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Christian Chronicles, October 1999 - Volume 2, Issue 47

| The Editor's Pen | Perspectives: Pray Without Ceasing | Fruit of the Vine |
| Please Pray For Me | Letter To the Editor | The Lord's (Disciple's) Prayer |
| Childlike In Prayer | Powerless Prayer | Prayer: What's the Deal? |
| And She Prays Her Many Petitions |

The Editor's Pen

Aside from the doctrine of salvation itself, no other has the significance or importance in the Christian experience than the doctrine of prayer. Few doctrines are less understood or correctly applied, though every Christian prays. Some of us pray regularly and some do not, but even among those who do pray regularly, few pray very effectively.

Properly understood and applied, prayer becomes the conduit that turns our attention from earthly concerns to heavenly, and that turns God’s providence into blessing.

In this issue, we shall cover several aspects of prayer in some depth. In the central article, we shall raise and answer the question, "How should I pray?"

Christian Chronicles has dealt with many important issues in our brief history, but no previous issue has carried the responsibility of the Christian to the heights of a single, lowly prayer. As you read this issue, it is our prayer that God will lead you to a new and greater understanding of this vehicle that carries us to a God who hears and loves us.

Perspectives: Pray Without Ceasing

Rejoice always,
pray without ceasing,
in everything give thanks;
for this is the will of God
in Christ Jesus for you.

(1 Th 5:16-18)

Who has time for that? And why would God command us to spend every minute of every waking hour in prayer in the first place? How could we possibly earn our livings or attend to our families? How is it that God expects us to rejoice in tragedy and trial? And why should we be thankful when the devil intervenes in our lives so cruelly? Why should it be God’s will for us to rejoice in suffering and to spend our lives on our knees?

Good questions, ones that touch the heart and mind of every believer occasionally. But we are not without answers to these seeming paradoxes. Let us take them in order.

Who has time for unceasing prayer? No one. And everyone. Why does God command us to spend every waking moment in prayer? He does not. We could not earn our livings or love our fellow man. That is not what the Apostle Paul meant in that brief passage. There is a great difference between unceasing prayer and continuous prayer. Unceasing prayer does not run continuously, but is prayer that is continued throughout our lives. We ought not stop praying when times are good. Similarly, we should not start praying when our backs are pressed firmly against the wall. In that passage, Paul is giving us general instructions for productive and fruitful Christianity, and especially in light of the imminence of the rapture.

Paul had earlier told the church at Philippi that it has been granted to us to suffer on Christ’s behalf. It is a privilege, not a burden. Jesus said that if the world hated Him, it will hate us also. One reason to rejoice and be thankful in times of trouble is that our prayers are often much more fervent in those tough times. Our relationship with God is much closer (though He is never any closer to us than He is all the time). If we pray in times of trouble, we begin to see things in a different light. We begin to seek God’s will and purposes, and He begins to reveal Himself to us in His strength and wisdom. Trials make us grow stronger in faith.

When Paul tells us to pray without ceasing, he is telling us that our lives should be characterized by prayer whether times are good or bad. He is not saying that we should pray continuously, but that we should never cease praying. When we arise in the morning, we should begin our day with prayer. We should pray throughout the day, and we should end our day with prayer. Our God is an ever-present help, and we are privileged to be able to maintain contact with Him daily. But God understands that we have things that we must do that command our attention.

It is easy to remember to pray when we are heavily beset by problems greater than our ability to solve them, but it is also easy to forget to pray when all our hopes and goals are being realized. Let us never cease praying when we are being blessed, even as we also pray fervently sometimes when we are seeking those blessings.

Fruit of the Vine

Witnessing without intercessory prayer for those to whom we minister is about as smart as going through our day without prayer for ourselves. Especially for the lost must we pray. We ask God to prepare the soil into which we plant the seed. Without the conviction that the Holy Spirit alone can provide, no witness will ever be fruitful. We cannot persuade anyone to become a Christian. It isn’t a matter of persuasion, but of conviction. Until the Holy Spirit moves to convict a person of sin (that’s God’s job, not the witness’ job), they won’t be saved.. If you desire to witness to someone, first pray for that person, fervently. Then, wait for God to present the opportunity. He surely will, in His own time and manner. But without intercessory prayer, you are seeking to save the person under your own power, and not by the power of God. Let us remember to pray daily for the souls of the lost, acting as priests on their behalf before the throne of God. It is God who saves, not us.

