Have you ever played peek-a-boo? It is a lot of fun. You can get a baby giggling for half an hour with a simple cloth and the surprise word: “peek-a-boo!”

In childhood development studies, this is one of the most important experiences for a baby. When they grow a bit, peek-a-boo turns into hide-and-seek and the purpose is similar, these games teach permanency—babies and toddlers learn that seeming absence, doesn’t mean abandonment—they learn that they can hide and be found or you can still be found. Often for a toddler, separation anxiety is an opposite emotional expression from peek-a-boo. Separation anxiety is marked by big tears, crying, screaming, clinging.

I write as a parent who is transitioning our son into nursery school currently. For me it is a study in separation anxiety (mine and his). I am joyful that our younger child has reached this stage and yet, it is difficult for all involved. Two days ago as we were headed into the nursery school, he looked at me sternly and, in his best bossy voice, said, “Don’t go!”

Rationally, I know that separation anxiety is a stage that changes and is made better by time and appropriate attachment. Emotionally it is simply a challenge and “heart thing.”

Since we are all children of God, what do we learn about our own relationship with our Heavenly Parent? One of my favorite scriptures comes to mind from Romans 8:

Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

May it is so with our spiritual journeys as children of God, while we are on the journey we continue to grow up spiritually. Let us all grow deeper in our relationship with God, confident that nothing will ever separate us from God’s love.