Here are some of the things God taught me as I spent last week in Germany with Tania visiting her family. They live in a beautiful area in the middle of nowhere, on land owned by a rich German count. We had to watch Tania's nephew and niece while their parents were away.
Colin:
While spending 2 days helping to take care of a 3.5-year-old boy, Colin, I somehow very quickly managed to become his hero. He wanted to spend all his time with me, wanted me to play with him, sit next to him, and even put him to bed. Colin, however, was incredibly loud and insatiable, and I am—ask my friends—not very good with kids. I found it extremely difficult to handle him, and to keep him entertained. The biggest problem was that we couldn’t communicate! He only spoke 3.5-year-old German, and I speak only English and Dutch. Besides the difference of age and interests that separated us, we also had this language barrier to deal with. It didn’t seem to bother him so much, but I was getting more and more frustrated. I asked God to help me with the situation, and he showed me something.
My relationship with Colin was comparable to God’s relationship with me in a number of ways. Colin was stubborn, he didn’t listen, he would constantly do things he knew wasn’t allowed, he was dirty, messy, threw lots of tantrums, and it always seemed to be my fault when something bad happened. Sound familiar? I realized that in a relative way, I act the same with God. I’m stubborn, I don’t listen, I keep doing what I know I’m not supposed to, and then I blame God when things go wrong. He has lots of grace with me, like I had to have with Colin.
This is what really got me though: Colin was probably convinced that I had some serious issues with my communication. From his point of view, I simply couldn’t speak properly… I was, well, rather stupid in his eyes, not even being able to correctly pronounce simple German words. Then I realized how often I accuse God of being a terrible communicator! Why does God always make such a feeble attempt at making his will known to me?
God showed me, through Colin, that actually the opposite is the case. See, in reality, it was I, the adult that was an excellent communicator. I speak two languages rather fluently, and am very experienced in other cultures. It was actually Colin that was too young to really listen, too rushed to really interpret, and too uneducated to really understand. In the same way, God is actually an excellent communicator, the best in fact! It is I who is too impatient to listen, to busy to interpret, too uneducated in spiritual matters to make sense of what God is always trying to tell me.
Zoë:
Zoë is Colin’s younger sister of one and a half years. She is very cute and easygoing most of the time, but is also sometimes prone to tantrums. It was my job one day to push her through the forest in her kid’s wagon. It was the kind of wagon that had a seat, a steering wheel like a bike, and pedals, but there was also a pole coming out the back with a handle so that the parent could push and direct the whole thing. Colin was being pushed in his own wagon by Tania’s dad, Tania was along side me, and Peter the cat was following us.
After a while of struggling through the forest, of which the floor was covered in roots and rocks, I noticed how cool the construction of Zoë’s wagon was. I realized that if I simply pushed, she could use the steering wheel to direct the wagon, and mostly she did a fair job at keeping to the path. Being so young and fragile, however, I still had to help her a lot. If I decided she needed to go left or right, I could easily control her direction no matter which way she tried to steer the wheel. In this way I was able to keep her from getting stuck in ruts and roots, or from tipping over.
God showed me something through this: In my life, it is I that makes the choices, right or left. I usually do a decent job of staying on track. But if God were not helping me, not only would I soon run out of momentum, but also I would get stuck in ruts all the time, and probably tip over now and then. In a literal sense, God has a handle on my life! He lets me steer, but at the same time he keeps me going in the right direction—as long as that’s where I want to go.
See every now and then Zoë wanted me to stop. She wanted to get out, look at something, or turn around. Even though I wanted to move on, I wouldn’t force her. My job was, honestly, just getting her to where she wanted to go so she could have a good time! Isn’t that what God wants for us? Isn’t that how he holds our hands and lays out our steps? Like a parent labors to bring joy to their child, so God labors to bring us joy.
SPF
September 16, 2009
