Recently, my eldest son has taken on the habit of trying to pick me up. In the morning, I will often come into his room and lay down in his bed beside him. But by this time, he has usually climbed out of bed, ready to take on the world.
So, there he is, standing beside his little twin bed at under three feet tall. He takes his tiny, toddler hands and reaches under my ankle to lift me up.
“Get up, daddy,” he’ll say. “I get up daddy.”
And so I’ll sit up in the bed.
And he will quickly come to me and ask for me to pick him up, sometimes politely, sometimes not so politely. “Daddy, hold!”
And so I’ll pick him up and lift him into my lap.
It is at this moment that my son does a very funny thing. He tries to pick me up. He takes my arm and begins to tug. “I pick up Daddy,” he’ll say as he grunts and strains to lift his daddy. And I’ll usually stand up, carrying him as we walk downstairs for breakfast.
How often do we approach God, attempting to lift him up, to do the work of a faithful Christian, and not even realize or acknowledge that it is God who enables and carries us to do these good deeds? What a gracious God, that he would so humble himself to the point of saving us, and then invite us to be a part of his mission of redemption, when we have so little to offer apart from what he has already given us. And while we think that we are accomplishing so much, the Holy Spirit is carrying us along, enabling us to become more like our big brother, Jesus and to honor our Father.
What a humble Holy Spirit we have. What a kind older brother we have. What a loving Father we have.