As I mentioned, I knew there was another lesson tucked into last week’s planting session.
As my daughter and I were planting our flower garden in our front yard, the plants we had bought were being kept in the back. I took my planting tools, and soil to the front with the intention that I’d go back and get the flowers to plant. My daughter insisted that she wanted to do it. Even when I tried to help to bring them to the front, she insisted that it was her job to do that, and she wanted to be the one to bring the flowers around to the front.
I know how persistent she can be, so I left her to do her job. When she had brought most of the plants around, the questions started. She had already made up in her mind that she wanted to go on a bike ride. She also knew that if after doing all the work myself and ended up tired, her bike ride would be delayed until likely after nap time. As my daughter knows how to try to outsmart me, she figured that she’d help so that I wouldn’t be able to complain that I had done it all myself without her help.
And so, as soon as she had done her part, the conversation started, ‘I’m earning my bike ride, right Mom’? And proceeded to ask every time she did a little work. I chuckled to myself. There were a few lessons tucked into her questions. She knows that if I have to do everything myself, that I may get tired and may not be able to do what she wants, so she wanted to earn it. But what she did not know was that I had already mentally decided that she could have a bike ride, even for a few minutes, so I was going to make it happen.
I think that God has some of the similar lessons for us. We think we have to do something to ‘earn’ His love and affection. We don’t have to do all this work for it, we simply need to accept it, and accept that He died for our sins (faith). The Bible states ‘“For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast.” Ephesians 2:8-9 NIV. And then, God has things in store for us, that He will give us when the time is right, we just have to trust Him and His time.
Dear Heavenly Father, we thank you that there is nothing that we have to do to earn your love. Help me to realize that it’s when I’ve accepted your unconditional love that I will then want to be obedient to you, and not because I’m trying to earn your love or grace. Help us to always be intentional about how we look for your love for us because if we are not, we may miss some of your greatest blessings.