Becoming Like a Child

At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” He called a child, whom he put among them, and said, “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever becomes humble like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.”[1]

…The development of the neocortex, however, also ushers in the ability to imagine possible-and as yet unrealized-futures. This ability affects us both negatively and positively. I have already mentioned the positive aspect of imagining possible futures: it allows us to make plans, set-up goals and strive towards them. The negative side to imagining possible futures is that it makes us worry a lot more than we otherwise would. …. A child lacks both the ability to empathize and the ability to time-travel, which is why children are supremely self-centered, but spontaneous and "in the moment". Adults, on the other hand, have both abilities, which is why we are more capable of compassion, but also more fragmented in time. …. What does all this mean for being childlike again? Or more precisely, what does it take to regain the sense of unselfconscious spontaneity while also being compassionate? …. What it takes to be a child again is to understand the sources of fragmentation, and then overcome them. For most of us, what fragments us is our desire to maintain high self-worth-through our looks, achievements, fame, power, money, etc. As we grow older, we worry increasingly about our deteriorating looks. We yearn for our youthful looks even as we recognize that we are, at the present moment, the most youthful we will ever be for the rest of our lives. And most of us also worry about our achievements, fame, etc., and how they compare to that of others. These worries erode into our self-worth and that makes us feel sad, inadequate and depressed. …. So, crucial to being in the moment, and thus crucial to being childlike (spontaneous, unselfconscious and joyful) is to delink the tie between how much we value ourselves from these extrinsic aspects. The more we can feel good about ourselves regardless of our looks and achievements, and all the other things we desire-fame, money, power, respect, love, etc.-the more we will be free to be in the moment. …. In sum, becoming childlike really takes a variety of abilities: awareness of why we lose our childlikeness, courage to challenge society's views about what's worthy of pursuit, and, finally, intelligence to figure out an alternative set of rules by which to live. In short, it isn't child's play to be childlike; in fact, it takes great maturity to be childlike.[2]

…having a childlike disposition before God shows a measure of peace and composure in one’s life. When trust is present in your spiritual walk, there is less need to call attention to yourself, less selfishness, and less angst to be in control of everything and everyone. The emotional stability that ensues can release us to be humble servants in our marriages, families, workplaces, churches, and ministries. Humility is not a sign of weakness, but evidence of a quiet and secure confidence in God.[3]

It is clear from reading, that the qualities of being like a child to which Jesus referred, were not what we would call childish, they were positive attributes most often lost on the journey to being an adult. Here are seven positive characteristics of children, “Curiosity, Excitement, Faith, Trust, Wonder, Short memory, Persistence.”[4] Jesus was not recommending naivety or gullibility, as seen from his instructions to the disciples before sending them out, “…I am sending you out like sheep into the midst of wolves; so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.”[5] From the context in which Jesus instructed his disciples to turn and be like a child, we see that pride was a factor. The disciples were asking about importance and position. That connects with what Raj Raghunathan wrote. “For most of us, what fragments us is our desire to maintain high self-worth-through our looks, achievements, fame, power, money, etc.” The quality missing in the disciples at that time was humility.

In the scriptures, God is portrayed as the father of the family:

Moreover, we had human parents to discipline us, and we respected them. Should we not be even more willing to be subject to the Father of spirits and live? For they disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, in order that we may share his holiness.[6]

Jesus sent word to his disciples, “…go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’”[7] We are children of God, “…to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God…”[8] Our roll in God’s family is to be his children. God the Father is the provider, the nurturer, the sustainer. We as children are to be submissive to the guidance and direction of our Father. Our submission to the Father is not because he is more powerful than us, although he is. It’s not because he knows more than us, although he does. It’s not because he is the Creator, although he is. We submit to God, because he loves us, and wants the best for us.

