July 13

“When a troubled, frightened child tells his mother of his wrong doings and asks for her sympathy and help, how ready in the mother’s ear to listen and her heart to devise ways to help.  Suppose the trouble has been all the child’s fault; none the less is the mother willing and eager to help him.”  Hannah Whitall Smith, God is Enough, 7/12

Hannah often uses mother-child illustrations to give us a picture of God’s love.  It’s made me think about my own adult sons.  When they were little I was able to teach them many things and I found great gratification in that.  But then they entered their teenage years.  Anyone who has raised children knows what I’m referring to--the know-it all years.  Now that they are young adults I am finding they come to me often for my advice.  I am once again a teacher in their lives.  This is a wonderful example of what it like with God.  I never wanted to stop teaching my children.  It was they who did not want to be taught.  God waits, with even more patience, for us to return to Him and draw upon His love and grace and wisdom.  He even allows us to stretch our wings and try independence for a while until we see how much better it is to depend on Him.  While we don’t want our grown children to be dependent on us, we do want them to be able to depend on our love for them.  God wants us to depend on His love, too.

“I will instruct you and teach you the way you should go; I will counsel you with my eye upon you.  Be not like a horse or a mule, without understanding, which must be curbed with bit and bridle, else it will not keep with you.”  Psalm 32: 8, 9