Please Pray For Me

Really, there are few other functions of the priest in this Age. We are priests, just as those who served under the Aaronic priesthood, though we offer no blood sacrifices. The sacrifices we offer are selfless prayers on behalf of others. As you fulfill your priesthood in this life, pray for the theologians at Christian Chronicles, even as we also pray for you regularly.

When Should I Pray:

It is amazing how many Christians pray at night, but not in the morning. We cannot pray today for tomorrow’s blessing. The rule is: Give us today our daily bread. If we wait until bedtime to pray, our day is done. We have gone through our entire day without the power and strength of God, preferring to operate under our own wisdom and power. This is just what the devil wants us to do. Greet God every morning fervently!

Letter to the Editor

To the Editor:

Just a short note of encouragement. CC is much appreciated. Like a cool drink of water to a thirsty man. I’ve only been receiving it for a few months now, but I’m amazed to say that what I have read in your pages lines up well with my understanding of Scripture. Which is also to say that it doesn’t line up well at all with what I’ve been hearing from the pulpits of a couple of churches I’ve attended.

It’s quite an encouragement to me to learn that someone I’ve never met can read the same Holy Scriptures I read and come up with the same understanding. I believe Him when He says if we continue in His Word we shall know the truth. It’s a blessing to see that He who indwells both of us is faithful to keep His promises.

... I mentioned that I didn’t like what I’d been hearing from the pulpit. From a Southern Baptist pulpit I heard a sermon that started out to be about love. I was pleased to hear it start out that way because I’ve heard too much DO THIS and DON’T DO THAT. Toward the end, the pastor asked how we can know if we love Him? The answer: "If you keep His commandments." Not a word about grace!

...In a Nazarene church I was told that the Aztecs had it right when they performed human sacrifices. They simply sacrificed the wrong human. As though a sinner could die for another sinner. He said that my not tithing prevented God from blessing those who did, including the entire body.

I’m not discouraged by this, though, because in His infinite love, He has given us a more sure word of prophecy so that we can discern the signs of the times. I am, quite to the contrary, quite bolstered by the fact that these end times are unfolding precisely as He said they would. I am looking for that blessed hope...His glorious appearing. I’m ready! It is my fervent prayer that He come quickly!

Keep up His good work.

In His service,

Rick Einar

Thanks, Rick!

The Lord's (Disciple's) Prayer

We call it the Lord’s prayer because it was Jesus who first presented it to His disciples. However, that is a misnomer. The real "Lord’s Prayer" is found in the Gospel according to John, in the seventeenth chapter (vvs 1-26). This is where Jesus Himself actually prayed. The prayer found in both Matthew (6:9-13) and Luke (11:2-4) is not the Lord’s prayer, but the prayer that He commanded His disciples to pray. It is really the Disciples’ Prayer. In Matthew, Jesus said, "In this manner, therefore, pray..." In Luke’s gospel, He said, "When you pray, say..." He was not telling them what His prayer is, but Jesus was telling us how we ought to pray.

It seems strange, then, that many theologians teach that we need not pray in this manner, but that we are to pray in other ways. Even among conservatives, there are many who diminish the importance of praying in the fashion dictated by God Himself, in the only places in the Bible where Christians are told how to pray. Yet, this model prayer contains the elements that effective prayer must have, and every word is important, and worthy of much meditation. Not only is every word important, but the order is also important.

Before we begin to examine this prayer in detail, it should be noted that Jesus never intended for His disciples to merely quote the words. Rather than endless repetitions, what we find in this prayer is a sort of outline, a guideline to the elements contained in an effective prayer. Rather than merely repeating the words by rote or ritual, it is a formula for our daily meditation. The word rote, according to Webster, has as one of its meanings, "the sound of surf on the shore — repeated sounds with no meaning, or words repeated with little or no intellect involved." For many, this is how this prayer is prayed, and it never reaches higher than the roofs of our mouths when we employ it in this manner. But when it is the method of our meditation, it becomes enriching and effective. Let us examine it more closely.

