The other day I was sitting in the office at my work, waiting to turn in my checkout, and above my the manager’s desk there’s a little crayon stick figure drawing of him and his son. His son took time to draw that in class and he put all of the expertise a young child can put into it. He drew his lines carefully and made sure he picked the right crayon color for his dads brown hair and he made sure to pick his little orange crayon for his hair. He took the time to draw glasses on his dad and a baseball glove on his hand. He even wrote everybody’s initials underneath them just in case you didn’t know which family member it was solely by their appearance.When he gave that drawing to his dad what do you think he did? “Son you mean to tell me that I changed your diapers for years, you drew on my walls with permanent marker a few weeks ago, I’ve fed you, worked my tail off to feed you and keep you alive for the last FOUR YEARS and THIS is how you repay me??? With a stick figure drawing? Clouds aren’t blue, son! Clouds are white!” Of course not! That painting meant the world to him because his little boy made it for him. His little boy whom he loves more than anything in this world, who he would lay his own life down for, put his time and effort into that picture just to make his daddy proud.
Now, in the grand scheme of life, how much do you think you could get for that drawing on eBay? Nothing right? It wouldn’t even be worth the shipping it would cost to get to your house, even if it was the best drawing a four year old has ever made with a crayon. But to my manager, his little boy’s drawing meant so much to him that he put it above his desk so that he, and all of his coworkers would see it every day. If that drawing came from anybody else’s kid he probably would have burned it as soon as they walked off. But it came from his little boy, whom he’s exceedingly proud of so it meant the world to him.
This is kind of like our obedience and acts of service to God. We do these little acts of service to him like feed the homeless, tell people about the hope we’ve found in Him, read his word because we want to get to know Him better. But in the grand scheme, it means nothing compared to what he did for us. He’s changed our filthy spiritual diapers, He’s provided for us, He’s clothed us, He’s spoken blessings over us and given us favor our entire lives, He was even beaten and tortured, nailed to a cross and suffocated in his own blood for 6 hours, naked in the sun just so you could have a chance to be in communion with Him. Anything we could ever do for God, the mission trips, serving in your church on the weekends, you could dedicate your entire life to God and put $500 in the offering bucket every week, but it’s still just a stick figure crayon drawing compared to what He’s done for us. Let that sink in… But in that moment when we look up after ushering on the weekends and say, “Daddy look what I drew for you!” He looks at you with love welling up in His eyes, smiles and says, “I’m so proud of you son, that’s beautiful!” because you’re his boy. You’re his little girl and He loves you with a love so extravagant that if He peeled back a new layer of it every single day for the rest of your life, you wouldn’t have even scratched the surface of it’s monumental glory. You could be laying on your death bed completely overwhelmed to tears by how much God loves you and you still wouldn’t be able to comprehend it’s vastness until you slipped into eternity.
I pray today that y’all catch this. I pray that you understand on a deeper level how much God cares for you and loves you and that your obedience would come out of that extravagance and a desperate desire to please the Father rather than out of legalism. This faith is not about a long list of things you can’t do. It’s about serving a loving Father who want’s to give you fullness, clarity, peace and joy. It’s about pursuing the loving God who created you and knows the beginning from the end. If we would just catch this and listen to the gentle nudging of His voice because He wants the best for us, I believe our lives would be so much richer. God’s love and what He has to offer is so much more intense and deeper than anything this world has to offer. Love you guys, thanks for your support.
