God has compassion on us

“As a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear Him; for He knows how we are formed, He remembers that we are dust.” Psalm 103:13-14
When I came across this verse recently, I was greatly encouraged by it. Sometimes we can feel like complete failures, and wonder why God bothers with us. We struggle against sin, but every now and then we are overcome by it. Like Paul, we can despair in our inability to serve God as fully and faithfully as we would like to: “I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do – this I keep on doing” (Rom. 7:18-19).
But here’s the comforting thing: God knows how weak and pathetic we are. He knows that we are mortal, frail, fickle beings, created out of dust and blown about like dust by the difficultes we face in life. He knows our limitations, better than we know them ourselves. And therefore He has compassion on us. Like a father watching his child start to learn to walk, He is smiling on us as we take those few faltering steps. He knows it’s inevitable that we won’t be able to do everything perfectly, that we will fall down from time to time. But every time, He is there to pick us up and put us back on our feet again. He treats us with compassion, not condemnation.