I went to Catholic school as a child, and this was a Bible passage that was often quoted and taught by the nuns in Religion class. This passage has been used to make many arguments; among them that people should be baptized as children in order to "guarantee" their entry into the "kingdom of God"; that children should be revered, because Jesus loved them so; and that children should be allowed to preserve their innocence as long as possible in order to remain in that "God-like" state.
Truth be told, I have never understood this quotation. I'm not a lover of children (other than my own); they are loud and annoying. Their "innocence" often makes them rude and tactless. Yet, this oft-written about passage in the New Testament spoke to me today for some reason.
Brendan's sixth birthday is tomorrow. In anticipation of it, he has very specific demands: he wants to bring cupcakes to school for snack time; instead of cake toppers, he wants a small toy to decorate each cupcake, as a "gift" to each of his classmates; he wants his birthday celebration to take place in the morning, before recess, not in the afternoon, as I have done it for the past few years; for his birthday party on Saturday, he wants it to be at Chuck E. Cheese's, but he wants to have a dinosaur or Power Ranger motiff, not the Chuck E. Cheese mouse; and he wants a pinata.
He related all of this calmly. He said it once and has not repeated it again (except to remind me to buy the little dinosaurs to put on the cupcakes). He had absolute trust that I would not only hear his request, but that I would grant it.
Today, at lunch time, I went out and bought all his stuff. I zipped to the bakery and got the cupcakes. I went to Party City and bought dinosaur stuff, including the toys to decorate the cupcakes.
As I put all the stuff away, it came to me that it had never occurred to me to say "no, I won't do this for you" or "you don't deserve this." Of course, his request had to be proper. If he had asked me for a boa constrictor, I would have absolutely said no. And it had to be timely; if he'd asked for a party "just because," that likely would have garned another no (Mama don't have it like that).
As I pondered the matter, this Bible passage flitted across my mind. After many years of not understanding, it suddenly dawned on me that it simply means that we should trust God. We say our prayers, declare our wants and we should trust God enough to know that (1) S/He has heard us and (2) our requests will be granted at the right time.
1 comment:
Oh so true.
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