The Spiritual Power Of Little Children

¹³ Then little children were brought to Him that He might put His hands on them and pray, but the disciples rebuked them. ¹⁴ But Jesus said, “Let the little children come to Me, and do not forbid them; for of such is the kingdom of heaven.”  Matthew 19:13-14

     Jesus attitude toward little children was nothing like that of the Rabbi's of His time on earth.  Even His disciples seemed to believe children were not "that" important in the grand scheme of things.  Unlike Him many  churches in existence today seem to follow the way of those who had an opposing view to Jesus as well.  You can hear them say things like "they are too loud" or "children should be seen and not heard."  Needless to say, there are no children to be found in such places of worship.

     At any rate,  it was unthinkable,  in that 1st century time period, for children to interrupt.  It was not socially acceptable to make them the center of attention.  And it sure was uncommon... if not non-existent... for the leader to stop everything just to touch the children and bless them.  This can easily be seen by how the disciples rebuked the children.

     Yet, there is really something special about children when it comes to healthy powerful spirituality.  They seem to have simple faith.  It does not seem difficult at all to convince them about the things of God.  They simply surrender, by faith, to the one they learn to trust... unless they are abused; however, for the most part, small children are believers.  They want to believe and they seem to simply want to trust. Indeed Jesus gave children a place of primary importance, and He tells us why He did so.  He said, "Of such is the Kingdom of Heaven." In other words, there is something in a little child that makes a child belong to God's Kingdom. So they make up the "stuff" of the Kingdom.

     The fact is that small children are totally dependent on others to care for their needs.  This is the exact place we need to be, if we are to heal from our brokenness, shame, darkness, addictions, abuses of the past and or sin. If we want to be made whole, we really need to give up our broken places of being to the ONE who wants to touch us, His children,  and give us life. He wants to give us life and give us full life. But we have to surrender.  We have to simply admit we are powerless to heal ourselves. When we come to the LORD,  with child like dependency, we are opening to the door to receive the incredible life changing power of our  Almighty loving Creator God. There is real spiritual power in becoming like little children. This is the first step to being made whole.

SoJourner