The Bible tells us that we are to have the faith of a child. There have been many times in my parenting when I have been delighted by something that my children have said, but when they speak spiritual truths; it thrills me to a totally different level.
Sometimes their theology is a little askew and they say things like: Jesus is the Son and God is the moon, or God is everywhere so He walks on my very lightly, or I can’t see God but He can see me, because His eyes are bigger than mine.
Sometimes they are questioning things about God. One night at dinner, my four year old daughter asked if Jesus was God then how was Jesus born at Christmas and God wasn’t born, he existed forever. Great question Kiddo! Later she said, “Jesus is God but he left the two other parts of God in heaven when he came to earth.”
Another child asked the question, why God created Satan, and then answered it with, “Oh I know, so that there are good Bible stories for us to hear.”
Sometimes they are recalling things they have learned. My son was telling me about how Moses was a great leader but not as good as “his sidekick” (he couldn’t remember Joshua’s name) because the “side kick” had never sinned in the Bible. I sat with him as he rambled off Bible stories he was learning, relishing to be a part of this moment with him.
Sometimes they are reciting a verse. I love listening to the kids say Scripture. Even if they get it a little mixed up at times. My current four year old was reciting the Lord’s Prayer recently and said, “Give us today our daily chicken.” He also tried to change the words to Psalm 100 and told me he wrote the Bible with God. Hmmmmmm?
Other times, they are processing their own experience with God and questioning how it all fits together. One time my son told me he needed someone to stay with him and tell him all the bad things that he shouldn’t do. I told them that the Holy Spirit is inside us and he whispers, “Don’t do that naughty thing.” He replied, “Yea, I’m going to need him to be louder.”
He also told me later that the Holy Spirit’s voice gets scrambled up in his head with his sin nature. How much truth is there to that?
And then there are the times when I am awed by the obvious Spirit of God, alive inside of them. One time a child came downstairs holding $16.62, all the money is his piggy bank. He wanted to give it to an orphanage and then asked to do odd jobs to make more money to give to the orphanage. He was seven.
A few months ago, we were planning a trip to Disney. I have a bruised tailbone and I was concerned about how I would fare on the drive down. Apparently it was a conversation that must have come up frequent enough for my six year old to pick up on (that and the donut pillow I bought to sit on). A few days before we left he came home from school and announced that I didn’t have to worry about the trip anymore because he had asked for prayer for me at school.
I casually asked what he had said and he replied, “I told my class that your privates hurt when you sit too long and we prayed that you would be able to make to Disney and back.”
Simple as that! My privates were totally covered in first grade prayer. He couldn’t have said “tailbone”? Somehow that would have made me feel better.
His faith was so alive that it was difficult to be too horrified that “my privates” were the topic of conversation in his class. All I could think about was Back to School Night, when the teacher showed the parents this big jar that all the prayer requests went in and how they would pull them out and rejoice over answered prayer. I was going to have to give an update on my privates for the class.
But my son was grinning from ear to ear, happy to have helped me with my problem, so I hugged him and thanked him and made a mental note to mention it to his teacher later. Surely she would understand it was my tailbone he was referencing.
This is a hazard of sending your children to a Christian school. The teacher may know more about you than you want her to know through the avenue of prayer. But I wouldn’t have it any other way. I want my kids to go to God with any area of concern in their lives.
When my daughter was in second grade, she got her first American Girl doll. She told me that she asked for prayer in school that her doll, Julie’s hair wouldn’t have so much static. Apparently some of her classmates laughed and she said her teacher said, “Never mind, God cares about all areas of our lives. The Bible says to cast our cares on Him for He cares for us.”
Recently my daughter’s homework was to reflect on a Proverb. The verse she chose was Proverbs 8:11, “for wisdom is more precious than rubies, and nothing you desire can compare with her.” She had lost a ring that her daddy had given her two months earlier and had been searching frantically for it. She made the connection that she should have been searching for wisdom as much as she did finding that ring.
I stood there listening to her share the conviction she had over that verse and realized that parenting requires as much learning (if not more) as it does teaching. My 14 year old spewed Biblical wisdom over me and I was honored to be a part of it. A few weeks later, she found the ring and said, “I learned the lesson God had for me and He answered my prayer.”
“Faith of a child” is taking God at His Word. Adults are much more cynical than children. Children are not jaded by the world yet and have the ability to see God in a clearer way than we do at times. I have watched God answer my children’s simple prayers and lead them on a journey of understand Him and it builds my faith as well.
Thank you God, for teaching me more about You, through the eyes of my children.
Matthew 19:14: Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.”
Matthew 11:25: At that time Jesus said, “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children.