Can someone help me with this

Last night i received a phone call from my younger sister. She was very upset when she told me that our father had a just had a heart attack. Let me start by saying that he is not my biological father, nor is her hers but we know this man as our dad because we were very young when he and my mom got together. We didn't discover that he wasn't our real dad until we were much older. My youngest sister who is of his blood also called me and was very upset. He has been out of my life for a very long time but has made recent attempts to get back in... I've had trouble with this because he and I have never really seen eye to eye and a lot of my memories of him are painful. He hurt me many times... in many different ways. I heard the news of his heart attack and that he is in pretty bad condition. He is on a medication to try and unblock the arteries but it doesn't seem to be working, he is still 90% blocked. In the case that it just doesn't work he has to have open heart surgery, but he is refusing to get the surgery if it needs done. Now my problem is I've been so angry with him for reasons i wish not to discuss that I'm not really sure how I feel about this. The fact that i don't really scares me. I don't wish that he would die nor do I necessarily want him to, i just am not really sure that i feel anything. And now I'm even more angry at him because with everything that he has put me trough I'm not sure how I feel about his not being well. I mean this is my dad, the only man that i know as my father and I am indecisive about his well being. His refusing to take the surgery just goes to show what kind of stubborn, unreasonable man he really is. My sister's and other family members not to mention the doctors and the nurses are trying desperately to get him to reconsider. My sisters were to young to remember everything that happened to us in our childhood everything he put our mother through but he has won his way back into there hearts and they are torn apart because of this. I on the other had just try to listen to them and be understanding without being judgmental or even sharing my feelings about if for the sake of hurting theirs. When i first heard of the news I wondered so much why I didn't feel anything, why I wasn't sharing in their grief. And now all i feel is anger, can someone please help me understand why i feel this way and if it is okay because i am very confused.

follow your heart

Forgiveness is tough sometimes Raven. Some things seem unforgivable, but where would we be if we weren't forgiven for our errors in judgement or foolish mistakes we've made. The main thing is be there for your sisters and hope the stubborn old fart sees the light.

Agent, although maybe sometimes it may be okay to follow the heart, sometimes we shouldnt at all. I will put up this verse to show you what I mean Agent, I am not trying to bash you in anyway mister agent, just trying to give you a more informative picture. We cannot always follow what simply feels right, we must react in view of truth.

Pro 14:12 There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way to death.

There are things that even professed Christians think to be right, but actually is dead because it is sin.

This is a sensitive situation raven, that I will comment and say that I am indeedly sorry that your father has treated you in this way. Men should never abuse any woman in anyway, but should honor and love them. I do not wish to speak wrongly of your dad and I do not know entirely what he did.

In view of a Christian, You should forgive him and be concerned about him. Although anger may be there, anger may be appropriate towards the idea of falsehood or evil but not against a person. As a Christian we should forgive, because we have been forgiven of much things. If you do know Christ, run to Christ knowing that you are nothing without him and that without him we could never forgive, never do anything worth good because our lives our found in him and only in him. Think of most of meanest person that you have ever known towards you and correlate this with how you have treated God in your life, but he forgave gladly, joyfully even. So in such a way forgive your father.There is no measure to where you shouldnt forgive.Because we all deserve hell, and Christians have recieved what we never deserved, life and joy and happiness in Christ. If it is genuine forgiveness it will change your mindset about the situation and in how you should act in this.

If you havent been forgiven by Christ, there will not be any desire whatsoever to forgive your father and no reason to.

What i am not saying is that if you dont forgive, then your not a Christian.
But forgiveness towards anyone shows that you indeedly have been forgiven by God. Christ should be the reason you forgive him, not simply your father.

currently, it sounds like Your father is at the edge of eternity. I dont know whether or not he is a christian, there is a seriousness to understand.

Col 3:11 Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all.
Col 3:12 Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience,
Col 3:13 bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.
Col 3:14 And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.

