When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things. For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.

(1 Corinthians 13:11–12) 

“Help you… I do it… Hold it… Bagame… Pinkers… Wakelmo… Sophie sad…” Unless Jaina or I were there to interpret for you, you would probably have no idea what Sophie (now 2½) is talking about when she speaks. This occurred to me only recently when someone asked Jaina what Sophie had tried to say to them. It then occurred to me that perhaps this provides some insight into the way that God deals with us as His children. While we certainly cannot operate or communicate on the same level as God does, He as our heavenly Father is both able and willing to condescend to listen to our requests and to grant them if they are truly in our best interest. The marvelous thing is that our Father can understand us!

He understands the trials and heartaches that we endure. When the Son of God robed Himself in human flesh to dwell among men (John 1:14), He experienced the pain that comes from losing a loved one, as He must have felt as He wept by Lazarus’ sealed tomb (John 11:35). The pain and mental anguish that He endured in the Garden, the five unlawful trials held against Him, the rejection by the Jews, and the six agonizing hours on the cross, must have been greater than anything that mortal man has ever borne. 

He understands our weaknesses and frailties. When God called Moses and charged him to return to Egypt to retrieve His people, Moses was reluctant to go, offering this excuse: “I am not eloquent…but I am slow of speech, and of a slow tongue” (Ex. 4:10). The LORD responded and said, “Who hath made man’s mouth? or who maketh the dumb, or deaf, or the seeing, or the blind? have not I the LORD” (Ex. 4:11)? Moses had failed to recognize that God did not need to be warned of His weaknesses in the flesh, for God had created man and therefore knew his frailties better than man himself, much as the engineer who designs an automobile knows more about it than the person who buys and operates it. 

He understands our temptations. Although “God cannot be tempted with evil” (Jas. 1:13), man is tempted by Satan with evil everyday. In order to show mankind that He understood the power of temptation, He sent His Son to be tempted in every conceivable fashion without committing sin (Heb. 4:15). Indeed no one has ever been tempted as strongly as Jesus was (see Matt. 4:1–11). God understood our temptations long before Jesus came into this world, but now He has revealed His understanding to us. 

Although we are far beneath God (Isa. 55:8–9), He is still able to understand us. Paul says that “the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered” (Rom. 8:26). God knows you better than you know yourself. He knows your weaknesses, and He knows what you are going through right now. Remember these things the next time you bow your head to ask for God’s aid in some matter, and take comfort in knowing that your Father understands and that He loves you more than you can ever know!