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Matthew 11:25, John 1:12

More on Childlike Faith

Filed Under: Devotions by Chuck
December 16, 2024

Christmas and the Kingdom of Heaven both are for children. Jesus made it clear that we all must be born again as little children and embrace as adults the faith of a child. God’s ways are filled with paradoxes. You must die if you are really going to live. You must give if you’re ever going to get. You must become last if you’re ever going to be first. You must be the least if you desire to be the greatest. God’s ways are much different from man’s ways. The world seeks people with power, influence, education, social status, and wealth. God seeks little children. God is building his kingdom on the characteristics most frequently found in children: love, innocence, lack of power, sincerity, without pretension, and, most of all, complete trust. God doesn’t look for power brokers. He wants trusting children. Adults have to unlearn a lot of things to become like children. That’s why Jesus told the wise and seasoned Nicodemus that he had to be born again.

A rebirth is necessary because grownups who put confidence in themselves can’t ever grasp the true meaning of the Kingdom of Heaven or Christmas. They have become blinded to the spiritual reality all around them. When his disciples finally grasped this truth, Jesus exploded with praise to God. He said, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children…” (Matthew 11:25).

Maintaining childlike faith in the midst of hurt, pain, suffering, and loss is not an easy matter. Christmas time, for many, can be a time of sorrow and suffering. We hear so much about perseverance and biting the bullet and staying strong and facing the giants and it almost seems like it’s all about our grit and courage. I don’t think God wants us to demonstrate our strength in the face of trial and tribulation. That makes it all about me. I think He wants us to demonstrate our faith. I sometimes hang on during suffering and trials out of devotion to duty, deep moral resolve, or some misplaced manly ability to endure pain. God wants me, as he did all the saints of old, to stand firm in my faith during times of testing. Like an innocent child, He wants me to stand firm in the fact that God loves me and has my best interest foremost in mind, regardless of my circumstances. It’s holding on with childlike devotion to God’s promises, not my strengths. Our obedience shouldn’t glorify us but the God of Grace. Yes, “To those who received Him, he gave the power to become children of God.” John 1:12

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Luke 18:17, John 5:24, Ephesians 2:8

Receiving the Gift

Filed Under: Devotions by Chuck
December 15, 2024

Christmas and the Kingdom of Heaven are both for children. He made it very clear in Luke 18:17 when he said, “Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it.” The conversation in which this comment was made was with the rich young ruler. He had it all and wanted to add to his account by buying or earning his way into heaven. He asked Jesus, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus went through the list of things he could sacrifice until he got to the ultimate point that if you wanted to buy your way into heaven or earn your admittance ticket, the cost would be very high. As a matter of fact, the cost was always higher than anyone could pay. When the rich young ruler understood this truth, the bible says, “When he heard these things, he became very sad, for he was extremely rich.”

It can’t be bought or earned, but it can be received as the great gift that it is. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son.” John teaches us that whoever “receives” Him has the power to become children. It’s not those who understand Him. (I don’t think we ever will!). It’s not those who master the doctrines of the Christian faith. It’s not for those who are wealthy, educated, or sophisticated. On the contrary, it’s for those who accept God’s gift – it’s for children! Paul tells us that it’s not by works (or wealth) we are saved but by God’s grace through faith. “It is a gift of God,” and the only thing that can be done with a gift is to receive it and accept it. If we attempt to earn or deserve or buy it, we’ve missed the point entirely.

Receiving the Gift of eternal life and believing in Jesus are the same things. John’s Gospel makes that clear to us. It is saving faith that brings eternal life, opens the doors to the Kingdom of Heaven, and makes Christmas what Christmas is really all about. John mentions eternal life about 35 times in His Gospel. The one who believes in Jesus has received Jesus and has in their possession the gift of eternal life. John 5:24 says, “Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life…” Only Jesus gives the gift of eternal life, and to receive Him is to receive that Gift because Jesus is God’s greatest gift of all. Christmas time is the celebration of God’s great gift to us – – His Only Son. And of course Ephesians 2:8 tells us, ““God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God.”

