"Can I help make the French Toast Miss Anna?"
These are just a few of the many questions that come out of dear Marta's mouth during a typical day.
And as heartwarming as it is to hear an offer of assistance, when it is coming from the mouth of even the most competent 3 year old it is quickly followed by thoughts of how it would be much quicker to do the dishes alone, or simpler to make the French Toast without help.
But then I see a pair of eager blues eyes belonging to a little girl who just wants to do anything and everything with me and I realize that my preferences of doing things a certain way or at a certain pace are not important compared to the opportunity to do something with Marta.
It also is not unusual in a typical day for the chubby hands of a toddler to almost de-pants me in an attempt to get me to pick him up. Once held he is happy to just be with me amused at my attempts to peel a carrot or whatever other task I am attempting to do with one and a half hands. If I am unloading the dishwasher he is right there as I quickly and strategically remove the non plastic items. One day I was watering the rose bushes and he deserted his balls and plastic bottles to help hold the hose. All of these portray the beauty of a child's desire and delight to just be with a person the look up to and love.
Of course kids have a tendency to be interested in whatever they see others interested in, but there is also an endearing aspect of their desire to just to be with you. There have been several instances where my first response was impatience at having to share a task or limit my ability to do a task efficiently because either Marta or Filip wanted to be with me. But it is in those moments that the Lord has pointed out the beauty of their desire to be with me. Not because it felt good that they wanted to be with me, but because of the example they are of how we can have the same childlike desire to be with God and do everything with Him.
Through these daily moments I am reminded that God wants to be with us. That is why He sent Jesus to be "God with us". He not only wants to be with us but He wants us to be a part of what He is doing in restoring people to Himself. And unlike me with the kids, God is not limited by our being with him nor is He impatient by our slower pace or many distractions-just to be with Him is His delight.
So just as Marta and Filip desire to be with me in anything and everything I do, so too do I hope to have that same childlike desire to be with God in anything and everything. Without an agenda but with a pure desire just to be with Him, live life with Him, to be and do everything with Him.....
"For in him we live, and move and have our being"
Acts 17:28
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| At the pool with Filip (his pants came off somewhere along the way!) |
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| Spent a few days relaxing at a mountain resort in Marlboro, Macedonia |
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