Tag Archives: little children

THE GOSPEL OF MARK – BLESSED AND COVERED

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BLESSED AND COVERED

13 People were bringing little children to Jesus for him to place his hands on them, but the disciples rebuked them. 14 When Jesus saw this, he was indignant. He said to them, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. 15 Truly I tell you, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.” 16 And he took the children in his arms, placed his hands on them and blessed them. Mark 10:13-16

We have already discussed why children are precious to Jesus and why He used a child as an example of what He values in people (Mark 9:33-37). It is obvious that the disciples had not yet got the message or they would not have shown contempt for the children who were brought to Jesus.

Why did Jesus relish “blessing” the children and what was the blessing He spoke over them? There is no indication in the passage of who they were, how old they were, how many there were. None of these details mattered. Every child at every age had value to Jesus. He took the opportunity to intercept any damaging word or experience spoken over any one of those children with His own divine, creative words of affirmation and acceptance that released shalom – peace and well-being – into their lives. He probably spoke the priestly blessing over them.

Jesus did not speak grandiose Ideas into the children of what they would become or achieve. He simply acknowledged their potential as God’s children and spoke affirmation and acceptance into their lives. We must beware, in our “ministry” to people, that we don’t subtly put ideas into people’s heads that lead them away from utter dependence on Jesus for life and fruitfulness.

One of the names of Messiah which Isaiah prophesied (Is 9:6) would be “Everlasting Father”. Jesus was acting in a fatherly role in receiving, affirming and accepting the little ones in order to release them into their full potential in the kingdom of God. It is seen clearly in Jesus’ story of the prodigal son. The father was not offended by his son’s behaviour. He received him back because of who he was – his son. In one act of acceptance and affirmation, he peeled off all the layers of offensive behaviour to reveal the heart of the young man – still his son, no matter what.

This incident is a visual aid of the way Jesus views His children. Our behaviour does not offend Him because He sees the potential and affirms the relationship He has made possible by peeling off all the layers of filthy behaviour that encrust us. He covers us with His own garment of perfect sonship and by His acceptance and affirmation, releases us into our destiny to become what we were created for, without the hindrances of what we think we are or what we have done. God sees none of that because it has been covered by the righteousness of His own Son.

THE GOSPEL OF LUKE – STEEP YOURSELVES IN GOD

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STEEP YOURSELF IN GOD

”What I’m trying to do here is to get you to relax, not to be so pre-occupied with getting so that you can respond to God’s giving. People who don’t know God and the way He works fuss over these things, but you know both God and how He works. Steep yourself in God-reality, God-initiative, God-provisions. You’ll find all your everyday human concerns will be met. Don’t be afraid of missing out. You’re my dearest friends! The Father wants to give you the very kingdom itself.” Luke 12:29-32.

There is fervour in these words of Jesus. What He is talking about here is the very foundation of life. Until we get this right, our experience of God will always yo-yo between doubting and trusting. Our worries and cares come from our being so us-aware and so close to the circumstances that we cannot step back, as Jesus always did, and look at the big picture.

The first thing to settle in our hearts is the non-negotiable truth that God loves us. Since He has taken the trouble to come Himself to redeem us at the cost of His own life, our physical needs and wants are miniscule by comparison. He did this for one reason, to restore us to His family as His sons and daughters. Settle that one too! Everything God has promised and does for us fits into that context – family.

Jesus urged us to approach the Father as little children, not teenagers who always think they know better but as little children who are helpless without their father. This is the amazing thing about life in God’s family. He is not training us for independence as human parents do their children. God is training us for complete dependence; in fact, in His scheme of things, the more dependent we are on Him, the more mature we are in the faith!

Jesus insisted, “Without me you can do nothing.” John 15:6 (NIV). To God, maturity means going back to infancy! Why has He built such a contradictory principle into our relationship with Him? It takes us right back to His dream – to create beings who would be one with Him (echad) because oneness in the Godhead is who He is. “Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one.” Deuteronomy 6:4 (NIV), Israel’s creed.

