This past Saturday I was playing in the floor with Charisse while ‘Cretia was getting ready for us to go on a family stroll around the neighborhood. She had these little multi-colored blocks that were in different shapes and we were both having a blast.
I turned my head for just a second to look at something and she fell over from her sitting position and hit her head on the ground, causing one of the pointed ends of the orange star she was holding to jab her in the mouth.
She let out a pretty vicious cry and I automatically scooped her up and began to try and comfort her…until…I saw the blood. Her mouth was bleeding and I pretty much freaked out, screaming for ‘Cretia to come and help. (She arrived to find both Charisse and I sitting in the floor in a state of panic!)
We were able to get the bleeding stopped and it turned out to be just a little cut inside of her mouth. After we talked to her and sang a few songs she was as good as new…but something about that experience marked me…and I could not figure out what. (Other than the fact that I felt like a LOSER as a dad!)
That night I was getting ready for bed and the Holy Spirit spoke to my heart and said, “Hey Perry, it was very uncomfortable as a father seeing the blood of your child, wasn’t it?”
WHAM! It hit me right between the eyes…what I had felt earlier that day in my living room floor paled in comparison to how God must have felt as He watched Jesus shed His blood for the sins of the world.
No parent likes to see the blood of their child…yet God watched Jesus receive a beating that left Him beyond recognition. He saw the nails in the hands and feet. He saw the splinters on the cross dig into His back. He saw the crown of thorns…He saw the whole thing.
No parent likes to see the blood of their child—yet God, according to Romans 5:8, allowed Jesus to die a brutal death while we were still sinners.
I’ll have to be honest, that kind of love blows me away. I don’t EVER want to see Charisse hurt—yet the love of God is so amazing that He allowed His Son to come and bleed and die so that you and I might have life.
Thank You Jesus for a love I cannot fully understand but am desperate for!