God: Our Loving Father

Psalm 5:1
Give ear to my words O Lord, consider my meditation.

Jeremiah 33:3
Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know.

It was not too long ago that I was sitting in a park watching a mother and a child interact, which is always interesting and enlightening. Sometimes there is a lot of playfulness and sometimes there is not. On one particular occasion, I can remember watching a mother with several children, and it just seemed that the children were a total annoyance to this mother. She did not want to be bothered with them. She was always saying, "Go play. Go find something to do. Go be with your brother." She just wanted to get the children out of her hair so she could sit on the park bench and relax. Certainly it is understandable that a mother needs a break, and it probably felt good to her to just sit there for a while. But on the other hand, by constantly pushing the children away she gave evidence to the fact that she really did not want to be concerned with them, at least not at that moment.

On another particular day, I watched a mother and a child interact in the most tender way. The child was coming to talk to the mother about having fallen. There was a scraped knee and a little tear trickling down the cheek. The child walked up to the mother and the mother very tenderly took the child, set the child in her lap, kissed the knee, and brushed away the tears. The kiss probably didn't do a whole lot towards healing the knee, but it sure did help the spirits of that wounded child. There was tender caring interaction, and the mother listened carefully to what the child's need was atthat point in time. A need for a hug, reassurance, and just tender care.

Some mothers seem to be more prone to that type of tenderness than others, and they just find it easy to care for their children. We do not often think of God as a mother, but yet the scriptures tell us that He wants to be all that we need Him to be, whether father or mother. In Psalm 5:1, David cried out, "Give ear to my words, O Lord, consider my meditation." God the Father did just that. He had the tender nurturing care for David like a mother would have.

David wrote that Psalm at a time when he was being threatened by his enemies, and we know that he had a lot of problems. Yet, despite those problems, he was crying to God. And God, like a tender caring mother, heard what the need was and gave him a reassuring hug, an emotional hug, a spiritual hug, and helped him out of his difficulty.

Sometimes you might feel like God does not hear you when you cry, but His word assures us that He does. Jeremiah 33:3 says, "Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you don't know." I would encourage you in those times when you are feeling despairing and despondent to call to God. Do not base your answer on feeling, but on the fact that His word says "call and I will hear." Trust Him to hear and He will. Let Him be both father and mother.

By Dr. Ann Shorb

Find out more about Christian counseling.

Related Articles and Devotionals:
God Never Sleeps
God Cares for Us
Find Peace in God's Care
We are Precious in His Sight

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