The little drummer boy becomes a dad

By Zion Jenkins –

Little Daniel wrote letters to his unseen dad through his grandmother through his entire childhood. Mr. Donnelly never responded to his son.

“I spent all of my childhood trying to win his approval,” Daniel says. “That fear of rejection that I was facing day after day, year after year, month after month, I didn’t realize like what that would do to me. I had to prove myself in every setting. (I felt like) no one could really like me for just me.”

Daniel Donnelly did indeed prove himself. He became the world-renowned drummer Zoro. He’s played with Lenny Kravitz, Bobby Brown, Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons, New Edition, Jody Watley, Philip Bailey of Earth, Wind & Fire, Angie Stone, Vanessa Paradis, Sean Lennon, Lisa Marie Presley and Brian King Joseph.

Eventually, he learned he didn’t need to prove himself to anyone. God accepted him just the way he was/is. And he became the best father and husband he could be, the exact opposite of his father.

“The best part about my story isn’t that I become a world-class drummer,” says Zoro. “It’s that I got to become the father to my children I never had and the husband my mother never found.”

Zoro grew up in Compton, in the Los Angeles area, with six brothers and sisters by a single mom, an immigrant from Mexico. They moved 40 times because they were always getting evicted, he says.

“When I gave my heart to Jesus as a young boy, I’ve been on a journey with him ever since,” he says. “I believe when you walk with God through the season of your life, you get better and you get more revelation and you get healing to a degree.”

The family’s pastor helped them, including buying shoes for young Danny.

The only thing his father gave him was a set of bongos, which led him into rhythm and music. He started as a little drummer boy.

Not having a father made him want to help others who suffer fatherlessness.

“The suffering and rejection is how I know how to love and inspire and encourage other people – because it’s coming from my pain. My purpose came out of the pain. I have been a father spiritually to countless people thousands of people around the world, younger than me, older than me, famous, not famous.

“I have that father’s heart because of what I didn’t have,” Zoro says. “Once the Holy Spirit sort of spoke to me, I’m going to become all the things that you wanted in a father. You’re going to become that for other people. The very thing that you were looking for – which is encouragement, affirmation, love, acceptance – is what I was going to use you to pour into other people.”

Zoro is an ordained minister.

Related content: Lecrae suffered for lack of a father, she was unwanted by her father, healing of the father wound. Source: Sean McDowell.