I was about to head outside to mow when I realized I couldn’t find my little girl. She had been reprimanded not long before. I checked the usual places – her bed, the corner of our bedroom, underneath the blanket.
It was the neatly closed closet doors that gave her away.
I sat with her on the floor of the closet, longing to be wise. Her tender little girl heart was still stinging from getting in trouble.
So I told her about another little girl, a little redheaded girl, who pulled the handbrake while her dad was driving up a hill. He spoke quite sternly that day.
That’s when she crawled into my lap.
It is most often my weaknesses and mistakes that help others. It is my own broken understanding of the struggles of human nature that help me empathize and teach.
As a little girl (and to this day), I never doubted my dad’s love for me. But I also knew that because he loved me, he would discipline me when I needed it.
I cried that long ago day on the hill in the car. But I also learned not to pull the handbrake! And I knew I could trust his corrections as well as his love.
The same is even truer of my heavenly father. There are times he must speak sternly to my stubborn heart. There are consequences I must face. And there are lessons – hard lessons – I must endure. But even so, I can trust his goodness and know that He loves me, and rest in the assurance that I am his.
“My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord,
nor be weary when reproved by him.
For the Lord disciplines the one he loves,
and chastises every son whom he receives.” ~ Hebrews 12:5-6
Photo by Julian Hochgesang on Unsplash
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