All Done
With the weather cooling off, and at the firm insistence of my toddler, we took a bike ride beside the river instead of our customary before bed walk. She climbed into the kid carrier attached to my bike and hummed a little tune as we cycled along the trail. The bike moves faster than the mosquitos, but slow enough to see the sights. It’s a pretty sweet deal for an early autumn outing.
We turned at the 60 km marker and headed back with the sun now below the horizon. The most treed portions of the path were full dusk, and the openings were a sepia hue. We were still three-quarters of a kilometer from home, and the streetlights were coming on. I picked up the pace a little, to get home before dark and a little voice behind me broke her tune to say “all done, mommy.”
It's been a tough year for our family, overall, and the little voice echoed my own heart. My prayers over the past weeks could best be summarized “All done, Jesus. I am all done now, please.” I know that is foolish. We have more to do. We aren’t finished with our wanderings quite yet. Still, I am at the end of myself. I am all done.
“O.K. sweetie,” I puffed. “But we aren’t home yet. We still have to get home.”
The words penetrated my sober heart. I had meant them literally. We had three-fourths of a kilometer between us and our front door. We couldn’t be all done. Still, I realized that this is the path of sanctification. Maybe after this next move we will have a time of rest, but I am not home. I am not all done. This path of life, beauty, crooks and all, leads on, beyond this little corner I see now. I may feel like I am all done, but I am not, because I am not home yet.
She went back to singing, and I peddled on. This too is like the road of sanctification. While I bump along the seemingly endless track, someone else is doing the hard work. I may be wondering about the next turn on the path or feeling the jolts from the road, but it is Jesus who bore the sweat, like blood, on his brow. He knows the way ahead, and he has it under control. Unlike my toddler, who was being pulled by a tubby middle-aged woman, also eager to be finished the task, Jesus can tell me it really is all done. He has done it. He is all done, and He is carrying me home.
The last hundred meters or so of the trip is a downhill coast from the public trail into our cul-de-sac. The second the bike tires touched the asphalt, my daughter clapped her hands, saying “home! Home!” She was all done. I had carried her home. My heart sang at the thought of one day saying, “all done Jesus. I am home.”
Therefore we do not lose heart, but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day. For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison - 2 Corinthians 4:16-17 (NASB)
