The Divine Crash

Recently,  my son has hit the stage where he comes up to me and puts his hands up and says “Up daddy up!” He does this because he wants me to pick him up.

However, he is two and initially I wanted to use this as a teaching moment so I started by asking him to say “please.”  After he would say it, I would pick him up give him a high-five and tell him good job and how proud of him I was.

However, I was noticing some unintended consequences to this so I had to stop.

Then it hit me, I was asking him to earn my affection!  By saying I wouldn’t pick him up until he said please it was forcing my son to act right before I loved him.

When I realized this I stopped doing it and now when my son says up I just pick him up and you should see how much it has changed him.  Now he is happier, smiles more, and comes to me more because he knows that he does not have to earn it.

When I force my son to behave a certain way it does not actually show that I love him and it does not actually change his behavior it only shows that he can say the words to get what he wants. If I want my son to know that I actually love him then I should love him no matter how he acts and maybe then his behavior will change.

Maybe this is the same with God? If God loves us regardless of our behaviors or what we say or do then maybe our behavior changes to show how much we love our God?  If this is the case then maybe Jesus really does mean what He says when He says “Come to me and I will give you rest” because we can finally relax now that we don’t have to worry about getting everything exactly right all we have to do is look at Jesus and say “Up! Up!”

Maybe not?  Maybe it isn’t this way with God, and God only loves us if we say the right thing at the right time and in the right way?  I sure hope not, because that thing I said to that driver who ran the stop sign this morning was not good.

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Family by RevBT