I Choose You

I Choose You

I don’t remember exactly when it began, but fairly often I would tell each of my children that if you put all the children on the whole earth in a line, I would choose my kids every time. I wanted them to know that no matter what happened, they could count on me. I would always love them and they could never do anything to cause me to stop loving them.

As parents, when we show our children unconditional love, they learn what it is to be loved. They learn what it means to be part of a family. By loving them we demonstrate God’s love to them.

Just recently, one of my adult children made a decision that caused me some disappointment. If it hasn’t happened to you … it probably will.

No matter the age of our children, they are still our children and absolutely nothing will change the fact that we love them and they belong to us.

In His amazing sovereignty, God has chosen us. Before the foundation of the world, He chose us to be His, and once we are in His family nothing can separate us from His love.

1 Peter 2:9 says, “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.”

Can we disappoint Him? Of course we can, just as our children disappoint us; however, that does not change God’s love for us. Are there consequences for disobedience? Of course there are. But because God never changes, His attributes do not change either.

Therefore when we disappoint God, and we will because we are sinners, He is still able to love us. His desire is for us to come to Him and confess our sin and accept His forgiveness. What an incredible parenting model for us to adhere too. When our children disappoint us, there may be consequences for their behavior. However, it should never change our love for them.

Romans 5:8 says, But God demonstrates His own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

We all sin. I sin. You sin and our children sin. But that doesn’t cancel out God’s forgiveness and love for us. And it should always be a reminder of the type of love we should have for our children.

After I learned of the disappointment with my son, he called me and told me he was sorry for causing me to experience disappointment in regards to his behavior. He asked for forgiveness and I gave it to him. But before we ended our phone conversation the last thing I told him was that I loved him and I would always choose him. He is my son. But more importantly he is God’s.