My Father's proud of me

My hand will sustain her; surely my arm will strengthen her. No enemy will subject her to tribute; no wicked man will oppress her. I will crush her foes before her and strike down her adversaries. My faithful love will be with her, and through my name her horn will be exalted.I will set her hand over the sea, her right hand over the rivers. She will call out to me, 'You are my Father, my God, the Rock my Savior." (Psalm 89:21-26, paraphrased)

Yesterday, my niece Lydia got married to Phil. What an amazing day! I had two revelations. First one was that I absolutely detest public speaking, and if I can help it, I'll never do it again.
Secondly, I realised my Father is proud of me. Trust me, this is not easy to say.

I did not have a good relationship with my dad. He is a good hearted man, but I could not count on him, I could not have in depth heart to heart conversations with him, ask for guidance or protection. For this reason I had to learn from an early age to become "creative" and fend for myself. The hardest lesson I had to learn in my relationship with God, The Father, was to trust He will not leave me when I need Him the most. I was convinced He will, and many times I honestly pushed the boundaries of our relationship intentionally thinking to myself "How about now? Will you leave me now?"

Well, if I thought I am stubborn, God invented the term. I think once He makes up His mind He loves you, you're "stuck" with Him for life. Someone very dear to my heart once told me, she woke up one morning with a massive hangover, and told God "Why can't you just leave me alone to have some fun and enjoy myself like everybody else?" She heard a voice inside herself "Because once a little girl asked me "God, would you like to be my father?" This person told me she completely forgot what she told God when she was a child, but on that morning at the age of 18, she remembered everything perfectly.

How did I get to my second revelation yesterday? It was during the father of the bride's speech. My brother-in-law, Robin, has an amazing relationship with his daughter. Countless times I found myself observing them and telling God "See, Abba, that's what I wanted with my dad". Yesterday, he was telling Lydia how much he loves her, how she was such an amazing daughter to him, never gave him grieve as a father, that she is an inspiring Christian and she makes him so proud to have had her (on a personal note, Lydia is all that:-)
All through the speech, I was sitting next to my husband thinking "Oh, how I wish my father would have said that about me" or that I would have looked at him with the same adoration my niece was looking at her dad. Later on when I wasn't thinking about it anymore, I felt the warmth and love around me again and in my heart it was like a whisper "I am proud of you"
Why would He be proud? He knows I am not the constantly faithful inspiring Christian my niece is. Why would He say that? And then I remembered something I wrote at the back of my Bible a few years ago when I was going through a stage of trying to prove myself to God and in a way earn His approval: "Emma, the fact that you choose to love Me without ever seeing Me, is the greatest proof of love I will ever need from you."
That's why I make Him proud. I choose to love without seeing and touching. I choose to follow without understanding where I'm going. I choose to believe even when I don't get what I want. And that's why you make Him proud as well.

Bat Melech, may Adonai bless her life, keeps saying: "Don't be surprised people fall and abandon God, be surprised when they stand firm." Bible says there is a cloud of witnesses watching us (Hebrews 12:1), there are angels watching us, God is watching us, and they all see every single time one of us chooses to love without seeing, follow without understanding, believe without getting what we want. The Bible says there is joy in heaven when a person turns to God. I believe that's not the only time there is joy in heaven. I believe they rejoice every time we choose to love without seeing, follow without understanding, believe without getting what we want. Because this is so unnatural to us, that it proves the validity of His sacrifice. He sees the fruit of His sacrifice and He is satisfied (Isaiah 53:11a)
That's when we make Him proud.