Get Real with God ~ Green Shoes & God's Love

My 12 year old daughter is such a delight; always trying to please, always trying to make my life easier, she is an utter joy to me! Well, the other day she got the notion of how fun it would be to go to a concert. We’ve seen Mercy Me twice, as a family, both times free and it was wonderfully fun. So she started doing some research on-line to see if any of her favorite bands were playing anywhere for really cheap or free. As she was searching she discovered that Point of Grace would be playing at the Mall of America, in the rotunda, for FREE! The date: July 21. So we loaded up the family and fought our way through the traffic that is the Twin Cities construction season and arrived at the mall. We were about an hour early and so excited to be able to get a good seat. Much to our surprise when we got there nothing was going on, no signs, no seating, nothing. So Mr. Taffy got out his “smart” phone to see what the scoop was. (I should interject here, I was a bad momma in that I didn’t check to see if her information was accurate, but I’m trying to let my older children experience some “grown-up” situations, like planning an event and doing research.) Sure enough, he found the website that she was looking at and it turned out to be true, only 4 years too late! Oh drat!

Well, you can imagine how mortified she was! She is a delight, but she’s a typical young girl too. Mr. Taffy didn’t blink an eye about the whole thing, just smiled and said, “no biggie.” We both hugged her, squishing her between us and made a plan to walk around the mall and just make the best of it. She smiled but you could tell she still felt bad. The first store we went into was Marshall’s, to look for size 16 & 17 shoes for my boys. (I am not kidding.) They did have pair of 17’s--too crazy for my hubby! But we did find the most beautiful pair of converse shoes: Kelly Green with a hot pink stripe. Beauty IS in the eye of the beholder and she was in love. The shoes were more than we usually pay for shoes ($22), but she is wearing a size 10 now and it’s getting harder to find cheap shoes in that size, and I really felt like the Lord wanted me to buy them. She was so surprised, so blessed, so thankful!

And as we walked away from the store it dawned on me—isn’t this just like the Lord. We do something dumb, foolish, whatever and then we repent and the Lord in His goodness turns around and blesses us in way that no one else can appreciate or understand. God loves my Tirzah so much, He knew how much those shoes would bless her, how unique they were to her personality. I told my daughter so too! I used that moment to pour God’s love and grace into my daughter.

“The LORD is merciful and gracious, Slow to anger, and abounding in mercy.” Psalm 103:8

No matter what, when we come and repent to the Lord, heartfelt, He meets us and forgives us and more often than not turns around and blesses us in a way we don’t deserve!

“And I prayed to the LORD my God, and made confession, and said, "O Lord, great and awesome God, who keeps His covenant and mercy with those who love Him, and with those who keep His commandments…” Daniel 9:4

My challenge to you is to pour out God’s mercy into your children, reminding them daily of His love for them and His interest in the little details of their lives!