Like A Little Child

As part of our recent trip to Senegal, Africa, the group I was traveling with was invited to attend a weekly "Kids Club" gathering in one of the nearby villages.  

At least a hundred kids turned up for it.  

They sang, danced, played games, listened intently to the story the children's pastor told, learned a memory verse about obeying their parents, and then hung around afterward, laughing, playing, and running amok. 

I was reminded once again how children everywhere act in similar ways, despite their circumstances, culture, etc.  

They have a way of looking at the world, experiencing joy, and employing play that gets lost along the way toward adulthood, sadly so.  

Henry Ward Beecher once wrote: 

“Children are the hands by which we take hold of heaven.”

It is a striking image. Children, in their openness and wonder, show us a posture toward God that adults often forget. They do not arrive with carefully curated résumés or theological arguments. They come with trust. They come with questions. They come with hearts ready to receive.

There is something quietly revolutionary about the way Jesus welcomes children in the Gospel accounts. 

He gathers little ones into his arms and says, “Let the children come to me; do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs” (Mark 10:14). The disciples had assumed children were distractions. Jesus reveals they are teachers.

Jesus presses this point even further: “Whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it” (Mark 10:15). He is not calling us to immaturity or naivety. He is calling us to a kind of holy simplicity—a faith that is honest, receptive, and alive with possibility. 

Somewhere along the way, many of us learned to equate spiritual maturity with having everything figured out. Yet Jesus suggests that true growth often looks like recovering what we have lost: curiosity, awe, and dependence on God.

Children imagine freely. They believe big. They expect goodness. When a child prays, they do not worry about phrasing or polish. They speak from the heart. When they worship, they do not measure their appearance to others. They move, sing, and wonder without apology. This is not childish faith; it is courageous faith.

The psalmist prays, “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and right spirit within me” (Psalm 51:10). A “new” spirit often means a renewed one—one that remembers how to delight in God, how to hope boldly, and how to trust even when answers are not clear. Paul echoes this invitation when he writes, “Rejoice always” (1 Thessalonians 5:16), not as denial of hardship, but as a declaration that joy still has a place in our story.

To have the faith of a child is to come to God empty-handed and open-hearted. It is to believe that grace is real, love is trustworthy, and that God delights in us more than we can comprehend. As we reclaim imagination and joy in our faith, we do not become less mature—we become more fully alive.

Prayer:
Loving God, draw us close to you. Restore in us wonder, trust, and joy. Help us receive your kingdom with open hearts and childlike faith, and teach us to delight in your presence again. Amen.

Reflection Questions:

1. Where have you noticed your faith becoming more cautious than curious?

2. What practices might help you reconnect with wonder, joy, or imagination in your spiritual life?

3. What would it look like for you to approach God this week with the faith of a child?