I can relate somewhat to what you are saying Raven. My biological father is... well... a deadbeat. He's always mooched off of the woman he's in a relationship with and been completely lazy. He was very abusive to me when I was growing up calling me all kinds of names and physically abusing me ever since I can remember. He didn't spend much time with me and now he has his own family and lives far away. We talk about once a month or so. Mostly small talk. Because he's my biological father I love him but he's really not much of a dad to me period. My step-father is more of a man and father than he will ever be. I feel conflicted at times between loving and hating him. He's never made an attempt to be involved in my life. Never sent child support when he and my Mom split up. The only thing that has made this whole situation easier for me is remembering that he is only human and has just as many flaws and sins as I have. He's totally capable of making his own decisions and being held responsible for them. That doesn't excuse his actions but it does make it easier to release some of the guilt I have in feeling the anger and resentment I have towards him.
I thank God however for healing and for turning even the worst situations around for good. Even though I went through all that with him for the first 12 years of my life, I somehow knew that his path was the wrong one. I've dedicated my life to treating those around me in the opposite way, with kindness and patience. Knowing this, has allowed me to have peace in my heart for what happened and in my relationship with him.

Raven,
I pray that God encourages you for the trial at hand.

I will not comment on anything between you and your father because it is between you, he and God.
I do however understand how it hurts at times, my father wasn't always as loving or caring as perhaps he should have been.

I know that whatever has been done feels unforgiveable, but let go of anger and see what God is telling you.

Take courage, for God is with you, all you must do is call upon his grace.
As He told Paul to do.
"My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me."

God only tests us according to what we are able.

"God be merciful unto you, and bless you; and cause his face to shine upon you; Selah."

Sincerely,
David J. Long

Raven I am so sorry to hear about ur step dad.I promise you I know how you feel.I went through the same thing with a grandparent.The only one I ever had.Pray about it.Let God walk with you through it.Please read my post on coffee shop.It may bring to light some of what you may need to do.Hey Jesus Love's you and so do we her at MsM.I pray for all my clan members daily.I know what I need to put with ,my prayers for you now. God Bless you


MsM
Marn

{MsM} Pvt. Raging Raven wrote:Last night i received a phone call from my younger sister. She was very upset when she told me that our father had a just had a heart attack. Let me start by saying that he is not my biological father, nor is her hers but we know this man as our dad because we were very young when he and my mom got together. We didn't discover that he wasn't our real dad until we were much older. My youngest sister who is of his blood also called me and was very upset. He has been out of my life for a very long time but has made recent attempts to get back in... I've had trouble with this because he and I have never really seen eye to eye and a lot of my memories of him are painful. He hurt me many times... in many different ways. I heard the news of his heart attack and that he is in pretty bad condition. He is on a medication to try and unblock the arteries but it doesn't seem to be working, he is still 90% blocked. In the case that it just doesn't work he has to have open heart surgery, but he is refusing to get the surgery if it needs done. Now my problem is I've been so angry with him for reasons i wish not to discuss that I'm not really sure how I feel about this. The fact that i don't really scares me. I don't wish that he would die nor do I necessarily want him to, i just am not really sure that i feel anything. And now I'm even more angry at him because with everything that he has put me trough I'm not sure how I feel about his not being well. I mean this is my dad, the only man that i know as my father and I am indecisive about his well being. His refusing to take the surgery just goes to show what kind of stubborn, unreasonable man he really is. My sister's and other family members not to mention the doctors and the nurses are trying desperately to get him to reconsider. My sisters were to young to remember everything that happened to us in our childhood everything he put our mother through but he has won his way back into there hearts and they are torn apart because of this. I on the other had just try to listen to them and be understanding without being judgmental or even sharing my feelings about if for the sake of hurting theirs. When i first heard of the news I wondered so much why I didn't feel anything, why I wasn't sharing in their grief. And now all i feel is anger, can someone please help me understand why i feel this way and if it is okay because i am very confused.

Sorry to hear that Raven. I can't really post much since this is kind of a complicated issue but i know god will walk you through this situation if u believe.

