Are We All Four-year Olds?

 Yesterday Maria came to clean our house - always a wonderful day! I had an interesting experience with Makynlee my four-year old granddaughter who is not sophisticated or artful, just a typical child.

I had come home late and asked Maria on her way into another part of the house if Jeffrey had paid her yet. She said no. When I went over to the sideboard to pull out my wallet, Makynlee wanted to see and know what I was doing. I showed her the money I got out to pay Maria. She asked if she could do it. I said sure. Maria came in with buckets, brooms, and mops in her hand and set them down. Before Makynlee could hand over the money, Maria went upstairs to finish off some vacuuming. I told Makynlee she could either hold on to the money or set it on the counter until Maria came back down.

Interestingly, Makynlee elected to hold on to the money and then decided to inspect Maria's work in the rest of the house. She found Isla's room not cleaned up and was going to tell Maria about it until her mom stopped her and told her that Maria didn't need to clean Isla's room as Isla had been sleeping in it when Maria came and nothing had been put away and it would have taken Maria far too long to clean her room when her time was better spent cleaning out the bathrooms and such. When Maria came down the stairs, Makynlee handed her the money.

I reflected on the "natural man" tendency of Makynlee to be the "inspector" because she was holding the money. She hadn't even thought of inspecting Maria's work until she held it in her hand.

I started thinking about callings in the church. When people hold a calling, they suddenly feel it is important for them to inspect work done or how lives are lived when they actually have been given God's grace to give to others. There is a "natural man's" tendency to be in charge, to interpret actions and lives instead of just transferring the blessing God wants to give. What if there is no one to stop them and explain what is really going on in a situation? 

Are we acting like four-year olds in our church callings?