"I am so weak that I can hardly write, I cannot read my Bible, I cannot even pray, I can only lie still in God's arms like a little child, and trust." The last words of Hudson Taylor, missionary to China in the 1800s.
While in Capernaum and likely at Peter’s house, Jesus asks His disciples, “What were you talking about on your way here?” (Mark 9:33) At first there is only silence as the disciples look at each other, like kids caught with their hands in the cookie jar. Finally one of them answers Jesus: “Who then is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven? (v.1)”
The disciples know there is something unique about Jesus, even though they cannot firmly grasp what it is. They know they are part of His inner circle, the political “cabinet” of this rising messiah who will return the kingdom to Israel. Or so they believe. They also know that Jesus is “showing favorites,” since only three of them accompanied Him to the Mount of Transfiguration. And they are all jealous of Peter who receives a lot of attention from Jesus.
The male ego is extremely fragile; it breaks easily and it constantly needs to be stroked. As a male, I understand why the disciples asked about who was the greatest; with my ego bruised, I too would have been wondering the same thing. And as usual, Jesus totally turns upside-down their expectations and breaks their paradigms.
Jesus sets before them a child, likely Peter’s child, and holds that child in His arms and says, “Truly I say to you, unless you are converted and become like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever then humbles himself as this child, he is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven (vv.3-4).”
I just returned from the Middle-East where what is valued is strength, self-reliance and pride. Acquiescing to the socially low, or worse yet to a woman, is shameful, weak, and worthy of God’s anger. We heard the story of a wife who not only failed to birth a son for her husband but birthed a handicapped daughter instead. He divorced her on the spot and left her all alone to care for their handicapped daughter. Failure and shame are not to be tolerated.
Likewise, in Christian America we value achievement over child-like faith. We have our “celebrity Christians” and everyone wants to go to a church exploding in growth. Can one find a Christian book where praise for the author and a list of his achievements is not printed on the back cover? Everyone wants to be first; few want to be last.
Humans value self-reliance and strength, but Jesus teaches us to value child-like trust. The Moody Gospel Commentary on Matthew says that Jesus here contrasts “the attitude of self-sufficient with the attitude of childlike dependence.” Childlike innocence doesn’t boast or brag; a child rests and trusts. There is no place for status or boasting in the kingdom of God. Rather, we hope, we rejoice, and we rest in the Fatherhood of God.
This is in sharp contrast to how the world around us thinks. Even the religious world believes ironically that in order to get God’s approval we must prove we have no need of God. Each of us, myself included, must repent of our self-sufficiency and ask God for the faith to trust Him like a child.
Jesus also readily identifies Himself with children when He says, “whoever receives one such child in My name receives Me (v.5).” As we proclaim Him, we must not ignore those who are abused, hurting and hungry. We who have been blessed must not say, “Be warmed and be filled” as we turn them away empty. If we love the Master, we will love sacrificially those who are invisible, ignored or cursed by the self-reliant and self-seeking.
Judgment Day is coming. And on that Day, when He separates the sheep from the goats, he who has caused His little ones to stumble, it would be better for him to have a heavy millstone hung around his neck and drowned in the depth of the sea (v.6). But those who have a child-like trust will be ushered into the very throne room of God where at the very first glimpse of our Lord, they will cry out with great joy, worship and delight, “Abba! Father!”
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