JUL, AUG, SEP 2024 VOLUME 17 Issue 3
42 years old, I’d all but given up hope that the day would come, but it finally did.
Just a year and a half ago I had the amazing gift of meeting my biological dad. Seven years earlier, with not so much as a name, I decided to start my DNA journey. With full enthusiasm, I spit into that 23 and Me tube fully expecting to solve the lifetime mystery of “Who’s Your Daddy?” in no time. The results came back quickly. I finally had answers to questions that I’d always wondered, like what my nationality was. I’m 50% British Irish. I knew it! My dad must be Irish. That explains my pale skin and blue eyes.​​
While it was exciting finally learning my true heritage, the big question was yet to be answered. Who was my father? I started combing through the 1500 plus matches. Eventually I had other close family members do the test with me. I tested on other sites like Ancestry. This expanded my search to thousands of relatives. Unfortunately, many were just distant cousins. Most of them were from my mother’s side. The few that were from my father’s side were so distant that even the best genealogist would have trouble assembling a family tree. It was like trying to find a needle in a haystack.
by Amanda Delaune
In the early days of my search, I messaged what seemed like every paternal relative just trying to find some clues to the identity of my father. I questioned my mother over and over about the identity of my father. One name that she’d give me was Michael Bolton. The only Michael Bolton that I knew of was a famous musician. I do write and sing, so I mean it’s not entirely out of the realm of possibilities that my dad could be a musician. It turns out that she was just two letters off in his name. My biological father’s name is Michael Boland, so close.
The months of searching turned into years. There once was a time when I would visit 23 and Me daily, but as the years progressed the enthusiasm that I once had faded. I’d given up on ever finding my father. I’d finally accepted that I’d likely never meet him, and I had to be okay with that. The emotional wall went up, and I just accepted that Jesus was the only father that I’d ever know. And I was okay with that.
Fast forward to October 2022. After a long time of not searching, I decided that I’d log back in to 23 and Me and found that I finally had a close paternal match. Based on our shared DNA, I assumed that this match was likely my father’s second cousin. You’d think I’d immediately message her, but I didn’t. I just went on about my day. Any other time, I would have been on cloud nine and rushing to message this cousin just trying to find out who my father was. I was so close, but there was no hurry.
What changed? Where had my desperation gone? I’d been in a healing season for the prior two years and for the first time in my life I actually felt like I was whole. The missing piece that I had felt my whole life and tried to fill with people, I’d finally filled with Jesus. Two months passed before I eventually decided to message this cousin. I really had no expectations that it would lead to me meeting my father. I was prepared for rejection if I did end up meeting him. Not only did this cousin help me meet my father, but he also didn’t reject me. In fact, he accepted me and my family so unconditionally and so quickly that it scared me a bit at first. He was kind and generous, and he couldn’t wait to meet us. I seemed to need way more time to process than he did.
After three months of talking nearly every day, I finally met my dad. It was a great visit. Over the last year and a half, my dad and I have continued to talk and our relationship has grown. Our relationship is better than I could have hoped for.
When I first heard that this issue of Lifesigns Magazine was on dreams being fulfilled, I automatically went to my most recent dream being fulfilled: publishing a successful children’s book. I thought I’d write about that. Then, I thought about the other dreams that I have had fulfilled over the years, like God healing my marriage. As I remembered these dreams, I was brought back to my one and only prophetic word that I have ever received at the RLM Worship & Prophetic Conference, and it was about dreams. We’ve been going to the conference for probably as long as they have been having it. In that time, I’ve only ever been given one word. About a year ago, I found a DVD from that prophetic conference. It was dated April 4, 2010. It was freshly sealed, never opened. The only thing that I remembered about that word was that God was looking at me through a telescope. I decided it was time to watch it. As I watched it, I was excited to hear what the prophet had to say and if any of the word had actually come to pass. This is what he said. “I saw a picture. I saw the Father looking through a telescope right at you. I felt like what He was saying is He’s focused on you. He sees you, that you’re not one among many, but you’re you. He sees your value. He sees your significance. And then I heard this word: breakthrough. That there’s a breakthrough. Several of the words have been about long, delayed things. I feel like there’s some dreams in your heart that have been long delayed. The Bible says, ‘Hope delayed makes the heart sick,’ and you know what it is to have that heart sickness. But, the Lord’s freeing you from that. He’s the fulfiller of dreams, and His eyes are on you. There’s not a single dream in your heart that He does not see.”
I hesitated including the full prophetic word, but I felt like maybe this word was never meant just for me but for others as well. Brother Allen is always saying if you hear a word and you want it, then receive it. Even though I heard this word fourteen years ago and then again a year ago, it didn’t really hit me until today: God sees me. God knew the dreams that I had deep down in my heart about my book, about meeting my father, and about a healthy family. In His perfect timing, He has fulfilled each and every one of those dreams. I still have many unfulfilled dreams, but I am confident that the Father sees me, and that in His perfect timing He will fulfill every one of those dreams.
I’ll end with this scripture from 2 Peter 3:9 in the Amplified version. “The Lord does not delay [as though He were unable to act] and is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is [extraordinarily] patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.” I know this scripture is talking about the return of Jesus, but I believe this applies to all aspects of our lives. Looking back over all the delayed dreams, I can clearly see that God’s sovereign hand was in all of it, even down to the dream of meeting my dad taking 42 years to be fulfilled. What if our dreams are delayed because God’s still working on the people that He needs to help fulfill them? I know that during my process He was working out things in my heart and life as well as in the lives of the others that were involved. I truly believe, had I met my dad any sooner or published my book any sooner, that it would not have worked out as well. Hope deferred does make the heart sick, but it also points us towards the Great Physician, the only one who can ever truly heal us.
Be encouraged that He sees you, too. He’s just working out the details in the waiting. Keep on dreaming on.