Raj Raghunathan concluded his article “…it isn't child's play to be childlike; in fact, it takes great maturity to be childlike.” To be like a child in Jesus’ teaching is, firstly to be humble, and then be willing to live by faith. Sometimes as adults our need to be in charge, if not only of our own lives, is going to get in our way. We will have dissonance between reason and faith, between intellect and belief. There is a desire to be well thought of by our peers, and not seen as naïve and gullible. Think about what Jesus said about rich people; “How hard it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!”[9] Likely because their security is connected to their wealth. Maybe their persona is tied up in their wealth. The problems rich people have preventing them entering the kingdom may be obvious to the rest of us, but we shouldn’t gloat because their issues are exaggerated and ours just less obvious. Long ago, I heard an example of submitting to God. “A man fell over the edge of a cliff, luckily he was able to grab on to a protruding root. Quickly an observer ran and held out his hand to the person dangling below. Try as he may, the rescuer could not pull the victim up. The rescuer asked the victim if he believed he could be saved. The victim said he did, to which the rescuer said, ‘To prove that, you will have to let go of the root.’” Some of us will have to let go of whatever it is that we are hanging on to, in order to submit to God. Only when we let go of attachments related to pride can God apply his saving grace. Pride causes rigidity which cannot be molded; humility present a malleable soul easily formed by God’s grace.

Jesus spoke to people in his day, offering them an alternative to frustration and disenchantment.

At that time Jesus said, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by my Father; and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him. Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”^[10]

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[1] Mat 18:1-4

[2] Grow to Be a Child, What does it take to become childlike again? By, Raj Raghunathan Ph.D.

[3] Childish or Childlike? By Dr. Eric Scalise

[4] 7 Childlike Traits We Should Recapture To Live A Happier Life. By Ayodeji Awosika,

[5] Mat 10:16

[6] Heb 12:9, 10

[7] Joh 20:17 

[8] Joh 1:12

[9] Luke 18:24 

[10] Mat 11:25-30

Spirit Religion

But when he came to himself he said, “How many of my father's hired hands have bread enough and to spare, but here I am dying of hunger! I will get up and go to my father, and I will say to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son; treat me like one of your hired hands.’”^[1]

To focus on the wayward son is natural for us since we easily identify with his waywardness and seek the security of knowing a return to wholeness is possible. Our comfort though is quickly focused on the father, who is the main character in the parable. The only meaningful action of the son was to return, it is the father’s love and acceptance we desire. We long for the assurance that weak and sinful as we are, hope lies in the overwhelming love of the father. In his statement of contrition the son admitted guilt for going against God and his father. Even though the parable along with others in the collection was directed toward the Pharisees and Scribes there was no hint of return to the cultish religion of Israel. Failing his father was to the son tantamount to failing God. Squandering the monetary wealth of his father was not as bad as depreciating his love. Living in dire need, having wasted everything he had received from his father, brought him to his senses. He listened to the echo of his father’s love coming from his inner soul; he followed that call back to his father, to the acceptance and love he had lost in waywardness. We realize that the parable is a verbal picture of the Father, God. The parable depicts the reconciliation of man with God as a process. Man must recognize his waywardness and that he is incapable of achieving wholeness. That can only be done by recapturing a child-like faith and moving toward God. Institutional religion is a sham, other formal religions are substitutes. Like the wayward son, we have to be moved by our spirits to seek the Father’s acceptance. Personal religion is the connection of the spirit of man with the spirit of God.

Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem. Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such as these to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”[2]

Institutional religion glosses over the words of Jesus recorded by John. By so doing, men and women are led into ritualistic forms of expression. It is hoped that believers come to their senses and give up the emptiness of legalism to follow the call of God’s love. In John’s gospel, Jesus told the woman that true worship was not limited geographically or ritualistically. Solomon in his prayer of dedication of the temple stated the obvious, “… will God indeed reside with mortals on earth? Even heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain you, how much less this house that I have built!”[3] From the writing of Paul we learn that Jeremiah’s prophecy is fulfilled in that our bodies are the temple of God’s Spirit[4]. The Samaritan woman was worried about places and things, but Jesus told her concerns were misplaced. Ritualistic, parochial religions are replaced by spirit religion.

I found the following excerpt interesting:

To suggest personal will and effort to one all sicklied o'er with the sense of irremediable impotence is to suggest the most impossible of things. What he craves is to be consoled in his very powerlessness, to feel that the spirit of the universe recognizes and secures him, all decaying and failing as he is. Well, we are all such helpless failures in the last resort. The sanest and best of us are of one clay with lunatics and prison inmates, and death finally runs the robustest of us down. And whenever we feel this, such a sense of the vanity and provisionality of our voluntary career comes over us that all our morality appears but as a plaster hiding a sore it can never cure, and all our well-doing as the hollowest substitute for that well-being that our lives ought to be grounded in, but, alas! are not.

