That Little Girl is Me
It’s June and I’m about to talk about Santa – that merry old soul who always has his arms outstretched to the little children to come sit in his lap. And, when they get there, he asks: “What would you like for Christmas?” I, like many other kids, fell for that “pitch” early on, but then the day came when my big brother gave away the true story of the man-in-red!
I’ve been going to a chiropractor for a couple of months now. I could talk about the decompression table that has helped me immensely, but with this talk about arms wide open, I must tell you about Dr. Ditto. He loves kids and they love him. I’ve seen young ones come in and get adjustments right along with their moms or dads. There’s a large chalk board at children’s eye-level to draw on along with other kid-friendly items. But what strikes me is how they run to this friendly man crying out, “Dr. Ditto”. And he doesn’t hesitate to show them some love.
There’s another story I love about children and Jesus Who welcomed them with open arms though others wanted the children out of the way for more important matters and people. I’m sure you’ve read the story in the Bible (Mark 10:13-16) about Jesus welcoming children to Him despite his disciples and others wanting the kids to stay away. I’m sure you can picture it in your mind. Truthfully, I picture myself as that little girl in His lap.
I remember going through a tough personal time in my life and longing to crawl up into my daddy’s lap. Since he was extremely ill from my age of eight to his passing when I was 15, I have few memories of being able to cozy up to him and sit in his lap. I remember tears filling my eyes and longing for a daddy to comfort and hold me. That is when I pictured myself crawling up into Father God’s lap and Him, with His arms around me, and looking into my eyes and assuring me “everything’s gonna’ be alright”. And it was.
Remembering that story, hearing about some of the struggles that you are going through right now, I clearly see Jesus with a slew of children around Him. Those children are you and me and He is present with each one of us in a different way, soaking up the joy of our friendship with Him. In my mind’s eyes, I see His eyes looking at me with love and joy. Try picturing Him looking at you with a big smile of pride and joy on His face.
But, we can only imagine that He’s all tied up with more important matters in someone else’s life who is dealing with a tragedy or more important people, and they have His full attention. It feels like He is far off and occupied with greater situations.
It’s easy to set aside that we are one of His beloved children and He is looking at us and adoring us. Jesus is always looking right at you and me. What He wants more than anything is for us to look back at Him and notice His loving gaze, already focused on our faces. Jesus came to earth as God-made-Man to have a relationship with us, with every single individual God has ever created or will ever create.
He formed us from dust and then came to walk in our dust with us. He sees all our ways and knows everything about us. Yet, despite all of this, because of all of this, He wants to be with us. He wants to be with me. He wants to be with you.
He calls to you and me like He told the disciples and the crowd: “Let her/him come to me. Don’t prevent her/him.” And then we don’t hesitate. We run as fast as we can to Him.