#01 Jesus and children

[AI translation] A well-respected family man in the prime of his manhood, in a high position, was once alone at home in his apartment, rummaging in his desk drawer. He came across an old photograph of him and his wife, twenty years ago, in their wedding dress, looking forward to their happy future as a young couple... Then he thought about what the future they had dreamed of looking like then looked like now: yes, he had thought differently then! He had imagined that he would carry his wife in the palm of his hand, that he would be a loving father to his unborn children - and look how little of that had come true! How could everything have happened so differently from what he had planned? He rewinds through twenty years of his family film. Yes, he had increasingly left the upbringing of his children to his wife, saying that he had nothing to do with today's youth, who were going their own way. Now he is painfully aware that his children are indeed going their own way. He remembers his eldest son: how much annoyance he has for him! Well, he had never bothered to bring this child up in a real, intimate, spiritual way, and now he was so independent that he did not even need his father's advice. He never turns to him as a child to his father. There is his daughter - she too prefers to go to the cinema in the evening rather than have a private conversation with her mother. His youngest son, too, has come to regard home almost exclusively as a canteen where he is fed. The family members are all living their own individual lives, and now it may be too late to change that. Yes, things should not have been allowed to go this far! And what he never thought would happen has happened: instead of a cheerful, happy, cohesive family life, the house is full of envy, selfishness and sometimes bitter quarrels! This was the result of his leaving his wife to bring up his children, and of his always being concerned only with office, with public life, with the accumulation of material goods to make his life as comfortable as possible. Yes, but his life has not been a fruitless one: here is a certificate of honour, there is a certificate of recognition, and then there are the medals he has received for his public activities! Yes, but the children?! Wouldn't they have been worth more than all the honorary memberships, honorary presidencies, medals and other rubbish?! His family life was destroyed! With infinite bitterness, he put the wedding picture back in the drawer, but deep in the other lim-loms, so that it would not be found again soon - and with quick steps he left home! He was in a hurry not to be late for the general meeting of the association to which he had been elected honorary president a week before. It was too late to change the family situation now anyway!I read this sad story in a Swiss newspaper, but it could just as well have been told by anyone, because the picture is unfortunately very common. This is how most family life is today. It's so disjointed, so divided, so disconnected, so bereft of a centre, of cohesion. And only one of the reasons for this - and not even the most serious reason - is modern life, with its busy lives, its constant rush, which leaves no time for a convivial gathering around the family hearth. The other cause is more serious and more dangerous: what a sad-faced man said to me recently when he was telling me about the tragedy of his family life that had been upset, and he ended his story by saying: 'You know, the trouble was that we left Jesus Christ out of our family life! Well, yes: that's the real reason! And if you recognized yourself in the description of that Swiss brother, or even if you found some similarities, then that is the real and deepest reason for all your problems, that you have left Jesus Christ out of your life! And every parent who has a complaint about his child would do well to check whether the cause of his troubles is not here too!
"Let the little children come to me", Jesus says in our Word, and adds the great teaching, "for such is the kingdom of God" (Mk 10,14) From this very familiar Word come some very serious insights that we would do well to take as seriously as Jesus said.
"Let the little children come to me". What this invitation means is that that child also needs the Lord Jesus, not in the way that we adults imagine that we need a Jesus Christ, with whom we encourage children to be good and eat their soup or else Jesus will not bring them a picture book - but we need Jesus as Saviour. Do you know who your child is, that sweet, smiling, clear-eyed little innocence?" as the delighted adults leaning over the cradle used to say. It is very unpleasant to say - and I am not saying it, but all Scripture - that he is the son of death, the bride of perdition! He is conceived in sin, born in sin, and is himself a little man infected with sin! Observe his first conscious manifestations of life: you will soon discover in him selfishness and envy. Who taught you that? No one! It was in him, he brought it with him, it was handed down through the millennia. Our creed calls it original sin. It is a terrible thing, but unfortunately it is true!
That's why that child needs Jesus and salvation through Jesus, just like you, his parent! Without being born again in Christ, he will not see eternal life any more than you will! If you don't want to be lulled into false illusions, don't think your child is innocent, for what else does he know of life! But look upon him as one who must be rescued from the prison of death into which he was born! And since you cannot save him, but only One - the same One who can save you, or who has already saved you: the Lord Jesus - it is a matter of such mortal importance that Jesus calls you to it with these words.