The first word is our. For whom are we praying? As we begin our prayer, it is wise to contemplate those for whom we wish to pray, to raise them up before God by name. Doing so puts us in a proper state of mind, a state of seriousness as we think about those who are troubled, ill, or in need of the gospel of God’s grace, our brothers and sisters in Christ, our families and friends, and our enemies. When we say "Our Father," we know for whom we are praying, if we have already contemplated those souls and their needs. Otherwise, we are using a word without meaning, surf pounding senseless against the shore.

Next, we recognize the unique relationship that every Christian has with God. Born of His seed the moment we believed the gospel, we are His children. As such, we have both the right and the guarantee of His wise and loving providence. He is our Father, and we rightly address Him in prayer. What is more, we are His sons, every one of us. As sons of God, we are responsible to conduct our Father’s business in His name. Children have privileges and rights; sons have responsibilities. It is important to recognize both in our daily prayers.

We acknowledge that our Father is in heaven. He is far beyond the material realm, dwelling in the eternal spaces, controlling every atom in the universe moment by moment. He alone is God. This is a time in our prayer to meditate upon the greatness of God, on His omnipotence and glory and omniscience, His wisdom, mercy and benevolence toward His children. Proper prayer is not so much talking to God as it is meditation upon God. When we say, "Hallowed be thy name," we are considering and declaring that there is no other God like our God, who is sovereign in the heavens and so far beyond any terrestrial gods that even His name is holy, held in reverent esteem by each of us. Our hearts ought to be filled with awe as we consider the magnitude of the God who claims us as His children. Recognizing God as God ought to bring such a reverence into our minds and hearts that the rest of our prayer and the balance of our day are filled with His great presence and power.

Later in Matthew, Jesus said, "...seek first the kingdom of heaven..." (6:33). And what did He ordain as the first request in the prayer that He gave His disciples? "Thy kingdom come..." In a sense, the Kingdom of Christ on the earth begins with the rapture of the Church. For it is the seven years following the rapture that mark the end of Gentile world dominion, preparatory to Christ’s return to establish His Kingdom. When we pray Thy kingdom come, we are agreeing with Paul in his letter to Titus that this is indeed our blessed hope (Titus 2:13). As our hearts are turned toward the rapture, our priorities become straight and we seek to serve here and now, to be fruitful in our earthly ministries, that we might lay up treasures in heaven, to be received on that great day. When our hearts have properly acknowledged the great God who is our Father and whom we serve, it is appropriate that our first request should be to see Him and to stand before Him in righteous perfection. As our thoughts begin to turn from meditations upon God to become more oriented toward our own needs, it is proper that our first request should be Thy Kingdom come.

For God’s will shall not be done on the earth as it is in heaven until that day dawns and His throne is established in Jerusalem. When Jesus reigns over the entire earth, His will shall be enforced with a rod of iron. When His Kingdom comes, even the unsaved shall do His will. Until then, it will not be so. Therefore, when we ask that His will be done on earth as it is in heaven, we are simply making an extension of the initial request, Thy Kingdom come. Nevertheless, God is able to work His will in the lives of His children if they are willing for Him to do so. Therefore, when we meditate upon this clause of the prayer that Jesus gave us, it is proper for us to expect Him to work His will in our lives, and especially since it is God who works in us both to will and to do of His good pleasure (Phil 2:13). When we meditate upon this clause of the prayer, we should recognize that it is a transitional clause, one that connects our desire for the rapture with our desire to serve properly today.

It is also the proper time in our prayer to consider the needs of the others for whom we are praying. We ought not pray that God will heal this sickness or that financial problem, but that He will work His will in our lives. Even when Jesus prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane, He said, "...not My will, but Yours be done..." (Mt 26:42). It is not God’s will that any should perish, so it is always proper to pray for the souls of the lost, but sometimes God allows sickness or troubles in the lives of Christians in order to accomplish His purposes. When we ask that His will be done on earth as it is in heaven, we are declaring that His wisdom is greater than our wisdom, and we are seeking His loving providence in the lives of those for whom we pray, whether it be according to our wills or their wills or not.

