Week Two, Day Three

God's Word

In the same way your Father in heaven is not willing that any of these little ones should be lost.

Matthew 18:14

People were bringing little children to Jesus to have Him touch them, but the disciples rebuked them. When Jesus saw this, He was indignant. He said to them, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it." And He took the children in His arms, put His hands on them and blessed them.

Mark 10:13-16

Do not be like Cain, who belonged to the evil one and murdered His brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own actions were evil and his brother's were righteous.

1 John 3:1-2

Live It

Okay. Think back for a minute. Waaaayyy back to when you were four. What did you do with your parents that was really fun? Run through the sprinklers? Catch bugs? Play with the neighbor kids?

My six-year-old daughter, Jessica, likes to tell stories, but she's convinced that whatever she says is true. If the girl walked up to you and said, "Did you know that there are pink bears walking on our roof?" she'd be totally convinced that there were actually bears on the roof.

The other day when I got home from work, my creative-thinking, highly imaginative daughter did the weirdest thing. When I walked through the door, my wife said, "Honey, Jessica went to the store to buy pizza and ice cream for dinner." Knowing my daughter, I came back with, "Yeah, cool, She went by herself, huh? Do you think she'll be home soon?" (Okay, I hope you realize that I didn't actually think she went to the store. But when you're a dad, you've got to play along with your kids.)

I spent a few minutes "looking around for her" as I put my book bag away and got myself a soda. I did my best to make it look like I was really looking for her. I talked about how much I wanted pizza and how I couldn't wait for her to get home because I was sooooo hungry.

Jessica does this once in a while, and I never really know where she's hiding. But I do know that when I get close to where she's hiding, I'm going to get it. I'll get a pillow in the face, or I'll get jumped on and attacked. Something will happen. That's the cool part about this game. I know she hasn't really gone to the store, but I don't know what she plans on doing to me when I actually find her.

So I looked and looked. Actually it didn't take too long, because when you're a kid, you can't wait to surprise your daddy. It was all Jessica could do to hold back. Pretty soon I heard her giggling. Then she started laughing out loud. I finally found her hiding behind the couch. She crawled out and leaped onto me, and we both collapsed onto the floor and laughed. When I asked her how the store was, she laughed louder and tried to force-feed me imaginary pizza.

I bet that to God it sometimes looks like we're trying to avoid him. And I bet He looks for us like a parent looking for a child in hiding. When we pray, we're like a child who's leaping out of hiding and landing on God's lap. We see Him. We're amazed. We're glad. Our entire body reacts at the thought of being in the presence of the Creator of the universe. We imagine that we're leaping on His lap. We see ourselves kidding with Him. I think God likes that.

God is waiting for us to leap out of our hiding places, wrap our arms around Him, and hang on with everything we've got. Whatever keeps you from reaching out and hanging onto God is silly and meaningless. God is "walking around your house" and can't wait for you to leap out and get His attention.

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Questions

AskYou Week 2, Day Two.