And here religion comes to our rescue and takes our fate into her hands. There is a state of mind, known to religious men, but to no others, in which the will to assert ourselves and hold our own has been displaced by a willingness to close our mouths and be as nothing in the floods and waterspouts of God. In this state of mind, what we most dreaded has become the habitation of our safety, and the hour of our moral death has turned into our spiritual birthday. The time for tension in our soul is over, and that of happy relaxation, of calm deep breathing, of an eternal present, with no discordant future to be anxious about, has arrived. Fear is not held in abeyance as it is by mere morality, it is positively expunged and washed away.

We shall see abundant examples of this happy state of mind in later lectures of this course. We shall see how infinitely passionate a thing religion at its highest flights can be. Like love, like wrath, like hope, ambition, jealousy, like every other instinctive eagerness and impulse, it adds to life an enchantment which is not rationally or logically deducible from anything else. This enchantment, coming as a gift when it does come, - a gift of our organism, the physiologists will tell us, a gift of God's grace, the theologians say, - is either there or not there for us, and there are persons who can no more become possessed by it than they can fall in love with a given woman by mere word of command. Religious feeling is thus an absolute addition to the Subject's range of life. It gives him a new sphere of power. When the outward battle is lost, and the outer world disowns him, it redeems and vivifies an interior world which otherwise would be an empty waste.

If religion is to mean anything definite for us, it seems to me that we ought to take it as meaning this added dimension of emotion, this enthusiastic temper of espousal, in regions where morality strictly so called can at best but bow its head and acquiesce. It ought to mean nothing short of this new reach of freedom for us, with the struggle over, the keynote of the universe sounding in our ears, and everlasting possession spread before our eyes. (Once more, there are plenty of men, constitutionally somber men, in whose religious life this rapturousness is lacking.[5]

I will not offer an interpretation of William James’ lecture, but instead look to certain teachings of scripture which appear to be along similar lines of thought.

Therefore do not worry, saying, 'What will we eat?' or 'What will we drink?' or 'What will we wear?' For it is the Gentiles who strive for all these things; and indeed your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today's trouble is enough for today.[6]

Then Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, “If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.”[7]

For all who rely on the works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who does not observe and obey all the things written in the book of the law. Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law; for “The one who is righteous will live by faith.’”[8]

Keep your lives free from the love of money, and be content with what you have; for he has said, “I will never leave you or forsake you.” So we can say with confidence, “The Lord is my helper; I will not be afraid. What can anyone do to me?”[9]

Since, then, we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast to our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.[10]

In the conversation with Pilate, Jesus clarified his purpose in coming to earth:

Then Pilate entered the headquarters again, summoned Jesus, and asked him, "Are you the King of the Jews?" Jesus answered, "Do you ask this on your own, or did others tell you about me?" Pilate replied, "I am not a Jew, am I? Your own nation and the chief priests have handed you over to me. What have you done?" Jesus answered, "My kingdom is not from this world. If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not from here." Pilate asked him, "So you are a king?" Jesus answered, "You say that I am a king. For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth.[11]

The kingdom of God, and the kingship of Jesus was the priority of his coming to earth. All that was promised through the prophets, all that was foreseen by the prophets found fulfillment in Jesus.

And all the prophets, as many as have spoken, from Samuel and those after him, also predicted these days. You are the descendants of the prophets and of the covenant that God gave to your ancestors, saying to Abraham, 'And in your descendants all the families of the earth shall be blessed.'[12]

Spirit religion is the spiritual connection with God through Christ, it is not a religion of ritual and tradition. The institutional Church is the outcome of human pride. The observation of rituals and laws founded in superstition not in spirituality. Spirit religion is having our head in heaven and our feet on the ground. God promised through Jeremiah, “I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.”[13] The lectures by William James focus on personal religion, surely religion cannot be more personal than having God’s law within us, written on our hearts. James lectures are a study in human nature. Spirit religion is taking on the nature of God.

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[1] Luke 15:17-19

[2] Joh 4:20-24

[3] 2Ch 6:18

[4] 1Cor 3:16

[5] The Varieties of Religious Experience, A Study in Human Nature, by William James  p. 31

[6] Mat 6:31

[7] Joh 8:31, 32

[8] Gal 3:10, 11

[9] Heb 13:5, 6

[10] Heb 4:14-16

[11] Joh 18:33-37

[12] Act 3:24, 25

[13] Jer 31:33