When we ask God to give us this day our daily bread, we are acknowledging our complete dependence upon Him for our every provision of life. We are asking for food, but not only for food. The Word of God is the Bread of Life, and we are asking God to feed us physically and spiritually, to enlarge our knowledge of Him, and to provide everything that He knows that we will need that day, whether we recognize that need or not. We are asking for correction where correction is needed, encouragement where encouragement is needed, material goods where those are required, spiritual edification and growth, money, clothing, food, housing, opportunity in our careers and in our ministries, fruitfulness, health, blessing and chastisement. Our daily bread is as all-inclusive as was the manna that God gave the Israelites in the wilderness. The word manna means What is it?, and when we pray for our daily bread, we are asking for whatever God knows that we need this day.

It is also important to note that we cannot pray today for tomorrow’s needs. We are to pray today for our daily needs. So many Christians say that they pray at bedtime. And what shall God give them that day? Sweet dreams? The day is already spent and they have asked for no provision until it is ended. How much more sense it makes to pray in the morning, so that all that day our needs shall be met. Begin each day with this prayer, and that day will be blessed. Or pray at night, having spent your day in your own will under your own power, receiving no blessing that day.

Forgive us our trespasses. Most of us dwell on this clause either too much or too little. Saved, we know that our sins have already been forgiven and forgotten, put behind God’s back and separated from us as far as the east is from the west. With this consciousness, we do not consider our sins as seriously as we ought. On the other hand, many Christians are so conscious of their sins that they do not feel that they can rightly go to God in prayer. And so they don’t go to Him at all, to their great detriment. The proper heart of the Christian toward sin is to recognize the holiness of the God whom we serve, thereby recognizing our own shortcomings, but to recognize the steadfast love and mercy of God toward His children as well as our sins. The proper heart is a humble heart, one that recognizes its unworthiness, as well as the greatness of God’s longsuffering and love, both manifested at Calvary. We need not dwell on sins that have been forgiven, but neither should we become so inured to our sin that we do not realize how seriously the heart of God is affected when His children break fellowship with Him in preference to our own lusts and desires and pride.

Paul, speaking of Christ’s emptying of Himself of His preincarnate glory when he came to earth, said, "Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus..." (Phil 2:5). But Paul was not speaking of only a part of Christ’s mind. He was speaking of the whole mind of Christ. David said, "Against you only have I sinned..." (Ps 51:4). When we sin, we sin against Christ. When He came to the earth, He came to pay for our sins and to forgive them. The second part of this clause reads, "...as we forgive those who trespass against us..." If God is able to empty Himself of His glory to the point that He was willing even to die for our sins, how can we be so proud (filled with a sense of our own glory) as to hold grudges against those who have offended us and now seek our forgiveness? We must desire that God work forgiveness of others in our own hearts, for that is the proper mind of the Christian. We are not to be proud, but forgiving of those who seek our forgiveness. As for those who do not seek our forgiveness, we are to pray for them also, for God loves us and we are to love them.

"...lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one..." A two-fold request, connected by the conjunction but, but also separated by another conjunction which follows, for, which joins it to the following clause. We ask God not to lead us into temptation. The word has a dual meaning, test/tempt. We do not want God to test us, for we too often fail. With every trial comes temptation, either to overt sin or to a weakness of faith. God makes available to us faith sufficient to meet every trial, but we seldom avail ourselves of that faith. In the end, God is always glorified, but we are often ashamed, either of our sin or of the weakness of our faith. And so, we ask God not to lead us into trials and temptations, but to deliver us from the evil one.

And then comes that other conjunction, for. For thine is the Kingdom, the power and the glory forever. We are back where we began. Deliver us from the evil one, for Thine is the kingdom... We declare that we know that we are subject to trials in this life, to temptations and persecutions by the devil until the day of our deliverance. But our deliverance will not be completed until the Kingdom Age, when we reign with Christ and the evil one has been chained in the abyss for a thousand years. Then shall come our deliverance, and then we shall no longer be tried or tempted. Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us. May today be the day of our final deliverance, but if not, then keep us in your will until that day. God is able to keep us from the evil one day by day, as we seek His will and not our own, as He gives us today our daily bread. We do not seek hourly bread, or weekly bread or monthly bread, but daily bread. Daily deliverance, but also final deliverance, for the Kingdom is God’s and He shall soon claim it for Himself. We close this wonderful prayer by returning to a contemplation of God Himself, acknowledging His sovereignty, His power and His glory. We began by meditation upon Him, and we end the same way, knowing that we are not the subjects of our prayer, though we pray for ourselves, but that the great God in heaven is our focus. For when we look to Him and not to ourselves, we are confident that we have a God who is able to answer our prayers, who is willing to do so, who loves us, and who will provide for our every need.

