"So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good gifts to those who ask him." -Matthew 7:11
If we think of ourselves as men and women who do both good and bad things, then we fail to understand our relationship to God. The fact is that apart from God granting us grace and faith in Him, we can do no good deeds. A man may do something with a good effect, such as helping the poor or saving a life, but although these things outwardly conform to God's will, inwardly the heart that does anything without acknowledging God's sovereignty is acting in rebellion to its created purpose, and thus all actions are sinful, whatever good effect may result from them. Still, even to think of ourselves as men and women who do evil fails to grasp our position before God, because as we stand before God, we are not men and women at all, nor are we children; we are infants, dependent upon Him in every respect for our life, unable to grasp the understanding and reason that is His. This being the case, why does He care for such infantile, wicked creatures?
The reason behind His love and grace I cannot explain, except to say, as Scripture does, that His ways are higher than ours and beyond finding out. But an illustration came to me this morning which was useful to me in considering how incredible and true the love of God is: I have a daughter who is just one and a half months old. She is dependent upon her mother and myself for everything. She cannot eat, cannot dress herself, cannot keep herself clean or warm, cannot move from place to place unless we carry her. Even communication is beyond her grasp, as her greatest articulation is an inarticulate cry. She is altogether helpless, and if her mother and I were to remove our care from her, it would be her end. This being the case, why should we care for her? What does she provide us? It is all well and good to say that she provides us joy, but she also provides a great deal of work, sleepless nights and days spent entirely providing for her needs, each and every moment. The fact of the matter is, we were happy before she was born, would have continued to be happy without her, and there is nothing that we do not have that she provides for us in any practical sense. Despite this, my wife and I love her with every fiber of our being, would willingly place ourselves in the path of any harm in order to protect her, and begrudge her none of her complete dependence upon us. There is no pain, even unto death, that we would not endure for her sake.
Even this is an imperfect illustration of God’s love for us, for though she does not provide us with any practical benefit, yet she does have the advantage of being altogether adorable. In the midst of her needs, her cries, her spitting up and soiling her garments, the look of recognition in her eyes when she sees us, the smile that parts her lips and the occasional laugh provide a joy that cannot be explained. She is helpless, but she is beautiful all the same. Yet, as beings created in the image of God we possess an imagination that can see and evaluate things that are not reality, but which could be under different circumstances. I can imagine that my daughter is not beautiful, does not smile, does not laugh, does not recognize me. I can imagine that, from her birth, she would scream and cry and bite if I touch her, irrationally fearing and hating me. I can imagine that her disposition toward me is so sour that keeping her clean from her own waste is nearly impossible for the trauma it causes and the fight she puts up. I can imagine that she is unsightly, smelly and violent. And yet, for all of this imagining, there is one thing that I cannot imagine: that I should not love her. I find within myself a predisposition to love this little girl that has nothing to do with how beautiful she is in my eyes or how bright her smile. She is mine, my own offspring, and whether beautiful or homely, bright and happy or dark and violent, I find that I cannot imagine any possibility within my heart except love. Indeed, the only effect that I can conceive were her behavior and disposition altogether different from what it is, is heartbreak. Complete, utter, devastating heartbreak that she would hate me, fear me, thrash and scream and cry at my touch. I could be hurt, but I could not cease to love. And if, in my love and care, that wretched little creature were to collapse in my arms, exhausted, and stop fighting but rest against my chest, I know for certain that my heart would melt within me as surely as it does when my true daughter looks at me and smiles.
This is our condition before God. We are all of us wretched infants, irrationally fighting against God with every aspect of our being, yet He, our Father, cares for us still, provides for us and sustains us. If we cease our fighting against Him, by the grace which He works within us (for, irrational things that we are, we cannot understand or cease our struggle without His giving this grace to us), He will hold us tightly and never, ever let us go. As a parent, He has already placed Himself in harm’s way for our sake, enduring the pain and suffering of the cross, and doing it willingly, as an earthly mother or father would take a bullet for the sake of their child. As a parent, He holds tightly to His children, loving and saving them despite their own actions. Once He has given us His grace in salvation, we are capable of truly doing good, of performing acts that bring joy to the Father’s heart, not because they outwardly align with His will, but because they are in response to His love, and express love back to Him. At that point we have ceased to be wretched, and now, though still infants, are infants in the sense that my daughter lives out every day. We are still dependent, helpless, prone to cry, to soil ourselves and to fuss, but also prone to smile, to laugh and to love. No matter how messy we may become, no matter how much we may cry, no matter the fussing or the fighting, from that point on we are truly God’s own children and offspring, and God will never disown us, never let us go. To think that God would let a child of His leave His care is like suggesting that I, as an earthly parent, would cease caring for my daughter because she became too difficult. To suggest that we ourselves, as “free agents” can, having experienced the salvation of God, then willfully choose to walk away from that salvation is like suggesting that my ceasing to care for my daughter is entirely her own fault. No, she is an infant, and I care for her out of my own love, not in response to her behavior. It is not only an irrational argument to place the responsibility for my care upon her own shoulders, but it is insulting to me as a parent to suggest that I would care for her for any reason except out of the unconditional love that I bear for her within my heart. And so it is with God.
Knowing this, let us cease all fear and fighting, and simply rest against the breast of our Father, knowing that our future, our life, our everything is secure within His loving hands.
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