Jade Fern Grove Sitting flat on your bum doesn't buy any bread.

The reiteration that John's god was flawless in its judgement did not sit well with Esma. Maybe it had to do with her age. Had they met, when she had been just a little and shy kid with no self-esteem, she would have eaten up his words as a sole truth and would not have questioned anything. Now, however, she was an adolescent, in that stage, when the figurative umbilical cord between her and her mom was weakening day by day. One of the first signs of that happening was that Esma no longer was convinced that her mom knew everything. And if this was true, then this also implied that she would/could make mistakes also. 

"How does the god know that they seek forgiveness for real?" Esma asked, because again the declaration that god loved all his children did not seem right. Contradicting even, though she could not remember now, what facts did not sit well together. "How can he love me, if he does not know anything about me?" she questioned. "And how can I love him, if I do not know him?" it was a valid argument, because she knew, what it meant to love her mom as a physical being. But loving something that you could neither see, nor talk to, nor feel? That did not feel real. 

"Is Jesus your brother then? Do you know him personally?" Esma asked, referring to the earlier part of their conversation, when John had mentioned that the god had had a son too. If John was his kid as well, then they had to be siblings.