“Like as a father pitieth his children, so the LORD pitieth them that fear him.”
The Tree
This verse uses ordinary human fatherhood, imperfect as it often is, as the actual comparison point for understanding God’s own compassion. Whatever genuine pity, tenderness, and compassion you have felt toward your own children in their weakness or failure, scripture says God’s own compassion toward you operates on this same pattern, like as a father.
This works two directions worth noticing. It teaches you something about God, that his compassion toward you resembles a good father’s toward a struggling child, not distant or harsh but genuinely pitying, tender toward weakness. And it teaches you something about your own fatherhood or motherhood, that this pity, this tenderness, is itself a genuine reflection of God’s own character.
This should encourage you the next time compassion toward your own struggling child feels difficult to access, perhaps because you are tired, or frustrated, or the child’s failure feels like your own failure too. Ask God for his own pity toward them, the same pity this verse says he already has toward you.
Whatever weakness or failure your child is currently struggling with, bring your own pity toward them today into alignment with God’s own pity toward you, tender rather than harsh, compassionate rather than merely exasperated by their weakness.
Tend the Tree
- Notice one current struggle your child is having that might be met with more pity.
- Ask God for his own tenderness toward them, matching how he treats your own weakness.
- Respond to your child’s next failure with pity first, before correction.
Prayer
Lord, you pity me the way a good father pities his children. Let me extend that same pity to my own children, tender rather than harsh, especially in their weakness. Amen.
Carry this today
Pity toward a struggling child mirrors God’s own pity toward you.