You Look Just Like Your Father

“You look just like your father.” “You have the same smile as him.” “You look nothing like your mother.” “You’re your father’s alright.” Dark eyes. Melanated skin. Kinky coily hair that won’t let you comb it without at least 2 cups of conditioner on deck. This has been the reality that I’ve ran away from for most of my life. Of course like any other black girl that grew up in America - I was convinced that what I looked like was only a canvas that needed to be altered and changed with perms, skin bleaching products and anything else I saw in Claire’s or a Mary-Kate and Ashley movie.

I’ve constantly fought against the truth that I looked like my father - that I was him. Hearing every similarity between him and I made me cringe, wince and then quickly change the subject or just laugh awkwardly. And it didn’t help that my father was a source of physical and verbal abuse, tension and dysfunction in my childhood home for 24 years of my life.

Because of that, I wanted nothing to do with my father which turned into not wanting anything to do with my reflection or anything that looked similar. But, what’s funny about this is how easily the sin we experience trickles into every part of our lives. Sin never exists in a vacuum whether it’s someone else’s sin or your own - it will always affect you and those around you internally and externally. Look at the story of the fall, in Genesis 3:16-19 (CSB), Adam and Eve’s sin caused us all to experience the consequences of their choices. My father’s brokenness not only broke our relationship, but also my perception of what a black man’s role is as my peer, within the family dynamic, and the world.

With each belligerent encounter with my father, my resolve that black men were useless and only brought pain felt justified. And the self-righteousness that birthed itself while in that time only fed off of all the memes and jokes that black men were good for nothing unless they brought something tangible to the table - money, gifts, sex, etc.

For years I chose to sit in the truth of my experience rather than look to the boundless truth and character of God. Anytime I experienced love or even friendliness from black men, I assumed it came with an ulterior motive. I thought of caring, loving black men as lightning - it could never strike twice especially in the same location. It has only been a few years since I’ve paid attention to the divine design that God has revealed in black men. But it had to start with me.

The restoration and renewal of my perspective on black men depended on my self-love journey. For me, in order to see the beauty and God’s immaculate nature in black men, I needed to come to terms with the fact that everything that I am came from the love of a black man no matter how brief that love was. I am a product of a black man, complete with his brokenness, his beauty, his passion and the opportunity to experience overwhelming grace for it all. God made me and every black man that I encounter in the imago dei - image bearers of God (Genesis 1:26 CSB). 

This means that I have the privilege to encounter God’s character with every black man in my life and since then each encounter has revealed more about myself than it has about them.

The distrust, impatient and merciless wrath that I’ve built up against my father has found its way into my relationships, romantic and platonic alike. I find myself less gracious towards black men because of the small glimpses that I see of my father. However, it’s bigger than that. Each time I allow myself to dwell in the truth of my experience, I’ve become a participant in the agenda to reinforce the negative stereotypes that black men are not out here handling their business, loving their women, uplifting their communities, raising their children- all the while navigating a world that seeks to take them out because of a mere glance as though it’s the 1960’s.

By God’s grace, I’ve been able to see the other side of my personal truth and experience the unique structure of black men. I’ve seen the sacrificial love that they have. I’ve been uplifted and encouraged, challenged and pushed when I avoid them and all in all, I’ve seen the many ways God shows his love through them.

Thanks to my first father, my heavenly Father who continues to shape, love, prune and chasten me constantly. I am able to recognize the faults in my perception and readjust my thinking. However, I ask for grace as I continue to actively deconstruct the truth of my experience as those walls have been established for years. Rome wasn’t built in a day and neither were these walls, but as God continues to show his glory through his creation, I look forward to walking in that freedom soon.