Christian friend, if you do not use this prayer that Jesus gave His disciples as the daily model for your morning prayer, then you are, first of all, disobeying Him, but you are also robbing yourself of the wonderful blessings of conformity to God’s Word and increase in the knowledge of Him. Every element that you leave out of your prayer is also an element that you leave out of your life that day. Jesus did not command us twice to pray in this manner without some good reason. He was not just filling space in the Bible. Rather, as we submit to the Word and pray as we are instructed, our lives become lives of faith and great fruitfulness; lives of peace, even as those around us swirl in the panic of chaos and disorder and hopelessness. Yet, the hardest thing for any minister to accomplish is to persuade those to whom he ministers that it is essential that they pray daily according to the pattern that God Himself gave us when His disciples asked Him, "Lord, teach us to pray." My prayer for each of you is that you will pray with a renewed steadfastness each and every day, in conformity with the never-changing, ever-wise and all-instructive Word of God. If you haven’t yet today, do so now!

Childlike In Prayer

From Steve Brown's Book - Approaching God

"One of the major reasons so many people do not have fulfilling prayer lives is because they have not understood that the essential nature of prayer is communication between a child and its father. Prayer is not a theological treatise; it is one person talking directly to another Person..

The nature of prayer is such that childlikeness is one of the primary requirements for effective prayer. It is the recognition that one is speaking to one’s heavenly Father and has about it a lack of sophistication and slickness. We need not present to our Father the heavily-edited and well-crafted presentations that are often presented in public meetings.

What Jesus did when He defined God as Father was define the word properly. He said, "If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him" (Matt. 7:11). He portrayed God as a Father who cares, who oversees His own children with love, and who is never an abuser of His children. The Scripture teaches that we call God "Abba", a term of endearment that could be translated as "Daddy" or "Papa." God is a Father who really likes to spend time with His children.

What does it mean to be childlike? First, childlikeness, at its elemental aspect, is a quality of trust. It is the recognition that God is not only in control but that He really is one’s heavenly Father. It is the perception that He not only can provide, but that He is also willing to provide for all our needs. Jesus said, "Do not fear, little flock, for it is the Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom" (Luke 12:32). The psalmist writes, "Trust in Him at all times, you people; pour out your heart before Him; God is a refuge for us" (Ps. 62:8).

I know that it is hard to trust someone whom you have not seen. If you, like me, are from a dysfunctional background, one of the highest priorities you have in your life is control. (By the way, I believe that one of the results of Adam and Eve’s Fall is that almost everyone is from a dysfunctional family in one form or another.) For most of us, life or family or difficult situations have taught us that every time things get out of control, we get hurt. In order to keep from getting hurt, we try in every way possible to exercise control over our emotions, our physical environment and those with whom we have relationships. It is our natural desire to hold the reins ourselves, allowing nothing to happen in our lives without our direct cause and effect.

But God will simply not allow that kind of control in your life if you want to walk with Him. In fact, those areas where you can’t exert much control are those very areas where God will teach you about Himself and about prayer. The woman who’s carriage ran away and who said to the hero who finally rescued her, "I trusted God until the reins broke," did not trust God. She trusted the reins but did not know it until they broke. God, I believe, takes delight in taking reins away, in putting those whom He loves in places where control is not an option, and then allowing us to see his sovereignty and great love in the wisdom of His handling of those situations. We would not learn otherwise.

In order to have the kind of prayer life that is meaningful, we must have a childlike trust. That doesn’t mean, of course, that we have to trust completely or totally, not in the beginning of our Christian experience. Trust is a process, and complete trust is the end of the process and probably won’t happen until we get home. However, it is desperately important that we begin the process and that we learn to lean hard on a God who not only loves us, but likes us. We must learn that our heavenly Father is also the great God of the universe."

