Key Truths: God Loves our Kids
Agape Love
This one seems like the easiest of the Key Truths I’ve been walking us through the last few weeks. Or at least the most talked about. But it being the easiest, doesn’t change the depth and importance of this foundational truth.
Love is easy to accept, most of the time because it is something that gets a lot of focus in our culture.
But there is a lot about love that our humanity skews and makes us doubt God’s love for us.
That’s why communicating God’s definition of love is so important. God lays out what his love is like so perfectly in 1 Corinthians 13:4-8
Most Christians are familiar with this verse, and can often rattle the words off in fast succession, but if we slowly read through the verse, it is eye opening.
Patient- bearing provocation, annoyance, delay, hardship, pain, etc., with fortitude and calm and without complaint, anger.
Kind- of a good or benevolent nature or disposition
Humble- not proud or arrogant; modest
Not Easily Angered- not showing or feeling nervousness, anger, or other strong emotions.
Selfless- concerned more with the needs and wishes of others than with one's own; unselfish.
Hopeful- feeling or inspiring optimism about a future event.
Encouraging- giving someone support or confidence
Persistent-continuing firmly or obstinately in a course of action in spite of difficulty or opposition.
That is a lot to be all the time. And that is who God is and more.
Along with teaching my kids what the biblical definition of love is, I try to working in little mom-isms, like only God loves you more than me, and there is nothing our kids can do the make God not love them.
But because our minds are limited, we often associate our experiences with love and project them on God. Especially our kids. It is very common to make a correlation between how our parents show us love is the same way God loves us. It is an unfortunate correlation but one to be aware of as parents.
There is no way to love our kids as much or as perfectly as God. But it is good to know that we often are a representative of God’s love, which is quite humbling. This always convicts me to ask for forgiveness, and communicate to my kids that I can’t do everything perfectly, as God does.
Reminding our kids what perfect love is crucial to their self-esteem and faith.
Philip Yancy puts it this way, “…there is nothing we can do to make God love us more…and there is nothing we can do to make God love us less.”
I want my kids to have this kind of security when it comes to God’s love. To have no doubt what love looks like, so that when girls enter the picture they have a firm picture of true love.