But what does it mean, then, what Jesus continues to say here, "the kingdom of God belongs to such as these"? We adults think that it is not appropriate to speak of Christ, salvation, eternal life, new birth, sin, in front of children, because they cannot yet understand these weighty words. I don't know whether they understand or not, but what I get from Jesus' words, "such is the kingdom of God", is that the fact of salvation and the new birth is not age-related, that it cannot be said that it is only for children over 16. In fact, it is as if it were said that in childhood the soul is more than capable of receiving Jesus Christ! And then it is not a question of preaching to the child about the new birth and conversion, but of letting him come to Jesus! The rebirth and the embracing of that child's soul into His kingdom is done by Him, not by you! The important thing here is that you yourself take deadly seriously the fact that your child, of whatever age, is a prisoner of sin! He needs deliverance, and only Jesus Christ - not the baby Jesus, because there is no such thing, but the Saviour Jesus Christ can deliver him and give him new life!
If you can't talk this matter over with your child, either because he is too young or because you are too young in the faith, then talk it over, but very often in renewed prayer with your child's Deliverer! Just as the mothers in the story took their little ones to Jesus in their arms, so you too should take them in the arms of your prayer, raise your little ones and your older ones to the Lord of Life and Resurrection, and ask the greatest for them. Not only a happy, healthy, long life on earth, but something more and more important: eternal life, redeemed and sanctified by Christ, life on earth and beyond earth! I cannot stress enough that you should ask for this for your child if you wish him/her well! You cannot know for how long the Lord has entrusted this precious soul to you, the parent, and when it will be reckoned to you, but you can be sure of one thing: you are not asking for this - eternal life, life redeemed by Christ, that is, true, happy life - in vain! There is a precious promise for this in the Scriptures, which reads, "If any man shall see his brother sin, but not a mortal sin, let him pray, and God will give him life." Without this promise, I myself, entrusted by the Lord with six children's souls, might well collapse under the weight of parenthood!
Well, if you could only do that, pray not only for him, but with him! Someone, a spiritual man, once gave this advice to a husband to take hold of his wife's two hands and pray with her, physically helping, supporting and dragging her, tired from housework, to Jesus. Oh, you parents, if you could do this with your children! If you could thus - almost literally by the hand - lead the dearest soul to the Saviour, and thus struggle together before Him for deliverance from sin and for eternal life, how many bonds would be loosed, how many storms would be quieted within you and between you! Try it! No blessing will be missed!
"Let the children come to me and do not forbid them", says Jesus. To whom is he saying this? Who are those who want to forbid the little ones from Jesus? Listen to the Word: not the state, not the police, but the disciples! It is never so dangerous and tragic when external violence forbids a child from Jesus. Sad though it is, this is not the important issue, because it is not the state's decrees - whether favourable or unfavourable - that determine a person's coming to Christ, but rather the behaviour of the disciples. But who among us who are sitting here today wants to ban them from Sunday school, from confirmation classes or from youth Bible study? Are we not rather glad to see the youth of our church here around the church? So there is no banning here, at least on our part! We let them, we even send them, just let them go! It may not be a ban, my brothers and sisters, but it could be much worse than that! When Jesus says, "Let the children come to me and do not forbid them", it is also to say, do not obstruct them, do not be an obstacle to their finding me! So do not stumble that child with your behaviour.
It often shakes my soul to think that as a father I bear the same majestic name towards my children as the Heavenly Mother Superior! And God has given me permission to use this holy name so that through my being a father, He may radiate the first rays of His fatherly love, wisdom and providence into the souls of my children. And this radiance is very often blocked by the many dwindling of my paternal quality! I hide rather than reveal to my child the Heavenly Father!
Oh, how right Jesus is! I must first become a child, a redeemed child of the Heavenly Mother, before I can let my child go to Jesus! Until you yourself are Jesus', you will, with the best of intentions, block your child's way to Jesus, so that he will not get there because of you! "Let the little children come to me, and forbid them not" - how closely related, how complementary, how another half of this Word: "unless you are converted and become like little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven" (Mt 18,3).
18 18.3: 18 18.3: Let him who has an ear hear what the Spirit is saying to the church even through these muddled, stammering words!
Amen.
Date: 21 November 1948.