My tiny humans singing with Zach, me, and the band during worship practice Sunday morning. I cannot describe the absolute joy this brought me! Thank you to my friend, Megan, for grabbing this fun photo!

If you’ve ever heard that classic hymn, you know exactly where I’m going with this message. I hope you’ll stick around until the end anyway!

As our preacher gave his sermon today about God’s grace, I was stuck with a realization that shook me to my core.

Now look, what I’m about to say my realization was, is a little silly. It’s silly only because I’ve spent my entire life going to churches that very clearly boast the forgiveness of our sins through Christ’s death on the cross.

My realization? That God loved us so much, He not only gave His only son as a sacrifice for our sins, but died for us as well.

Did you catch it? God died for our sins through His son Jesus.

Look, I realize this has been foundational to my Christian faith for the entirety of my life, but I think the understanding has been surface level until today. Let me see if I can explain it a little better.

As our Pastor continued his sermon, he made mention of Romans 5:7-8.

Grandpa and Ben fell asleep together in the chair watching movies before bedtime.

To put it simply, Christ died for all of us. Not just the best of us, but all of us. Everyone who accepts Him as Lord and Savior. God sent Jesus for ALL of us.

Can you imagine putting your own life on the line for someone else? What kind of person would you be willing to lay down your life for? I can tell you for certain, I would struggle to lay my life down for just anyone. There’s a reason I’m not in the secret service or the military! At this moment in my existence, my children and husband almost exclusively exhaust that list. But God died a human death, and not a peaceful one I might add, for every single one of us and our transgressions.

BUT WAIT. Let me take you one step further into my deeper understanding.

God is Jesus. Jesus is God. But, Jesus is also God’s son - His ONLY son.

I’m going to take a slight detour here, but I hope you follow my train of thought.

Recently, Bennett and I (and Zach when he’s been available) have been reading the Bible (a Children’s Bible) together before bed every night. When we got to the story of Abraham and Isaac in Genesis chapter 22, I didn’t realize the termoil it would bring, considering I have hear the story so many times. Until becoming a parent, I clearly never understood the true devastation of this story on a deep level. For anyone who doesn’t know the story I’m talking about, I’ll briefly summarize.

Abraham and his wife Sarah had prayed and prayed for a child. They became old and still had not had any children, then God blessed Sarah at a very old age with a pregnancy! They had a baby boy, Issac, whom was loved beyond measure. One day, a few years later, God told Abraham to bring Isaac to the top of the mountain and sacrifice him to the Lord. When he got to the top of the mountain, he tied up his son, and was just about to kill him for a sacrifice when God stopped him and provided a ram to sacrifice. It was a test of his faithfulness to God.

CAN YOU IMAGINE??? You are being asked to end the life of your only child for whom you’ve ferverently prayed and love more than anything or anyone in this world? Would you be able to even take it as far as Abraham?

I’ll be honest, I had trouble explaining this story to my son. How was I supposed to tell him that the characters in the story that he identified with our family (me/Zach = Abraham, him = Isaac) were literally about to perform that of a parents absolute nightmare? How could I explain that Issac’s daddy was about to end young Isaac’s life because God told him to? The same God I remind him daily is so good, is so loving, and is taking care of us? Watching his face try to understand the terror of this story was almost heartbreaking.

As a parent, I read that story with fresh new eyes. It brought such sadness and weight to my heart as I reread the story, only compounding when I tried to explain it to my 3 year old.

To lose a child is already a devastation beyond comprehension, but for that child to be lost at your own hands? I am not sure how I’d ever be able to continue on in my life. Truly.

Circling back to my point, this is exactly what God did for us. Except there wasn’t someone else to step in and save the day, no one to send him another appropriate sacrifice.

God knew how it had to end the minute He sent Jesus to earth. But He still did it for us. US!

I don’t know about you, but there is nothing on this earth I love more than my children. This realization made me want to try even harder to deepen my relationship with God, and honor him, thank him, and praise him for his deep sacrifice for us.