Like children
This fresh set of Daily Devotions is being provided for our LCA/NZ family, friends and visitors to help us to keep our eyes on Jesus as we face unsettling times. They can be used by families and individuals as part of the LCA/NZ’s Church@Home resources to encourage us and build trust in our Heavenly Father during this season of uncertainty and physical isolation.
by Pastor Reid Matthias
Click here for your printable verse to carry with you today.
Let the little children come to me … for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs (Mark 10:14b).
One of the most amazing things about Jesus, the king of all creation who has power over wind, sea, storms, sickness and even death, is that he seems to be powerless against the innocence of children.
What does it mean that ‘whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it?’ When do we stop being a little child? How do we recapture that?
Instead of entering into a dialogue about the struggles of life, the fear and the threats that chip away at the ‘outer child’ turning us into an inner child, Jesus instructs and leads us to experience the world in a way that seeks him and seeks others. The kingdom of God experienced by a child is one of wonder and learning, a deconstruction of difficulty and one of faith, guided by questions.
How are you, as a little child, feeling today? Are you, like the small, little boy who encountered me on the playground at lunch, excited about a beautiful day? He looked up at me, pushed his glasses further up onto his nose and exclaimed, ‘Pastor Reid, I love life!’ Or maybe you are in the same place as the ten-year-old boy who said five minutes later, ‘Pastor Reid, it feels like we’ve lost everything. This covid-19 is really messing up my life.’
Ten. He’s ten.
How are we, adults, bringing people into the blessing of Jesus so that they can experience the present kingdom of God right here and now without fear, but with a simultaneous sense of awe and respect? Can we talk with kids about their fears and about their hopes for the future? Can we help little children hear just as much about the love of God as the fear of the virus?
And perhaps that’s not bad advice for us adults as well.
Heavenly Father, you delight in the wide-eyed wonder and joy of children. Help us adults to strip away our hard edges built from fear and uncertainty, and restore to us the uncomplicated, unquestioning trust that we had as children. Amen.
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