I Want You to Help Me

Joseph had a lot of siblings.

Honestly, he didn't even know all of them. There were some with whom he was very close, some were acquaintances, but the vast majority of them he had never even met. They were all united by a common purpose, despite a few minor differences, and they all lived to serve their Father.

Their Father had adopted them all, snatched from different dangers to come and live with Him in safety. Some had been adopted from as young as five and six, while others had silver hair before the adoption papers had been signed. All had different skills and varying levels of talents in each of those skills. Joseph was not terribly skilled at anything in particular, but he was more learned than a good number of his siblings.

The greatest ongoing project of the family was “the house”. It was an enormous structure that had been worked on for longer than any of the siblings had been alive, and could easily go on for decades, maybe centuries. Father included all of the siblings on it whenever He could.

Joseph was excited to work on the house. At times, Father would even leave entire jobs to him – Joseph had completed electrical circuits in whole rooms of the house, had lumber cut and ready for use when his Father arrived, and could set up or tear down equipment after any job was finished.

But as time went on, the house never seemed to end. Joseph would arrive at home, and Father would be sitting by the door.

“Joseph, would you like to go work on the house?”

If Joseph had had a good day, he would reply “Sure!”, but if he’d had a long or tiring day, he would say “I guess… let me go get ready.” with little or no enthusiasm.

Every day he would come home, and every day Father would be waiting for him.

“Joseph, would you like to go work on the house?”

And Joseph would more and more predictably reply “I guess… let me go get ready.” And as time went on, he was never ready by the time Father had left for work. Joseph would sigh apologetically, and would generally end up wasting what was left of the day.

At this point, whenever Joseph did come to the job site, his work was more foreign to him. He didn’t understand the pattern, and he didn’t always understand his Father’s instructions. As a result, work was slower, and he would always get frustrated. He used this as an excuse whenever he didn’t make it to the site. “It’s always inefficient when I’m around. Father works faster with a different sibling, or even by Himself.”

One day, during a relatively frustrating project, Joseph threw his tools down and raised this point to his Father, who sat down across from the exasperated son.

“Joseph, it is true, I can build this house on my own, and yes, you have siblings that are perhaps more skilled than you. I don’t need you to help Me, but I want you to help me. With this house, not only can it provide shelter for those who need it most, but while you and I work on it, it is where you learn to know me the most, and where you learn to grow the most. I love these times, Joseph, and even on the days where you may not enjoy it, I wouldn’t trade a moment of it.”