Of all the things that I thought I’d think this Christmas, the most surprising thought happened as we were traveling southbound on I-77 somewhere past Ridgeway and somewhere before Blythewood on our way to Columbia, SC.
That’s when I woke up and realized that I’d nodded off. Maybe it was for a few seconds or a few miles, but there was definitely a moment that my eyes were not on the road! The first thing I thought when I woke up was, “Thank God, I’m not driving,” and the second thing I thought was,
“Oh, God! I’m not driving!!”
My sons are in the process of getting all of their required 60 hours of time behind the wheel as they prepare to trade in the driver permits for licenses, and lately Parker gets the drive down to Columbia and Will gets the drive back. And my nodding off while Parker was driving was a fantastic lesson about the reason behind the coming of Jesus that we’re celebrating this season.
In Christ, God came near, yes. But God isn’t one of those “helicopter” parents who hovers over his children and makes sure that his kids never experience pain or failure. Of course, he’s also not one of the cold, prickly parents who never console a hurting child or take the time to hug good night and say, “I love you.”
And while this analogy will fall woefully short, I fell asleep – even if only briefly – because something in me knew that Parker was okay at the wheel. Think about that from our perspective, and how jacked up our view tends to be of the coming of Jesus on that first Christmas night.
We think that God sent Jesus to be near us in order to ensure that we would never – even for a split-second – have to deal with any kind of choice or responsibility. We sing “Jesus, Take the Wheel” loudly like some kind of bad karaoke simply because we’re tired of driving, when the reality is that God came near to us at Christmas in order to fill us and send us back out into dark and dangerous places at Pentecost.
There will be a day (and it’s coming quickly) when Parker and Will are going to slip into a car behind the wheel and they are going to drive somewhere at some speed for some reason and I won’t be in the car with them. My job is to prepare them for that day, and the more prepared they’ll be then is directly related to how relaxed I am as they drive now.
So many times we sit in a car that isn’t moving and wait for God to move it, but the truth is that He is waiting to lead us, and it’s so much easier for him to do that when the car is moving and we’re pushing the gas. Maturity as followers of Jesus is the difference between Parker driving with me in the car and him driving a car that is behind mine as I lead him where I want him to go. For that to happen, I’ve got to trust that he can actually drive, and God wants to have that trust of us, as well.
[Tweet “As God’s children, we are led by him, not driven by him.”]Again, this isn’t a slam at Carrie Underwood’s hit song, and it’s not an analogy that will hold up under intense scrutiny, but the Bible reminds us in Romans 8:14 that, as God’s children, we are led by him, not driven by him.
Sometimes, God’s silence says more about our growth than it does his absence. He wants us to be prepared to take our lives anywhere he leads us, and when he can trust us to drive, he’ll be faithful to caravan us into the greatest adventure we could ever imagine.
[Tweet “Sometimes, God’s silence says more about our growth than his absence.”]At Christmastime, we realize that God came near in order to send us far, and that means that “Oh come, let us adore him” must be followed with “And now, let’s go proclaim him!”
Crank up your car, because God has given you some keys, and there’s a car he trusts you to drive. He’s with you, even if sometimes it seems like he isn’t.
