughter that resented him. But Mom still loved the man she married and other children were born.
I don’t even try to imagine the pain when their third child died at a month, the little wood box made by their neighbor to burry the baby in, the rock that a friend carved G. G. (for Gloria Garner) on to put on her grave, and the days that followed. There could be no greater pain. I, in my weakness and ignorance, could not begin to tell anyone how to cover or cope with their pain. I am thankful that my Mother was matured enough that her love and care got them through in spite of Dad's inability to cope in a sensible manner. Not long after Gloria's death my Dad's son by his first marriage died. How do people mend? I do hope I could have been as strong as my mother, but who am I to pass judgment upon the lost and miserable with whom our Savior came to save?
After Mom had us five little girls, she was put into a TB sanitarium because she was hemorrhaging in her lungs. Dad, in his lost and confused world, had to figure out what to do with us. It had to break his heart to separate each of us by putting us into homes of family and friends for an indefinite period of time. Mom said he came to her at the hospital and just wept.
Though Mom was not well, after two months Dad picked her up and they gathered us all together. Oh, what joy and fear had to be running through his soul; one man feeling the full responsibility of so many lives.
Mom found the Lord and soon after Dad gave his life to the Lord. The Lord blessed them with twin boys after Dad had had six girls. There were weeks of stress while the twins struggled to live. Though they did live and become ministers the worry was great and I am sure my Dad felt the strain of it all.
After moving several times and going from job to job, Dad went back to work in the Arizona copper mines. The pull of the world was too hard to resist and his bitterness, grief, and resentment grew deep so he ventured away from the Lord and away from Christian influence. Anger vented every chance it got, and we didn’t help matters because we didn’t know how to reach out for him. We, too, needed the supernatural power of the Holy Spirit to deliver us from our weaknesses and ignorance.
During the time we lived in Arizona, Dad lost his oldest brother to cancer, leaving six children behind. Dad had the responsibility of his own six children and couldn’t be any financial help for them.
Dad had a sixth grade education, good health and was a good worker. He didn’t usually make much, but we had what we really needed. Most times it was by the wisdom of my Mother that we survived. Dad did what he did best; he worked and worked. I often wonder what would have happened to my dad if it weren’t for the love of my mother carrying him along life’s journey. She is a perfect example of dedication to marriage vows. I am reminded though that if she hadn’t joined herself to the Lord she could have never accomplished such a task.
I had a child of my own, problems of my own, fears, bitterness, and anger. I had given my heart to the Lord when I was six. I loved righteousness even though I did not always know how to act in righteousness. I loved going to church, learning of Yahweh, and teaching children. My unsaved husband had promised to stay in church and share my passion for the Lord, but it was only words. I feared my husband would be like my father and my baby was feeling the stress of my fear and anger. One day he was crying and crying, my nerves were upset and my anger came out toward him. I was screaming at him, telling him to shut up while I was bouncing him on his back against the bed. While I was screaming at him a voice in my head was saying, "Stop, stop, stop." I stopped. I knew I needed help. My anger was being reinforced by an angry spirit other than my own angry spirit—I was out of control and my baby's life was at risk.
I left my baby with a sitter and went to the empty church; there, I went into a little storage room and knelt down to pray for my desperately needed deliverance. While on my knees, I felt myself lifted up in my spirit so strongly that I thought that I was literally lifted up. When I left that room that day, I felt like I had literally lost weight. I was never the same in my temperament anymore. Yahweh had delivered me from that intruding temperamental spirit and began teaching me how to use his weapons of warfare in the place of the temper that I once thought I needed to fight my battles.
After raising four sons and one daughter of my own, I don’t wonder how Dad must have felt having four teenage girls in the house. Teens and parents are stressed under the best circumstances; no wonder he was a stranger in his own home.
I’m sorry his children could not see his "need" and reach out to him, no child could have. But I’m glad that as an adult I can let go of the resentment I carried over his inability to cope with a hard and unfair life. It was a long hard journey for us all, but with the Lord's help we were victorious!