Although He gave us the gift of choice, He knows very well where it takes us when we use it to enforce our independence. The same capacity to choose becomes a powerful tool when we recognise our dependence on Him and align ourselves with Him as helpless infants. The benefits of this attitude are ‘out of this world’ – access to the limitless supply of God’s resources, a carefree life in the care of God, and the inexpressible joy of being responsible partners in His kingdom, bringing His rule of love and truth into the mess we humans have made because we insisted on being independent.

If we keep on viewing God as a blown-up version of our human fathers, we will forfeit the most unpredictably exciting life. Instead we will spend our lives chewing our fingernails, chasing ‘things’ as though this life were all that mattered, and missing the journey that takes us deeper and deeper into the heart of the Father. If we are to be the disciples of Jesus we claim to be, then we have to learn to think like He did. Jesus was joined to His Father at the hip. He was a mature Son who depended on His Father like a new-born infant. That’s the paradox of the Christian life. Growing up means becoming more and more like little children. In this way, Jesus said, the kingdom is ours.

Potential And Opportunity

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POTENTIAL AND OPPORTUNITY

I wonder whether Jesus didn’t see something else in little children that we sometimes overlook – potential.

What possibilities are locked up in the tiny frame that lies helplessly in your arms? All you are aware of at that moment is the beauty and perfection of the little one, the excitement of its safe arrival and the love that wells up from within and threatens to overwhelm you as you hold your new-born child’s warm little body against you. You are conscious of the great responsibility that lies ahead to nurture, protect and provide for your child as he or she grows up in your home.

There is, within that bundle of joy, great potential – for good or evil. I remember learning a poem at school which reminds me, in the superb poetry of Gray’s “Elegy in a Country Churchyard” of the unlocked potential of the ordinary people whose bones lay beneath the sod.

Three verses in this wonderful poem stand out for me, expressing in Thomas Gray’s matchless arrangement of words his lament that so much unfulfilled potential lay buried in that forgotten spot.

Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid 

         Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire; 

Hands, that the rod of empire might have sway’d, 

         Or wak’d to ecstasy the living lyre.

 

But Knowledge to their eyes her ample page 

         Rich with the spoils of time did ne’er unroll; 

Chill Penury repress’d their noble rage, 

         And froze the genial current of the soul. 

 

Full many a gem of purest ray serene, 

         The dark unfathom’d caves of ocean bear: 

Full many a flow’r is born to blush unseen, 

         And waste its sweetness on the desert air.

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poems/detail/44299 – retrieved on 2016.04.26.

 

How tragic that there was no one to give these humble peasants the opportunity to develop their potential!

 

Solomon, in his wisdom wrote:

 

Train up a child in the way that he should go and when he is old he will not depart from it (Prov.22:6).

 

Sadly, most of us miss the point of this instruction. We take comfort from a promise that our children will return to God in later life even if they stray from His way when they are young in spite of our teaching. This verse does not mean that at all. Solomon is not speaking about backsliding. He is encouraging parents to recognise the potential in their child and to guide him or her along the “bent” that is already within them.

 

Many parents try to live their own unrealised dreams and unfulfilled potential through their children or to force them to follow in their footsteps because it is a family tradition. Solomon gave wise advice – get to know your child and help him or her to develop what is inside them. In their adult years they will not try another way because they will be fulfilled in what they have become.

 

Side by side with potential goes opportunity. Children should be given the opportunity to become what God has placed inside them to be. This can only happen when parents are loving, affirming and supportive. There is no greater gift a father can give his child than the words, “You are my son, my daughter and I love you. No matter what you do, you will always be my son (or daughter).” If Jesus needed to hear His Father speak these words of love and affirmation to sustain His through His earthly life, how much more do our children need their father’s blessing to give them identity and security.

 

Within each new-born baby is the potential for great good or great evil. What they become will depend on the foundation upon which their lives are built. Parents who nurture their children in an environment of love and acceptance give them every opportunity to become not only what they were created to be but also mature and responsible adults who are givers, not takers in their own world.

 

Society, unfortunately, is flooded with maladjusted and angry people who were raised in an environment of rejection and insecurity, often fatherless, without an identity who take their anger out on the world around them. Denied the opportunity to become who they were meant to be, they can only fulfil their potential for great evil.

 

It is up to every parent who brings a child into the world, to play his or her part in creating the environment for that child to become everything a loving Creator put inside of them when they were formed in the womb.

 

Scripture is taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

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