the middle kid and a king.
So I’ve got this middle kid. He loves all animals and dinosaurs and casually busts out obscure facts he’s memorized about them. His favorite song on Spotify is called “1,000 Fart Sounds” (look it up, it’s a thing). He loves baseball, devours every single Calvin and Hobbes book he can find, and asks to ride his bike from the moment he opens his eyes to the minute he lays himself back down. He makes weird faces in every photo ever, he’s great at pressing all the buttons everywhere we go (both literally and figuratively), and he tries to rough and rowdy his baby brother on the reg while simultaneously menacing his older sister whenever possible . He’s SO awesome, but sort of in a hot-mess-express kind of way.
For example, this is when he cut his own hair.
[Not pictured: me dying/laughing/dying laughing.]
But then he has this other side to him, which I think shows more of the true core of his personality. In those rare in-between moments like walking to the car in the parking lot or on a hike, he’ll just walk up and quietly hold my hand. Or ask me to watch him play Legos. Or gently snuggle up next to me when he first wakes up in the morning while I’m reading on the couch. I know the “little years” are about over for him, but man I hope he never shakes that. He just genuinely loves togetherness, even if there’s nothing to say. He is such a beautiful picture of exactly what the Lord is asking of me in our friendship, and that it’s okay to just slow down and be together. It doesn’t have to be fancy, prepared ahead of time, or bustling with any kind of anything. It’s as sweet as it can be, even in its most simplest form.
I had a conversation a while back about what it’s like to know Jesus rather than just knowing about Jesus. If you had never met me, you could probably find me online, scroll through my profiles on social media and get an idea of what I look like or some of the things I was interested in. You might even realize we know some of the same people even, or have been to some of the same places.
If you came over to my house, even if I wasn’t home, you’d probably still be able to get a sense of who I am. Seeing what hangs on my walls, what’s in my fridge, what kind of books are stacked on my bedside table. You could talk to my friends, and they could tell you all they know about me, all of the funny stories and memories we have together, about the times I probably kind of blew it with them. But until you and I were actually together, you’d never truly know me. When you and I are in the same room, looking into each other’s eyes, hearing each other’s voices, the intonations of how we speak and the sly cheeky humor we are most definitely bantering with, it becomes more intimate. It’s not just a safe outside observation from a distance of this other person over there. It’s a real connection that’s happening, a friendship.
I love the way Bob Goff describes this idea in his book, Love Does:
“Jesus said that unless you know Him like a child you’ll never really know him at all. Kids don’t care about facts, and they certainly don’t study each other. They’re just with each other; they do fun stuff together. That’s what Jesus had in mind.”
Jesus came to the same earth you and I are standing on, and he got involved. He breathed the same air through the same kind of nose and laughed and cried real tears from his eyes and felt real pain, just like you and I. He had real friends and went to hang out at their houses. He spoke life into people’s darkest moments. He did the work of just showing up, even when it cost him something. Even when it cost him everything. Colossians 1:15 says of Jesus that, “He is the image of the invisible God”, and if that’s the kind of friend God is, then count me in.
But while he was so relatable in his humanness, he also had that flip side of being 100% God at the exact same time. He did so many things just like we do, but he also did for us everything that we could never do on our own. He wasn’t just here to have a good time, or be a good person, or to make something of himself in this world. He came to mend all that is broken in the world, even us, and restore us to our Father, the way it was always supposed to be this whole time.
“For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.”
- 1 Colossians 1:19-20
Jesus was the presence of God in the body of a man, because God wanted us to know him and to be with him both in this life and the next, and there simply wasn’t any other way for that to happen except through Christ. He drew near, because we couldn’t.
Don’t miss this, friend. He’s not just a mentor you should respectfully study from a distance to know how to live a life that’s good. His love is not an imaginary tale from a far off land. It is here, it is now, and it is yours for the taking. FOR. REAL.
Jesus is the blessed one. He is the blessing. And he came and died and rose again so he could share it with his friends and bless them too. What a friend we have in Jesus.
