Reckless

I'm going to revisit a few topics today and tie them together in a way that has been important to me.

I am very much an advocate of teaching children essentially from birth who God is.  My common answer to people in this area is: "They cannot serve Someone they don't love.  They cannot love Someone they don't know." This is a very important thing to me.  I watch young people fall away from the faith of their childhood all the time.  There are obviously many reasons for this, but having taught many age groups with the church prescribed material, I can say that there is not a strong emphasis on teaching the character of God.

How do we get to know people?  Often we start by learning about them.  This comes from observation, from stories other people tell us about them, from inquiries on our part.  Then we spend time with that person, learning them.  Sometimes, we decide this person is worth loving and pursuing.  So we spend more time with them.  And eventually that turns into a deep and abiding love that means I would do anything for that person, up to and including dying for that person.  That sinful, selfish person who has and will hurt us time and again.  I don't say this as a criticism.  We are hardwired to need other people and to love people.  That is an important part of who we are as humans.  So when I call out the nature of humankind, I am not in any way saying don't love someone, marry them, etc.  I am simply making the point that if we can love a human being who is... well, human, to the point of being willing to die for them and KNOWING we are willing to die for them, why is there even a question as to whether or not I am willing to die for God?

He will never ever hurt me.  He is not selfish.  He is not sinful.  Every painful thing He allows in my life ultimately results in my good and His glory.  So why on earth do we struggle with the question of would I lay it all on the line for Him?  He certainly laid it all on the line for me.

But do we really think of it that way?  Do we really choose to spend time with Him every day as a means to fall more and more in love with Him?  Do we serve Him out of love or out of duty?  Do we recognize that out of His love for us, He put it all out there?  He actually completed the act I hear people contemplate as a maybe.  He DIED for you.  Died.  It doesn't get more heartfelt than that.  And yet people still question whether it's worth it to follow Him to the ends of the earth, whether they have the faith to die for Him.  What a question.  Maybe it's not faith that's at fault here but love.  Do we see our relationships with God as a sacred romance or as a mundane ordinary part of my life.  I can read all the books in the world on the subject.  I can know doctrine and theology like the back of my hand.  But what do these profit me if I don't have love?  Absolutely nothing.

The next time you say you would die for your kids, your spouse, your best friend, consider this: God is your Father, your best friend.  Would you say the same of Him as you say of those imperfect humans you would lay it all on the line for?