Asking Our Father to Help

Peter, a spry four-year-old boy was fooling around in his back yard.  His best friend lived next door and was in his backyard too, they were playing through the fence that separated the two yards.  In both of the little boys' yards, there was a huge rock.  Perhaps a boulder would be a better distinction to do the stone its justice.

Both boys were trying with all their might to move their respective boulders.  Peter could not make his budge.  His friend was equally unsuccessful with his stone, and frustrations were growing by the moment for each of the young boys.  Peter tried pushing, pulling, and prying to no avail.  He could hear his best friend struggling equally through the fence.

Peter could hear as his friend threw up his hands and exclaimed, "I give up!  I'm getting my dad to help me!"  His friend ran inside his house.  The next thing Peter heard was his friend, with dad in tow, coming out to the rock.  Peter peered through the gaps in the fence to see his friend's father walk over to the stone and, with no effort, lifted the stone over his shoulder and brought it to the outskirts of the yard and tossed it out of the yard and into the woods.

His friend was so excited and relieved, Peter could hear him shouting with glee.  This only strengthened Peter's resolve to move the stone himself.  He tried even harder than before to move the stone, still making no impact.  He could hear his friend go back inside as the sun began to set, but he was still no closer to moving the boulder.  He began to get very angry and started to cry out of his dejection.  Peter could easily have asked his able and willing father to help too, but he was determined to do it himself, without any help.  As a result, the boulder remained unmoved as Peter cried himself to sleep.

Aren't we just like Peter trying to move the immovable boulder without any help?  Life is full of stones for us to attempt to push around.  And, though we could easily ask our Heavenly Father for help, we turn back to the boulders like prideful and compulsive toddlers, just beating our heads against the rocks.

The boulders are there, they will always be there in our way.  How we handle them is the important thing.  We can either trudge against them like Peter, or handle them like his friend and call on the power and willingness of our Father in Heaven.  These are the two choices for dealing with trouble and challenges in life.  Let us then choose to rely on God at all times for all things because in doing so we are doing what He asks as well as what He wants!