Greatly LovedSample

Of all the names God has given us, Child of God has been the hardest for me to grasp fully. Perhaps it’s because my childhood felt like a rush to grow up, and I never fully understood what it would look like to live like a child. Does becoming like a child mean feeling safe and cared for without fear of the future? To be curious and take risks? To rest, be joyful, and free of the weight of the world? That wasn’t my childhood. My dad battled addiction, fought in a gang, and lived with Hepatitis C. Someone introduced him to Jesus, and he changed his life around (praise God!) . He started outreach on the streets of San Francisco to our friends living without homes and battling with addiction. I am proud of the streets I was raised on and amazed by what we saw God do, but it also came with a heavy childhood. At a young age, I saw people murdered in front of me, my parents both assaulted, and various drugs being sold and used. At 18 years old, my dad got cancer and passed away. I learned early to carry heavy responsibilities, deal with loss, be resilient, and work hard. There were positive sides to that, but also negative ones. I spent my early adult years weighed down by the pressure to be productive and in control, never taking breaks, stressed about the future, without any childlike wonder in my life. I deeply hurt some people along the way. These past few years, I’ve been on a journey of rediscovering what this one name really means. For the one who has lived with the world's weight on your shoulders… you are more than you’ve been told. God calls you His Child (Galatians 3:26). Once we give our lives to Jesus, we are invited to relearn what it means to be a child. We can give Him the burdens we were never meant to carry alone. It turns out we are safer than we’ve ever imagined– to trust, take risks, take steps of faith, rest, enjoy, and celebrate just like children who are safe and loved. Child of God. That’s your name. For the one who feels like you’ll never be set free from the shame of who you were or what you’ve done… you are more than you’ve been told. Jesus calls you Free, Indeed (John 8:36). When we give our lives to Jesus, the same Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead now lives in us. We have a new kind of posture, perspective, and power surging within us. If God is not enough to raise us from the dead, if He’s not enough to save us from our lives of sin, if He’s not enough to redeem us from all the places we’ve been, then He couldn’t have been enough to resurrect Christ. So we have been made alive, or Jesus is still dead. But since He is not— since the tomb is empty and no Savior’s bones are lying amongst a graveyard— we know that death has long been conquered. You are not chained to your past Free, Indeed. That’s your name. ## Friend, you may be carrying burdens you don’t have to anymore. You may be living in chains you don’t have to live in anymore. Surrender them to God, and live as the free Child of God you really are.