Walking on the Father's Feet

During some reflection just now, I felt God give me an incredibly powerful image of His grace.

For those of you who don't know, I have two little brothers, Nate and Asher. Being 16-19 years older than them has provided some really amazing opportunities and experiences that many would have to wait until parenthood to happen. One of these is a simple little game that I would often play with Nate when he was still learning to walk. I'm sure it's a game many of us would be familiar with, even if we didn't get the opportunity to play it with our own parents - basically, Nate would stand on my feet, I'd hold him up by his hands, and I would walk around with him standing on my feet. When he couldn't quite walk for himself yet, I was able to help him get where he needed to go while helping him experience and learn what it is like to be able to walk on his own.

We are God's children. The Bible makes that abundantly clear over and over again. We are still learning to walk, and though some of us are perhaps more practiced or developed than others, I don't believe we will truly reach the fulfilment of that until Christ's return. While we are learning to walk, we have two options. The first is that we can try to learn all on our own, in which case we are going to regularly stumble, fall, and run out of energy. The second option is that we call out to our loving Father, lift our hands up to Him, and let Him lead us to where we need to go.

You see, when we finally raise our hands to heaven in complete surrender, what God sees is an invitation to take our hands and lift us up so that we don't stumble again. We might occasionally slip off, just like Nate's feet would sometimes slip off mine as they were jolted by the rocking steps, but I would always pick him back up and get him back on my feet in no time. In the same way, we are always held up by God's strong arms of grace and mercy, even through all the craziness, change, temptation, and acceleration that life throws our way.

When we're walking on our Father's feet, He will always get us to where we need to go. But an even more incredible thing is that we also get to be a part of the journey! We're not being carried from one place to another, and we're not constantly falling on our faces instead of moving forward - instead, we are moving in step with our Father, experiencing things a little bit at a time under His guidance. Through this process, He can take us to see things we might never have seen if we'd just been exploring on our own! He can also steer us away from things that would put us in danger if we'd gone near it, protecting us from them.

This is God's grace. This is how we receive it. Hands held high to the heavens, asking for God to come and lift us from our sin, lift us from our struggles, and to guide us along His path to the places we need to go.

I know it's not always easy to accept it, or even to wrap our heads around it. We as a human race are fiercely stubborn and independent, particularly in Western countries. In fact, the reason that I actually had this image come to mind at all is because for the past several months, I've had to wrestle between my independence and God's grace. Last night, I finally put my hands to heaven, and despite the fact that I was sick, tired, and sore all day, today has been one of the easiest, most productive, most God-centered days I have had in a little while. The difference was God's grace, actively moving in my life.

The same gift I've been reminded of in the last couple of days is available to you as well. Will you receive God's gift of grace? Will you stop trying to walk on your own, and finally call out to your loving Father - finally ask Him to lift you up, place you on His feet, and walk you to where you need to go? "For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened." (Matthew 7:8 NIV)