Raven, I'm sorry to hear that you are struggling right now. I think it is normal to feel pain, anger, bitterness towards someone who hurts us and it is doubly so when it is a family member. God brought me to a similar conclusion as Rad. I realized that my parents are not perfect and they struggle and do things they shouldn't. This helped me not to be as bitter but my aunt, my mother's older sister who is a christian, talked to me once and told me how my mom had a very difficult childhood. How she had been abused and treated horribly by her father and her mother did very little to prevent it. I realized that my mom was treating me the same way she had been treated. I'm a Christian and my mom isn't so this helped me to sympathize with my mom because I have God she didn't.

My aunt's revelation also reminded me of a verse in Ex. that says, "you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me," Some believe that sin is cyclic and that the sins of the parents are also sins that the children will be tempted by. Whether this is genetic or behavioral I don't know but when I saw that I had similar tendencies as my mother and father I decided the cycle had to stop with me. I was going to do my best to love and not hate, to be compassionate and not abusive. It is hard but I know this is what God wants and He has given us the example of forgiving those who abuse us through His Son who while hanging on a cross said, "Father forgive them."

I have found that forgiveness is not always a one time occurance that I have to continually pray not to feel bitter or respond in kind to hatred. I said it is hard and I have apologized many times to my mother and father because I simply get tired of it and I respond to their anger and abuse. I don't want to behave that way but my buttons get pushed and I say something I shouldn't. But after apologizing I have peace and I continually pray for them because I know they do not have peace. They are not happy with the way are.

Thank you everyone. Forgiveness has never been one of my weak points. Im not one to hold a grunge at all, sometimes i think im too willing to forgive... but now that i say that and after meeting you all im seeing that iv forgotten how much better i feel about myself when i don't have hate in my heart. Lately iv lost trust and faith in people... It's really nice to be in the company of such good people that remind me of the person I want to be. And on the subject of my father, he isn't refusing the surgery.. I guess i was given some false information, but but the situation is still tearing my sisters apart. Which is probably even more sad. Im try to be there for the both of them without getting into the middle of it. it's hard to watch the people you love and care about the most fight like this. I pray that God is with them and can help them resolve there problems.

Yeah Raven that is a pretty tough position to be in and especially with someone that you want to care about or are trying to care about. My heart does go out to you. I dealt with a situation with my sister and another family member and I will use the experience of it to maybe help you because it worked out very well for my sister and the family member. Try to look at the situation from a point of forgiveness firstly because if you harbor bad feelings towards your Dad it will not work no matter what the solution. Then from a point of forgiving make up your mind whether or not you can forgive him of whatever he did to hurt you and that includes what he may have done to others that caused you to be hurt toward him and when you have reached the point that you can forgive him totally then you can gather up the rest of the situation and go forward. Then look at it from a self point of view not to be confused with a selfish point of view but from a self point of view and ask yourself this....If my Dad passes away and I know that in my heart I have forgiven him and put all the junk from the passed behind us would I be able to live with his death and not feel guilty thinking that I could have done something else to better our relationship....Do what you can after you have forgiven him to make things livable for yourself and so that you can deal with what ever fate God has for him without you feeling responsible for things that you did not change between you two. Guilt is a terrible thing to have to deal with and I know because there was a time in my life when I dealt with guilt but I thank God that it was able to be resolved and put to rest. We sometimes cannot control everything that a relationship needs when it comes to mending so do ALL that you can to mend the relationship so that you then become free of any issues within yourself no matter what happens. Who knows, if you are able to forgive your Dad and put your part of the relationship in order then if his fate is to have more time on this earth then maybe he will realize what you have done for the relationship and he will do the same and you two could develop a wonderful relationship full of happiness and love and if it is not his fate and he passes then you dont have to live with any guilt of not doing anything and you can have your peace with it and let God handle the rest of it for you. Hope this helps you Raven, I dont know you very much but reading your post made me hurt for you and for your family and I have prayed for you all. God bless you and your family.

Thank you pun, and yes this does help a lot. I just have a lot of thinking to do. I appreciate your concerns and prayers, it really means a lot to me. I appreciate you all.