The cost

He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?  Romans 8:32

Due to some very mean pranks played on me by those who did the sonogram of our first child, I was fully expecting a son.  When our child was born, I was very surprised when the attending nurses kept talking about what long legs she had.  Her legs didn’t look long to me, but those nurses must have known what they were talking about because today she is about 5′ 8″ (and, if I do say so myself, the picture of loveliness)!

As I was about to learn, it is hard to overstate the deeply affectionate bond that develops in a parent toward their children. A child is an extension of us.  A child is our most precious possession.  We would give all we have for them.  We can not conceive of a more tragic loss than the loss of our child.  It is the penultimate sorrow.

This deep bond that we feel must only be a shadow of the intimate bond between the Father and the Son.  Our hearts are scarred and calloused by sin.  Our knowledge of our children is partial and finite.  But within the Trinity, there is perfect joy in perfect fellowship among perfect persons.  We have no idea what that is like.

As Christmas approaches, I want to meditate on the fact that when the Father sent his Son for us, it was exactly like sacrificing his own dearest child.  In the recesses of my mind, the emotional, relational, sacrficial cost to him is somehow minimized because I assume that since the Father is God and knew the end, the cost to him was not entirely genuine. But God does not lie and he wants me to understand that the grief and pain that I would feel about the loss of a dearly loved child was genuinely endured by him for my sake and that that is the proof of the measure of his love for me.