Help!

We ask God for help.  We are taught to ask God for help.  It seems right to ask God for help.  However, most often what we ask for is so small and so short sided.  If we had access to a great chef, yet asked for an egg sandwich because we were really hungry, we would be fed, but not enriched.  Better than asking for sustenance is asking for the chef himself, saying "Teach me!"

Deuteronomy 8:3
"3 He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your ancestors had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord."
 

Also, when we only ask for his help and not Jesus himself, we imply that we have things figured out, we have our plan, we merely need his help in executing it.  Asking for Jesus himself is a means of surrendering that he is all.

In Luke 10, Martha asks for help,


“Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!”And Jesus answers her, "but few things are needed—or indeed only one.[a]Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.”


Mary chose better.  Mary chose Jesus.


The Prodigal Son, as we know by now chose wrong.  He basically said to his father, "I would rather have your riches than you!"  He went and spent those riches and was left empty.  He realized then that merely being in the presence of his father would be better than anything he could want.  He was humbled enough to finally realize that he didn't need his fathers riches (because he was too foolish to enjoy them) he needed the goodness of his father, a father that provides for those that seek him.  The son came back home, just to be near his father and his father did what our heavenly Father does when we seek him: embarrass us with the bounty of his Love.

I helped my daughter as we were climbing trees recently.  We found a beautiful tree with all the branches lined up just so.  You could just see that it was going to be a great tree to climb.  The problem was that the first branch was just out of reach.  So, my girl needed my help.  I boosted her up so she could reach the first branch.  Once she got up there she took off quickly up in the tree.  We do this to God sometimes.  We ask him to get us where we want to go and then once we are on our way, we leave him behind.  Well, until we get too high or too stuck or too far to get down.  And in our desperation we look to find him waiting, just like I was waiting for my girl, watching the whole time, patient and waiting and ever so excited when she called on my name and was back in my arms. 

Martha seems righteous in her complaint, but we realize that she has her eyes only on the smallest of matters and is missing the better portion.  The better spot is to be at Jesus' feet, like Mary.  The son went too far, and yet was received with joyous celebration when he returned.  He wasn't returning for his father's help, he was returning for his father.  What a patient Father we have, knowing that we ask for the wrong things and granting us access to the fullness of his love when we finally say "Jesus, I need you!"