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Luke 18:17, Proverbs 16:19, Philippians 2:3

Untutored Humility

Filed Under: Devotions by Chuck
December 14, 2024

The Kingdom of Heaven and Christmas are for children. In Luke 18:17, Jesus said, “Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it.” In thinking my way through the characteristics that God desired in us adults that reflect a child-like faith, I think we need to consider the idea of untutored humility. What I mean by “untutored” is that children don’t need to be taught to be humble. It’s a part of their characteristic of living in a grown-up world. When you live in a world where you have to look up at everyone around you, where you are fed by others, clothed by others, cared for when you’re hurt by others, and just about every necessity of life is met by others, you must understand your place in the overall scheme of things. But grownups get tall, strong, self sufficient, competent, and learn how to take care of themselves in life. That leads to confusion in our overall lot in life.

There was an interesting article in the Omaha World-Herald a while ago about saying Grace and praying in public in general. Several people interviewed argued that it wasn’t necessarily a public display of religious pride on the part of those who prayed.  Rather, it represented a sincere desire on their part to reflect an honest attitude of gratitude to their maker for the many daily blessings in their lives. I like to think that’s the reason I do it. We become confused by our grownup economic system. It’s easy to believe that we deserve what we have, that we’ve earned everything we have, that there’s no such thing as a free lunch, and we all have to pay the price, etc. But the bottom line in it all is that we have been blessed to be part of a country in which we have the freedoms that we have, the opportunities that we have, the resources that we have, etc. A truly childlike humility looks up at those who’ve gone before them and paid the price for the great freedoms we have. It looks to the maker of heaven and earth as the supreme provider and acknowledges one’s helplessness to provide and sustain all these blessings by our own efforts. None of us would enjoy this life if weren’t for others and for the God that made us and sustains us.

Proverbs 16:19 tells us that “It is better to be of a humble spirit with the lowly than to divide the spoil with the proud.” Someone said, “If you are too big for a little place, you are too little for a big place.” A. W. Tozer wrote, “Humility pleases God wherever it is found, and the humble person will have God for his or her friend and helper always. Only the humble are completely sane, for they are the only ones who see clearly their own size and limitations. Egotists see things out of focus. To themselves, they are large, and God is correspondingly small, and that is a kind of moral insanity.” Paul reminds us in Philippians 2:3 to “Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.”

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Matthew 21:16, 1 John 3:1

Innocent Worship

Filed Under: Devotions by Chuck
December 13, 2024

If the Kingdom of Heaven and Christmas are for kids, what exactly is it about kids that give them this honor? When Jesus was entering Jerusalem on what we know as Palm Sunday, the crowds were shouting and singing and praising God, for they had acknowledged Jesus as the coming Messiah. However, the religious leaders rebuked the crowds and called for Jesus to do the same. They asked Him, “Do you hear what these children are saying? “Yes, replied Jesus.” Then Jesus quoted an Old Testament passage that prophesied that upon the arrival of the Messiah, God made sure that “children and infants” would praise Him. (See Matthew 21:16). What kids do is worship! They especially worship at the coming of the Messiah, which is what we celebrate at Christmas time. Children always look up to those all around them.

I once got lost in Brandeis when I was 6 years old. Brandeis, for those of you who do not know, was the largest department store in downtown Omaha back in the 1950s. It would be compared to Higbees in the Christmas Story movie. I was on the 8th floor, where all the toys were, and I got disoriented, and my mother was waiting in a checkout line. The most frightening thing was that everyone around me was so huge, and I was so small. I felt helpless. I didn’t know which way to turn, and the big people were all too busy rushing past me to stop and help. It wasn’t until I began to cry that someone stopped and took me to a store employee who announced in the store that if anyone had lost a little boy to come to the lost and found. That was me. I was lost, but then Mom showed up, and I was found. That was me. Once, I was lost, but now I’ve been found.

Innocent Worship is worship that comes from that salvation experience. It’s what the Psalmist described in Psalm 95 when he wrote, “Oh come, let us sing to the LORD; let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation! Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving; let us make a joyful noise to him with songs of praise! For the LORD is a great God and a great King above all gods. In his hand are the depths of the earth; the heights of the mountains are his also. The sea is his, for he made it, and his hands formed the dry land. Oh, come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the LORD, our Maker! For he is our God, and we are the people of his pasture and the sheep of his hand.” God is big, and we are small. No matter how big we get as adults, there are ways that we should remain as children. John tells us in 1 John 3:1, “See what kind of love the Father has given to us that we should be called children of God; and so we are.”

