Buddy the Elf

There is a scene in the movie Elf..............

( rabbit trail with me for a moment.... I never laughed or cried so hard at a movie..... my kids will to this day tell you how I laughed and laughed at that silly little movie and yet there was something on it for me... and in its simplicity it spoke volumes.)

Don't quite know how to give you a synopsis of this movie except to say Will Ferrell plays a human orphan who gets adopted by Santa.. he is raised in the North Pole and then one day realizes he is different and is told he isn't an elf and goes to Manhattan to find his Father.... seriously.... this movie spoke to me... we can't choose what He uses .. I'm just glad He does...

So at one point Papa Elf is talking to Buddy about the lack of Christmas spirit and when he tells him that not everyone believes in Santa (bare with me here) Buddy is incredulous. He has seen him... grown up with him... watched him.... etc.... etc.... etc... He has knowledge of the things that make Santa ... Santa...

Well when I watched that movie for the first time it was moments like that one that grabbed a hold of my heart and it obviously wasn't about Santa.....

A son of mine was giddy... he had been in a history class where they had talked about some council and how in a vote they almost but one vote would have with their decision made someone else Jesus' mother...... He was challenging me about the basic tenets of the Christian belief. I just laughed... I said to him that many go to seminary and hear these things and more... I explained to him about authorship of books being challenged... and all the different things that get stirred up in an academic environment... and then I told him how I got saved....

No one ever witnessed to me..... some of you have heard that my only exposure to anything "Jesus" was Little House on the Prairie.... Seriously....

So I told Him... One night in a very dark and lonely place... as I stood by a window ... words came out of my mouth like the sinners prayer. I spoke to God and said to Him that I didn't even know if He existed... or if He was real.. but if He did and if He was and if He came to me ... then ... Then I would give Him my whole life to Him.. if He would just come to me .....

I told my son that the words weren't out of my mouth when the room filled with a presence and a reality and a light so strong that from that moment though I have faltered I have never been able to push away the reality of God. In that moment I knew 5 things... I knew there was a God, I knew it had to do about Jesus, the cross, the bible, and that He was going to lead me somewhere to teach me about Himself......

For months upon months after that moment He walked with me and talked with me and never left my side...... His eyes gazed at me and burned into me, His love washed over me, His hand held me up, HIs kindness gently moved me through that first season of knowing Him.....

Though there have been many a moment when I have faltered.... I have seen too much.. walked too far to ever deny who He is........ Robed in majesty and yet a Father who gently and compassionately leads His people.... Holy in all His ways yet stoops down to sit with us.... Creator of all Heaven and Earth and yet so in love with the object of His affections ... with the Masterpiece He calls forth in each of us ... that if He did not contain Himself His heartbeat would send shock waves throughout the universe.... His penetrating glance undoes me and I walk undone... His patience startles me ... His strength makes me... His kindness moves me... His touch melts me....

I long for the knowledge of Him to fill the Earth... I long for the lost and the hungry and the broken and the list could go on and on.... I long for those needing salvation and those within the family of believers ... that we would all know His passions.... They are for us.... The heartbeat of God pulsates with a wonder and a power and an ache....... He yearns for us .. It amazes me and may my amazement go even deeper still that my Creator aches for me ... yearns for me to be with Him and walk with Him and look up at Him and hear Him and love Him..... may we walk into the understanding even more fully that the Heavenly gates stand wide and open and that as His we can walk straight in and up... straight in and up with boldness and confidence... because we are His.. His sons and His daughters..... we belong.... we are a people ... we are His....

With Childlike faith I want to journey until the end of my days.... He sustains all.. His breath is in all ... He holds up all.. He brings forth the Sun to run its course and He makes all things new.....

That is why I fell in love with Buddy so many years ago... with childlike faith that character walks in and out of circumstances and believes.................