I wasn’t going to share this story because it’s really personal and vulnerable but the Lord told me that I needed to so here I am. This story begins before I was even born. My mom moved from Honduras to Los Angeles in 1989 in search of a better life for her and her 3 children that she left behind in Honduras. When she was in Los Angeles she met a man named Carlos from Colombia at a party and things happened really quickly that soon she found out she was pregnant with his child. ME. He found out and told her that he wasn’t ready to have kids. His priorities in life were to party and drink as much as he could not raise a child. When I was 2 months old he came to visit me and bought me my first pair of tennis shoes. After that, we never heard from him again until July 2018 which I’ll share with you later so keep reading…
My mom continued with her life and when I was 3 months old she met a man named Jhun from The Philippines who promised her he would take care of me and yes he kept that promise. My mom sat me down and told me this when I was 12 years old outside a Checkers on Buford Hwy in Atlanta. Great memory huh. I always knew something was different cause my sister looked so Filipino and I didn’t lol. Growing up after I knew that my biological dad left me was very emotional and hard to deal with. Many times I would lock myself in my room and cry to sleep just wanting to know more about this man named Carlos. The enemy always used moments when my dad Jhun and I would disagree and have arguments to remind me that my biological dad didn’t want me in his life and as a teenager, I believed it. I struggled with a lot of inner depression throughout middle and high school but one day the Lord was faithful.
I was at a youth camp in Florida and they did an altar call for people who had been struggling with depression. As they were praying for us a man walked up to me and told me that the Lord told him that I was struggling with the father’s love. WOW. He continued to reveal my struggles and said that I had a man that left me but that wasn’t my father. He continued and said that the man in my life right now has provided for me but that I wasn’t feeling the father’s true love. Then he said that I needed to release my expectations of a father’s love to the eternal father Jesus. He asked me if I was ready to release and as I was standing there balling my eyes out I said yes. After that, we began to declare the word release over and over and the more I yelled it the more freedom the Holy Spirit was giving me. I began to speak in tongues for the first time and my body entered into a freeze that I couldn’t control. I dropped to my knees and cried uncontrollably for about an hour and I felt the Lord just place His arms around me. It was then when I truly experience the father’s love! My relationship with my dad Jhun began to flourish and I love him with every fiber in my being. He loves me and has sacrificed so much for me even though I’m not of his blood. Family isn’t always blood. It’s the people in your life who want you in theirs.
Fast forward to years later. In 2018 my biological dad sent me a message on Facebook asking me to forgive him. He had also decided that he didn’t want any relationship with me to honor my dad Jhun. It was hard and a wave of anger began to grow inside of me. I didn’t understand why he would reach out to me. See the thing is that I thought I was fully healed but I was missing such an important part in the healing process. FORGIVENESS. I had to forgive to truly be healed and so I began my journey of forgiving him which took over a year. During this time I was also ready to commit to what God had for me on The World Race. I knew that I wanted a route with Colombia in it so I picked Unscripted which had Colombia at the end in November.
January came and I launched asking the Lord to allow me to forgive this man who left me and didn’t want anything with me. In August when we were in Spain our coaches Bruce and Shay walked us through individual healing prayers with the Lord. It was then when I was able to see that Jesus was always there for me when I was struggling with the father’s love and that he never abandoned me. I was able to forgive and surrender my relationship with my biological dad to Jesus. I was able to take ownership and pride in who God made me to be. He’s my father and I’m his son. GOD LOVES US SO MUCH AND HE’S SUCH A GOOD GOOD FATHER. So yeah November came and I was able to celebrate my 26th birthday in Colombia my birth dad’s country. I was able to see and love the people in front of me knowing that they form part of my who I am. I’m half Colombian and I’m still learning to take pride in that as much as I’m proud of being half Honduran. Have you experienced the Fathers love? Have you been healed? Take some time to think and ask the Lord what the Fathers love truly means.
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