Dean Deliberations

And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.       —Ephesians 3:17-19

A member of my discipleship group tells a wonderful story about the trust young children have in their parents—mom and dad were talking when their young son, vying for attention, butts in and asks Dad to play tag. To get rid of the interruption Dad says “you run and I'll catch you.” The young child takes off running and without hesitation launches himself into the air superman-style towards his father. Dad is caught by surprise but manages to catch his son. The boy had complete trust in his dad; after all Dad said “I'll catch you.” The trust of our very young children in us is close to complete. We feed them, hold them, and comfort them. We put them to bed and are there when they rise. They trust us because they do not doubt our love for them. In their young minds, they know us.

In our relationships as adults we tend to trust those we know. The better we know someone the more we trust them. In our most intimate relationships our trust is the greatest. I love my wife and she loves me. I know her so I trust her.

In Joanna Weaver's book Having a Mary Heart in a Martha World, she writes “We don't trust God because we don't know God.” We trust those we know, those who we know love us. So why is it that we (I) have trouble trusting the only one who truly loves us (me) unconditionally? Paul prays for us in Ephesians “…to know this love that surpasses knowledge….” Wow! Paul is beseeching God for us to know that which surpasses knowledge. It sounds almost impossible but when, through the Holy Spirit, we begin to get a glimpse of God's unfathomable love for us through Christ, we begin to know God. We begin to trust God.

Trusting God with the issues in our own lives can be difficult. Trusting God with the issues in our children's lives is frequently much more so. When our children are hurting or failing it can be difficult to trust in the goodness of God. But when we do, and our children see and hear that in us, what a testimony it is to the power of knowing God.

As a covenant community, church, home, and school, our greatest desire—our primary mission—must be for our children to know God. All of our children at Seven Rivers Christian School know about God. They are told daily. It is only when these children know God that we can be assured of seeing heart-altering change in them. And it is only through the changed hearts of our students that our purpose can be accomplished, to transform culture for Jesus Christ.