November/December 2002
The Prodigal Father
by Sharon R. Haynes
Thanksgiving Day was especially cold, even for northeast Ohio. As my mother and I stood chatting in her front room, I glanced out the window and saw a man in the street, gazing in our direction. He looked frozen, ragged and unsteady. Then I gasped. The man looked like my father. And yes, it was Dad.
The last time I saw him was a Sunday morning in 1967. My brother had to pull Dad's hands from around my neck. I ran from the house. A couple of years later I became a believer in Christ. Receiving forgiveness created a struggle within me to give up the hate I was harboring for my father.
I had heard rumors that Dad was homeless. The street person I saw outside my mother's window was gaunt, and one hand was bloody.
When I went outside, he couldn't explain how he had arrived on this street corner. What was I to do with him? Mom was remarried and probably trying to explain to her husband what was going on out front in the street. I coaxed Dad into my car and took him to Burger King. The turkey and trimmings would have to wait.
After his meal I offered to take Dad to his room. Unable to give me an address, I suggested a local motel. He agreed.
| Dad and I had not talked about the past. He had never asked me to forgive him. And I had not extended forgiveness. He couldn't die -- not yet. |
While he showered, I scrounged a nearby Goodwill Store for a new wardrobe. It was all so strange; this person, once larger than life to me, was now a helpless old man.
I got Dad a room in the county home. After a medical examination, I was informed that he had Huntington's disease. I had never heard of this genetic illness, which devastates the body and then the mind. I was totally unprepared for the realization that I had a 50 percent chance of carrying the gene. The revelation of this family secret caused years of past hurts to bubble to the surface. As much as I wanted to help my father, one thought pounded painfully in my brain, Is he going to hurt me in a new way, and through this disease hurt my children too?
Over the next eight months, Dad and I often had lunch together. It was not easy to communicate beyond the disease or his years of hiding behind veiled truths. Our relationship took on a form of comfort. I could have left it at that, but God's Spirit stirred within me a concern for Dad's soul.
My father was 62, yet tired of living. A veteran of WWII, he was still fighting the war in his head. He saw the enemy in unexpected places. One day he went on a rampage in the county home and assaulted an aide and the manager's wife. The sheriff was called; two deputies arrived. Dad threw one of them over the porch railing while the other was hitting him with a stun gun. It took multiple attempts to subdue my 150-pound father.
When I arrived at the emergency room, three cubicles were occupied -- the injured aide in one, a deputy in another and my father in the last one. I stood there shaking and praying, feeling responsible for what happened. None of this was my fault, but a voice I'd grown up hearing said I should have been there to stop him.
"Fortunately, no one has any critical injuries," the ER nurse informed me. "The aide and deputy will be treated and released. The manager's wife did not need treatment."
"How is my father?" I asked with trembling voice.
"He's very restless so we had to sedate him, but you may go in and stay with him," she stated kindly.
Tentatively, I pulled back the curtain enough to see Dad lying on a gurney. He was stripped from the waist up showing multiple bruises from the stun gun. I walked softly to his side. He twitched and groaned but didn't open his eyes.
"Dad, it's me. I'm here. Everything's going to be all right."
Actually, nothing was right. Everything was out of control, at least out of my control. What was I going to do now? I was so afraid I would fall apart. Yet, seeing the deputy that had subdued my father I approached him to apologize and express my concern.
"That's okay, ma'am. This is just part of our job. Don't you worry about anything."
Dad was taken to a Veteran's Hospital. When I went to visit him, the doctor informed me that he was refusing to eat. They had restrained him and were force-feeding him through a tube. He was very agitated. It had not occurred to me that he could die anytime soon. But now I realized the doctor did not expect Dad to walk out of the hospital. She called one morning.
"Your father does not want to live. Last night he worked his feeding tube up till his lungs partially filled with fluid. He has double pneumonia. We've put him on a respirator. You need to make a decision. Do we keep him on life support or not?"
This seemed so unfair. Dad and I had not talked about the past. He had never asked me to forgive him. And I had not extended forgiveness. He couldn't die -- not yet. He did not know Jesus. I rushed to the hospital, praying all the way.
Lord, give me the grace and strength to do what I must do.
My father was pale and very weak. Pain stabbed my heart. Is this ache for Dad, or me or all the lost possibilities? He looked at me, then turned his heard away.
"Dad, we've never had much of a relationship. There's been a lot of hurt between us, and I don't understand why, but I want you to know that I forgive you."
He nodded, but did not look at me. I said good-bye and left.
As I walked to the car, I knew that any hope I had of ever enjoying a normal father-daughter relationship was dying in that hospital bed.
Lord, I've been obedient to you. I've expressed forgiveness to my father. This is all I have to give. Let it release him from any guilt that he has carried. Send your Spirit now to set my father free.
My sister, Eve, came to town to help me make a decision concerning the life support. We talked, we prayed and we agonized over the unfairness of life. Then we trusted God to lead in the doctor's decision and gave her permission to stop any extreme measures whenever she saw fit.
The next day, Eve and I went to see Dad. We believed this would be our last good-bye. He was too weak to talk, but acknowledged that we were there. Eve and I both felt awkward. Then the doctor arrived, interrupting our discomfort. She asked if we'd like to see a chaplain. We nodded yes, and requested a Protestant chaplain. The doctor returned informing us that the Protestant chaplain was out of the building. Would we see the Catholic chaplain? As I hesitated, remembering Dad's bigotry, Eve said, "yes."
The chaplain approached my father's bedside with an air of confidence, made sure that Dad could hear and understand him, then proceeded to explain the gospel as clearly as I've ever heard.
As he lay restrained in bed, Dad nodded his head in response and listened to the words of Jesus given to him through this chaplain. While we stood amazed, Dad nodded yes to Jesus. That was the day before he died. What was going on in his heart? Only God knows, but I know what was going on in my heart. I had learned to live a deeper life of trust knowing my good and sovereign Lord has everything under control.
Sharon Haynes lives in Ohio.