My daughter has begun spontaneously expressing affection. “Mommy, I love you,” she says as she cocks her little head to one side, smiles and bats her eyes. I will admit that it makes my heart melt. But it also taught me something new about my relationships with God. My daughter’s expression of affection is adorable, but she is really too young to know what love means. She says she loves me because I take care of her, because I give her things she wants and needs, and because she knows I like to hear it.
This is how many of us start our relationships with God, and if we aren’t careful it can remain that way. We love God because he takes care of us and gives us nice things. But truthfully, is that the kind of conditional love I want from my daughter? No. But I realize that as she gets older, she will develop a deeper love for her father and me that is based on more than just the nice things we give her.
I love her just because she exists. But at age two she can’t comprehend that kind of deep unconditional love. It’s even more amazing to me to think that I have a heavenly Father who loves me just because I exist, in a deeper and more sacrificial way than even my love for my daughter. I realize now how God must feel when I say I love him. He probably smiles to himself and thinks
“Thank you, my child, I appreciate the sentiment. But I hope that someday you will know better what it is you are really saying.”
If I want to grow up and not remain a toddler level Christian, I need to learn to love God for who he is, not just for what he does. As an adult, I feel like I have finally gotten to that point with my own human parents, but I know it will be a while before I can reach that level with God. But I will continue to strive for it. In the mean time, I will tell my daughter I love her and enjoy hearing her say it back.
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