Just Love ‘Em!
Grandchildren have got to be the best thing that has ever happened to me. It is a love that is so different than mother-child love. Just as deep, just as wide, but different.
My daughter and her husband have one daughter. She is a little ball of love and giggles and attitude. When I see her I just want to melt. I want to sit down and just watch and absorb every moment. I want to celebrate that my role is just to love her. That’s it. Just to love her. So simple. How ridiculous is that?
Just love ‘em – that is so worthy of celebration. So simple.
[pullquote width=”300″ float=”left”]In my Lenten devotional, it strikes me that so much of what I am meditating on has to do, not with the Cross and the Empty Tomb, but with the celebration of life, the life that we have because of all that God did.[/pullquote]Our family was recently blessed with two more grandchildren when my son and his wife adopted two little boys, brothers, from an orphanage in Costa Rica. I was concerned that it might feel different, that my love would be different for these little guys than it is for my granddaughter. But I was so wrong. So beyond wrong. I melt into them just as I do with her. I want to just sit and watch and absorb. (And I get to do that a lot since they don’t speak a lot of English yet, so translation by their parents slows it all down a bit.) I realize my role is the same. Just to love ‘em. I am up to that challenge.
Just love ‘em – that is so worthy of celebration. So very simple.
Those words – just love ‘em – are so much bigger than this one single season of my life. My role, as a Christian, is just to love them. And ‘them’ is more than my grands. It’s the people I already love, and the people I really don’t care for, and it’s the people that annoy, and it’s the people I usually overlook. It’s the people. That’s who we are to love. The people.
And to love BIG, like God loves us.
Easter is this month. In my Lenten devotional, it strikes me that so much of what I am meditating on has to do, not with the Cross and the Empty Tomb, but with the celebration of life, the life that we have because of all that God did. The scope is bigger than one weekend of events. All of the history that led up to it. All of the teaching that Jesus did to upturn the unloving of the day. All of the pain that Jesus endured.
I have come to believe that Easter is God’s best-planned, calculated, strategic, escapade of escape, motivated by one thing. Love.
Just love ‘em. And then do whatever you can do to show ‘em.
Can we do any less than he did for us?
In this season of my life, and in this season of Easter celebration, I want to remember that our role is always and forever to ‘just love ‘em.’ So simple we miss it. So simple we have no excuse not to.
Enjoy.
- Our Future’s Kingdom View - July 29, 2020
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“I have come to believe that Easter is God’s best-planned, calculated, strategic, escapade of escape, motivated by one thing. Love.”
Yes. Planned from the very beginning. He loved us even when we are unlovable. Sometimes it’s just so unbelievable!
Becky – it is unbelievable to me sometimes, too! And even when we remain unlovable sometimes, he still loves us. Just like we love our grands, only better and bigger. Ah-mazing!
Pray for me…I’m a wee bit jealous of all you grammies out there.
Wait. That wasn’t the point of your post. ?
Yes. Just love ’em. We cannot ever outlove Jesus, & he loves us so well, even on those days when we’re not being so lovable. There’s a whole lotta freedom in knowing exactly what my role is.
Gretchen – grands are the best payback for all that we struggle with as parents! Worth every sleepless night, screaming fit, curfew enforcing agony, crying jag moments in raising them!!!! And yes, freedom is in knowing that role!
Love that reminder… Love is the answer to every question, every challenge, every person. Congrats on your new grands! Thank you!
Our oldest daughter got married last May so I’m starting to get a little excited about grandbabies some day. Especially when people say how AWESOME they are:)
“Just love ’em.” Every one. Because He does and He asks us to do the same. It’s not always easy, but it’s our responsibility right?. My heart breaks when I see believers being hateful to others, people they know and people they don’t. If we don’t show love, why would anyone want to know the reason for the hope that we have?
Thanks for this reminder!
With all the political shenanigans going on right now I find myself having a hard time loving ALL of ’em. But it’s not my choice. *sigh* I really need to remember this. (And the thought of grandbabies someday is what keeps me going!)