I Love You!

Our youngest daughter, Erica, has started doing something that has the power to melt my (sometimes stubborn and calloused) heart.


There are many days that I will come home from work and she will greet me with her arms wide open and say “I love you daddy!” and proceed to give me a big hug! I love coming home from work those days!

But this is not the only time Erica will tell me that she loves me.

When she is being scolded for something wrong (which is the only time one should be scolded) she will, as I am reminding her why I sent her to her bedroom, she will interrupt me, and say, with tears in her eyes: I love you daddy” and give me that big hug…

She could have picked a better time than that to tell me that, because most of the time, I simply hug her, and remind her in a gentle way that I love her too, but what she did was wrong.

She will remain in her room for a few more moments and then she will be allowed to come back out.

As I pondered Erica’s statement—“I love you daddy”—my mind goes to 1 John 3:1 which says: “How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!” (NIV)

One of the definitions of the word Lavished is: “to expend or give in great amounts or without limit”

As much as Erica loves me, God loves me even more! He has generously—and graciously—given great amounts of His love to me, and to you, so much love that we cannot begin to imagine the entire scope of it all..

But the fact remains: God Loves Us!!