Powerless Prayer

In this day and age, there is a great, ongoing tragedy. People do not believe in prayer. We have been caught up in the philosophy that science is god. We’re taught that we live in an impersonal universe.

This results in us having a hollow god. A god with no heart, no compassion. Science can’t feel, laugh or show mercy. It can only analyze, measure and dissect things. This makes us all feel a sense of meaninglessness, a loss of significance, no hope and a lack of power.

Our prayers have become empty, meaningless rituals. Even when we pray honestly or for something specific we often do not believe it will be fulfilled. The power of God is limitless yet we, as silly as we are, have the power to limit the action of God in our lives through our unbelief. In so doing, we deny that God still has a personal relationship with His creation and we deny the power of the Holy Spirit in our lives.

This is the way we lose power in prayer. Yet God is the same today as He was when Jesus died on the cross for us. We need to know that God’s power is unlimited. In Malachi 3:6 God says, "I, the Lord, do not change." God still wants a personal relationship with us. He’s your Father and wants to know your dreams and desires, your needs as well as your wants. By yourself you can do nothing but with fervent prayer, all can be accomplished.

If prayer were not important, Jesus would not have taken the time to teach the disciples to pray. They never asked Him how to preach or how to interpret Scripture but instead, how to pray. They saw Jesus constantly praying to the Father. It was an attitude of His heart and mind. He prayed while healing the sick, feeding the hungry and raising the dead. He prayed because He believed what He preached when He said, "The Son can do nothing of Himself." Jesus had a constant sense of need for His Father.

We all need to imitate our Savior, knowing that the Father does indeed hear our prayers and will answer according to His sovereign will, working all things together for our good. The Father loves us, His children, and wants us all to give ourselves to Him always through prayer. It is through communication with Him that our relationship with Him grows and through this relationship, we ourselves grow and are strengthened.

Prayer: What's the Deal?

Why do we pray? When do we pray? How do we pray? These are questions every Christian has asked at some point in his life. So what is prayer? Prayer is dialogue with God. We come to God with many petitions or requests mainly from the selfish standpoint of our own needs or desires. "Please God, get me out of this," or, "God why don’t you stop that from happening?" or, "God, what am I going to do about this?" We have a loving Father who has our best interests at heart. We should exercise faith in our petitions or requests from God and trust Him to answer us according to His wisdom.

Jesus taught His disciples how to pray: "And when you pray, you shall not be like the hypocrites. For they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the corners of the streets, that they may be seen by men. Assuredly, I say to you, they have their reward. But you, when you pray, go into your room, and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father who is in the secret place; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly. And when you pray, do not use vain repetitions as the heathen do. For they think that they will be heard for their many words. Therefore do not be like them. For your Father knows the things you have need of before you ask Him." Then Jesus said "In this manner, therefore, pray: Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done On earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, As we forgive our debtors. And do not lead us into temptation, But deliver us from the evil one. For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen."

In Romans 8, Paul tells us: "Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered."

So, when we pray, the Spirit takes our prayers and presents them to the Father on our behalf. What a great deal! The book of James teaches us, "Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray. If anyone is sick, pray over him." We are to confess our trespasses and pray for one another. Prayer is the one thing that Christians do not do enough of. So, we beseech all our readers to pray. Pray for your church, family, friends, needs, or anything you would like to talk to your Heavenly Father about. He does listen and will answer your prayer.

And She Prays Her Many Petitions

It’s a line from a not-so-famous poem. The next line reads, "She prays her will and conditions..." It is true of so many of us. In our prayers, God becomes our celestial servant, a cosmic bell-hop to do our bidding. We do not pray as we ought, but we send our wish list up the line, not even believing that it will be granted. Much of the time we aren’t really talking to God, but we’re telling ourselves what we want. Or we are worrying out loud over what might befall us if we do not get the things we think we need. In many prayers we are not really making contact with God. We aren’t really even considering who and what God is, but we are thinking about our desires. But our God is a patient Father. He understands His children even as our earthly fathers understood that we loved them, though our hearts were always on our desires. Even as we understand our children’s love, though they frequently treat us like we treat our heavenly Father, so God loves us. Our God is love.

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