Come by our house on a sunny day and there’s a good chance you’ll see me mowing the yard. Something I used to despise has become one of my favorite past times…there are few things I enjoy more right now than hopping on my dad’s riding lawn mower (that he loans to me for this purpose) and cruising around our relatively secluded property, the sun shining on my face.
But by far my favorite part of this new mowing experience is that my almost-1-year-old son Sam loves to join me. Maile says that if he’s inside the house when I start the mower, he sits up and waves his arms in the air, excited at what’s to come.
He sits on my leg as I buzz around the yard, and I have to really hold on to him. Even though I can’t hear him, I can feel him humming to himself, just jabbering away in his little baby language.
Sometimes he kind of gets in the way when he grabs at the steering wheel, but I gently pry away his hands.
Sometimes, when we’re cutting close to the boundaries, the branches reach out and scratch him. He doesn’t like this, and I always move him over to my other knee if I see that it’s going to get too painful for him.
He also usually chews on his hands and gets slobber all over my jeans, but I love that he enjoys doing the work with me, even if he’s not really doing anything.
I wonder if this is sometimes how God feels.
I wonder if he just wants me to be excited about spending time with him.
I wonder if he wants me to know that he’s got a firm grip on me.
I wonder if he wants me to get my little fingers off the steering wheel and let him drive.
I wonder if he is trying to show me that even if the branches occasionally scratch my face, it only happens after he has reached out with his own bare hands and, gripping the thorns until his hands bled, kept the worst of it away from me.
i often find myself wondering if God thinks my tractor’s sexy…
great allegory, mr. smucker. though i want to know how God feels about you slobbering on his work pants.
he’s used to it.
Thank you – I needed all of those points today!
James Brett, you’re officially responsible for a minor nuclear blast in the Far East. Not the Koreans, thankfully – just me letting off one of my concert-hall-large LOLs when I read your comment.
I cried when I read this. So Awesome!! Great analogy
awesome analogy. i think that is truly how we are to be about his work in our lives, sitting on his knee and letting him do the driving. so often we get in the way and try to take the wheel from him.