Psalm 103:13
Just as a father has compassion on his children, So the Lord has compassion on those who fear Him.
My life was a mess. Addiction had made me unreasonable and often gave me delusions of grandeur. I shared my small efficiency apartment on the second floor of a rundown apartment complex with more cockroaches than I could count. Most of the time my cupboards were bare. I had quit my job as a deckhand mostly because I was just sick of the whole thing. My last paycheck gave me enough for rent and a small amount of food. My standard meal was a pizza mix that I would put together during commercials of whatever comedies, talk shows and such were on television. When I quit my job, I figured it would be easy enough to get another one. But now the rent was coming due, and I had zero wiggle room. I had a handful of friends, but most people just let me to myself. Most days I was moody and always very selfish. Each day I would look at my phone and will it to ring with a call from some random business that had randomly dialed my seven digits and then randomly offer me a job. In hindsight that was not ever going to be an effective strategy.
My dream was to be a writer and my half-written book stood in a pile of papers next to my typewriter. I also wrote essays. Out of bitterness most of my essays were hate letters to and about God. My whole being despised the whole idea of a Creator, of need for a Savior and the idea of God as Father was a joke. I had showered and changed clothes when the phone rang. Was this my miracle job? I prayed a prayer to the God that I did not believe in. The voice on the other line was a friend from the riverboat. She mentioned that she and some others were going to the bar down by the racetrack and wondered if I wanted to join them. I did a quick calculation of my funds and knew that logic said no. But I said yes before I even realized it. Why not, I was already clean.
The next morning I woke up with only about a week left before the rent was due. I was in my bathroom on the floor covered in vomit. For several minutes I tried to remember how I got there. Then I smiled because at least I knew where I was. I took some time to clean up my mess. While pondering the hopelessness of my life I made my daily pizza. Watching TV while eating I ran through my options. I knew that I was in trouble. My best option was to call home and ask if I could stay there. The problem is that I had been a real butt when I left and had called my mom many mean names. Over the seven or so months in the apartment we had mended our relationship just a bit but would they take me back? I prayed again to a God I did not believe in. I picked up the phone and started dialing. Just for good measure before I dialed the last digit I threw out another prayer, “Let me dad answer the phone. I was less of a butt to him.” Pressing the last digit I waited, the phone rang, I waited. Join us next week as I continue this story.
