Several years back, I was stirring a simmering pot of pasta when she came and stood next to me in the kitchen. Even though the other children were all playing, she seemed content to quietly observe.

“Mrs. Tara,” she finally spoke, “did you know that we don’t have a daddy?”

My heart skipped a beat. Yes, I did know that she and her seven adopted siblings (most with special needs) were being raised by the single, bravest woman I’ve ever known, but how was I supposed to answer that?

“But it’s okay,” she assured me, “because Jesus is our daddy.” With that, she scampered off to play with the others and left me standing alone in my kitchen, which suddenly felt like holy ground.

Her words rang with truth, and I could testify (because her mother is a good friend of mine) that she was right. Jesus is her daddy—and a really good one at that. I had heard all the stories of His protection and provision for her life and the lives of her mother and siblings countless times before. But the way He provides for them—so faithfully, so continuously, so completely—is what I find most compelling. He provides for them through His church—His people who take His command to love one another to heart.

A new command I give you: Love one another.
As I have loved you, so you must love one another.
By this everyone will know that you are my disciples,
if you love one another.
John 13:34-35

Recently, I had a chance to see this type of love unfold in an up-close and personal way. My friend discovered that due to some dire medical needs, she would need to bring her whole family to America for a year-long medical furlough. However, moving would cause an enormous expense that she could not cover. In addition to keeping up payments on her home abroad, she would need to find a home here with a landlord willing to rent to someone with 8 children, a van big enough to cart around her entire crew, and everything you need to make a home run (beds and bedding, sheets and a couch, kitchen cookware and utensils, laundry supplies, and the list could go on and on). She was praying, but the task seemed daunting. Could she really move 8 children halfway around the world as a single mother?

With Jesus as their daddy—absolutely!

All I did was make a few announcements and organize a list of needs, but a great fire can be started with only a small spark. The love of Jesus compelled His people to give in ways I could never have dared to imagine. People who didn’t even know my friend were calling me on the phone asking how they could help. Everything on the list, from a whisk to a 15-passenger van, was covered in only a few weeks. Volunteers poured in to help me set up the house. A handful of ladies offered to come throughout the year to help with dishes, laundry, or babysitting. Several men offered to pick up and move heavy furniture. Teenagers offered to help mow the lawn. A speech therapist who specializes in Down Syndrome offered to assist my friend’s son. A piano tuner offered to tune her piano, an English teacher offered to help the kids with their homework, and another dear woman handed me an envelope full of pre-dated checks to cover all the utility expenses for the whole year! These are things that were not specifically asked for, but needed. Who but the Son of God could so intimately know and meet the needs of my dear friend and her children before she even asked? Who else could lavish love like this?

And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love,
may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people,
to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ,
and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—
that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.
Ephesians 3:17-19

Only Jesus, the One who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine. The One who calls on His people to love one another. The One who is the head of the body, the Church, and the One who longs to be our daddy.