Little by little

Hans Christian Anderson gave us the story of the ugly duckling: how one large, ungainly, gray duckling was born within a flock. As Anderson tells the story, the ugly duckling was mocked and teased so much that it ran away. But wherever the ugly duckling went, it was made fun of. A long year passed, and in the Spring the ugly duckling flew to a reed encircled pond and saw at the other end a group of large, long-necked, beautiful birds. They started swimming toward him. The duckling thought, 'They're coming to kill me. Oh, well, if I must die, I would rather lose my life to these lovely creatures than to the ducks who never loved me. Fearing the worst, the duckling bowed its head, and at that moment, saw its reflection in the still water. The image that looked back at him was a graceful-necked, snowwhite swan.

Little by little: it is how seemingly ugly ducklings becoming lovely swans; and just so, it is little by little that Christians become mature Christians. It is so with the realization of God's promises, and it is so with the coming of the Kingdom of God.

The Bible's book of Exodus relates that long before the children of Israel ever arrived in the Promised Land, God had spoken to them: 'Not all in one year, or the land would become desolate and the wild animals would multiply against you. But little by little you will increase and possess the land.'

This is God's way: 'Little by little I will keep my promise. Little by little the land will be yours. Little by little I will answer your prayers. Little by little you will become my people.'

It was for the good of God's people! They were not yet large enough or strong enough to enter Canaan. God indeed delights to bring us into the Kingdom; but first God will make us fit for the Kingdom.

A children's poem, God's Wheel, by the late Shel Silverstein, humorously describes what our intellectual and moral progress is like: God says to me with kind of a smile, 'How would you like to be God a while, And steer the world?' 'Okay,' says I, 'I'll give it a try. Where do I sit? How much do I get? When is lunch; and when do I quit?' God said, 'Gimme back that wheel. I don't think you're quite ready yet.'

Slowness and littleness make it difficult to see progress; and we become disheartened. The movement of the hour-hand on a clock is not easily noticed. The sun and moon and stars show little apparent motion. They seem suspended in the heavens; yet all are wheeling through the universe at unimaginable velocities.

Ralph Waldo Emerson once asked, 'What is a farm but a mute gospel?' But he was only saying again what Jesus had said about the little-by-littleness of God's creativity among and within us: 'The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, and would sleep and rise, night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how.'

Little by little, God opens unto us the promised land. Little by little God surely keeps his promises. Little by little, God takes sinners and makes them saints, till one day we look down into the water, and see our reflection, which little by little, has become the beauty we had always dreamed of, the beauty God was all along creating.