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Matthew 18:3, Ephesians 4:15

Growing Up

Filed Under: Devotions by Chuck
December 12, 2024

Christmas and heaven are both for children. Jesus made it clear that the Kingdom of Heaven was for kids. Several times, he said, “Unless you turn and become like these little ones, you will never enter into the Kingdom of Heaven.” (Matthew 18:3). The specific characteristics of children that are desirable have to do with their helplessness, humility, acceptance, and childlike faith. Unless we become like children, we can’t enter into God’s Kingdom. Yet, there are several passages that exhort us not to be like children. We read in 1 Corinthians 14:20, “Brothers, do not be children in your thinking. Be infants in evil, but in your thinking, be mature.”

The scriptures are full of such paradoxes. We must give up our lives or die to ourselves if we are to truly live. We must give if we are to receive. We must become last if we wish to be first. We must lose it all in order to gain it all. We must become the least in order to rise to greatness. It goes on, but the point I want to make is that Jesus often taught us in paradoxes. Paradoxes are seen everywhere in Jesus’ life as well as in his teachings. He’s often proclaimed the son of Mary, yet he’s to be called the son of God. He was born in Bethlehem, the city of the kings, but lived in Nazareth, a city from which nothing good could ever come. He was born a king, yet born in a stable. He was worshipped by Israeli Shepherds and foreign Kings while the current King of Israel, Herod, sought to take His life. An angel announced His arrival, but there was no room for Him at the Inn.

Leonard Sweet describes this characteristic of Jesus’ life as being “surround sound.” It’s like stereo: two sounds, each coming from a different direction. We are exhorted to be like children but not to think like children. We need to think like adults. I’ve often been impressed with how children who grow up in the church have strong faith, participate in many church activities, profess faith, are baptized and partake of communion services, read their bibles, etc, and yet when they leave home for college, military, or a career, they often lose their faith. They have been taught the Biblical truths at home and in the church but haven’t learned how to think about the truths they have been taught as adults. A child might think Christianity has all the answers. An adult believer, on the other hand, wrestles honestly with tough questions, trusting that God has the answers even if we can’t come up with them. Paul taught us that “…we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ…” Ephesians 4:15.

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Matthew 1:18

Born of a Virgin

Filed Under: Devotions by Chuck
December 11, 2024

Christmas and the Kingdom of Heaven are for children. Jesus made it clear that “unless you turn and become like these little ones, you will never enter into the Kingdom of Heaven.” (Matthew 18:3). At the same time, the Bible exhorts us not to think like children. Paul tells the Corinthians, “Do not be children in your thinking…but in your thinking be mature.” (1 Corinthians 14:20). Many who grow up in Christian homes and are taught the Bible from their earliest years lose their faith in School in the workplace, or in the Military. They become exposed to sophisticated philosophical systems that leave no room for what they’ve been taught at home or in the church. When this happens, the awe and wonder of the world goes away. Everything that captures the imagination and hearts of children is reduced to a scientific formula of what and how. There’s an obsession with the “what” and a passionate search for the rationale of “how” things work in the world. But the glorious Biblical “why” the world is as it is and why mankind, and ourselves as individuals, are in the mortal state that we’re in is left unanswered. The Message of the Bible is the only legitimate answer to the why questions of life.

Saint Augustine is famous for saying, “I do not understand in order that I might believe. Rather, I believe in order that I might understand.” It all begins with childlike faith, but it must go on to a mature understanding of the tenets of the faith. A child might readily accept the Christmas story of the virgin birth of Jesus as described in the Gospels, but it’s not until they understand the “why” that their faith grows to a mature level. We must teach our children the “whats and hows” of faith in their early years but then expand the teaching to reach them with the why level so that their faith will become stronger, not weaker when confronted with atheistic and agnostic doctrines in the world.

The virgin birth of Jesus was absolutely essential to the fulfillment of the role for which he came into the world. We are all sinners. The Bible presents the sins of mankind as blotches, stains, breaks, scars, flaws, welts, and numerous other images, all of which present the reality of man’s imperfection. Yet the only acceptable sacrifice for the sins of man must have been a perfect sacrifice. One commentator puts it this way, “He would be ‘holy’ from the womb.… His name was to be Jesus … denoting Him as Savior. The holiness of Jesus is here put in connection with His miraculous conception, and surely rightly. In no case in the history of mankind has natural generation issued in a being who is sinless, not to say superhuman.” Mary brought forth her firstborn son, but he was certainly superhuman. Matthew 1:18 says, “When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph before they came together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit.”

