I currently have two daughters. One is Eve (pictured) the other is Dorothy. Just recently Dotty started walking with help (video below). They both make me very happy and have given me some insight into how much God loves me. Evelyn likes to push everything as far as she can.

I was sitting in my chair reading the mail. I had opened a bill and set it down on the table next to me. Eve walked up and grabbed the bill. I asked her to put it down and told her it was an important piece of paper that daddy needed. I then asked her not to touch it again. She knows what the consequences are when she disobeys. So she set it down, and stepped back a little. Then she smiled, looked me in the eyes and put her hand on the table, about 6 inches from the bill. She looked at her hand, the bill, then back at me, and picked her hand up and moved it closer, 5 inches. She repeated this, each time with a huge smile.

I sat there, watching her, knowing that she was going to grab it, but really not wanting her to. I wanted her obedience, I wanted to not have to punish her for what was quickly become the inevitable. 2 inches.

At this point, I grabbed her hand, looked her in the eye, and said something to the effect of “I asked you not to touch it, and you’re trying to see how far you can go before I do something.” As soon as I let go, her cute little hands couldn’t help themselves and grabbed the paper. Such a small thing was such a disappointment. Now I had to follow through and give her a little swat for touching a stupid piece of paper.

After I did, I held her and asked her if she knew why she got punished. Of course she confused the action she had taken with her heart’s desire to sin, and answered “Me touch paper.” This was true, she got disciplined for touching the paper, but the bigger picture I wanted to give her was that she got disciplined because her heart didn’t want to obey her daddy.

I can’t begin to imagine how much I do this to God. Sometimes I catch myself in prayer asking for His forgiveness for an act I did, not really wanting to face my sin. I think, “If I’m going to be forgiven for something, it should be my rudeness to my wife, and not my lack of wanting to obey my Daddy.”

It also comes out when I get pissed about a situation, say, at work, and begin to get defensive or stressed instead of going to God and asking for some clarity in the situation so I can get a bigger picture of what is going on. Then approaching the party involved and being able to walk through it with them seeing not the tasks in front of me, but the idea behind it.

When I get asked to create a complex email set up for a customer that will stop emails going to their boss and have them come to them, unless said emails are from user x, y, and z, I get bogged down with tasks. I pray that God will help me continually step back and see that what I am doing, these simple yet time consuming steps, isn’t vanity. This will help the users involved be better at their job, and their job isn’t pointless either, it’s Gospel work, spreading the story of Christ. The most important job one can have, and God has given me the opportunity to be part of that.

Archived source: Blogger post BLOG-021 · original entry URL