Jesus Our True Friend makes an excellent Christmas gift for children and parents alike

Sally Lloyd-Jones speaks about how the grace and friendship of Jesus drove the writing of her latest book for children

Tell us about your book Sally - who’s it for? What do you want it to achieve?

The book really comes from my experience as a little girl who got the idea that I had to be good for God to love me. In all the things we’ve given children, I sometimes wonder if we’ve forgotten to give them hope. Children of course need our guidance in all sorts of things, but when it comes to their devotional lives, they don’t need to be told to do it better, try harder, believe more. That only leaves them in despair. The moral code always leaves us in despair. We can never live up to it. We don’t need a moral code. We need a rescuer. I wanted children to know that God loves them, they don’t have to be good for God to love them. I want them to know that Jesus is their friend, that he sees them, he knows them, and he loves them even when they mess up or everything goes wrong.

You talk about God as a friend to children; how do you think children best understand that idea of friendship?

I didn’t set out with this theme of friendship, it emerged as I wrote. I started writing different stories and saw a thread: friendship. The book sort of knew what it needed to be. As books so often do.

Children know what a friend is. As a little child my dad told me that Jesus would be my best friend, and I understood what that meant. I knew absolutely what that meant. A friend is someone who is there for you, who loves you and likes you. It is the opposite of thinking of God as a ……