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Luke 10:21

Who’s the Grownup?

Filed Under: Devotions by Chuck
December 10, 2024

Christmas and the Kingdom of Heaven are for kids. Jesus made that point several times in the Gospels. I’ve been trying to capture the particular characteristics of children that are so meaningful to God. One of those characteristics seems to be a simplistic hearing of God’s teachings and open hearts to embrace them without the confusion of a personal agenda or a history that clouds the clarity of Jesus’ words. Grownups don’t always get it. I think this is what Jesus meant when he prayed, “Thank you, Father…that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children” (Luke 10:21). One of the things that children seem to “get” when adults miss the mark is in the area of forgiveness. One Sunday School Teacher tells about picking up one of her students for Sunday school. She writes:

When I went to pick up Shanna for Sunday school one week, she was crying and had blood on her dress. “It’s my uncle Joe!” she said. I knew that her family was “going through changes” because of Uncle Joe and his drug addiction. Shanna had particular reason to feel bitter toward her uncle. For years she had dreamed of owning a bicycle, and that Christmas a donation from a church made her dream come true. Shanna rode her shiny, new blue bike everywhere, bragged about it, polished it, and treasured it. Within a month, her uncle had sold the bike to buy drugs—an ample reason to embitter a nine-year-old. Now, on this morning, there was one more reason. Uncle Joe had come home wearing a T-shirt that read, “Say No to Drugs.” Shanna commented, “Why don’t you read your own shirt?” He hit her, causing a nosebleed. The white collar and yellow lace of her Sunday dress were a mess. Nothing else was clean, and everyone else was still asleep. We went to church to wash out the bloodstain. When it came time in the service for individual prayer petitions, Shanna’s voice sounded bright and clear as a trumpet: “I pray for my uncle Joe. He needs your help, Lord. Please, Jesus, help my uncle.” What a privilege to drink from the same chalice as Shanna.

In the Lord’s Prayer, we’re taught to pray, “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” I think Shanna gets it while many adults still harbor bitterness and unforgiveness in their hearts. It’s only when we become like children and are able to forgive and let go that we experience God’s peace. Matthew 18:3 says, “Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”

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Matthew 13:13, Mark 4:33

The Christmas Story

Filed Under: Devotions by Chuck
December 9, 2024

When I tell stories or use illustrations to clarify biblical truth in my sermons, I’m often told that even the kids understand them. Telling stories is the primary method that Jesus used to communicate truth to his listeners. I expect that even some of the youngest kids in his audience were able to understand much of what he taught, while many adults would miss the point. Jesus explained that he often taught in stories because “seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand” (Matthew 13:13).

Mental blindness and deafness are some of the most devastating effects of sin. Many people may hear the same story or parable and come away with different responses. Everyone will acknowledge that the Christmas story is a beautiful story. It’s eloquent, imaginative, and interesting. It will be told in thousands of churches across this country in the weeks ahead, yet many will not see the significance and will miss the personal point of application. It is the same today as it was in Jesus’ day. I’ve been occasionally told how appropriate my sermon was for some absent person. But, I always wonder if it touched them. We hear and yet don’t get it. We see, yet don’t perceive. It’s part of our fallen nature. We tend to hear what we want to hear, and we tend to see what we want to see. We become so single-focused that we miss the point. There are some fascinating pictures that are drawn in such a way that we tend to see it only one way. But the truth is, it has something more to it than meets the eye. We tend to see what we want to see. There have been several photos posted by my Facebook friends that tell you to close your eyes and open them again slowly. When you do that, you see something different. It’s usually a picture of what Jesus might have looked like.

The secret is that you look at the picture in a different way. When we learn to think outside the box or to look outside the framework of what immediately meets the eye, we can see it from a new perspective. This is why Jesus taught in parables. A parable is a picture that must be looked at in various ways to get the message. The value of a good story or parable is that they have a way of sneaking past the defenses of the heart and striking us with previously unseen truth. At the same time, the truths are hidden from those who cannot change their focus. They will always see just what they want to see and nothing more. The Story of Christmas is about my sinfulness, God’s love, His sacrifice, and my redemption! God so loved me that He sent the most perfect present of all times, His own son, to die for my sins. Mark tells us that Jesus often spoke to us in word pictures like this. Mark 4:33 says, “With many such parables he spoke the word to them, as they were able to hear it.”

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