Children

I had the most wonderful skype conversation with Jen--it was Saturday afternoon here and Sunday morning there and I could hear the birds singing in New Zealand while she sipped her coffee. During our conversation she asked me about a book I'd had when she & I were roommates. I'd bought it visiting Jon when he lived in Chicago & he'd taken me to the Wheaton College Library (that's where I got hipped to Dorothy Sayers, too.) Anyway, I still have the book and pulled it out and have been enjoying it thoroughly before I send it along to Jen when our friend Laura heads to NZ for Christmas.

It is called "Wishful Thinking: A Seeker's ABC" by Frederick Buechner and was first published in 1972. It is a lexicon, and under the letter C, he says this about Children:

When the disciples, overearnest as ever, asked Jesus who was the greatest in the kingdom of Heaven, Jesus pulled a child out of the crowd and said the greatest in the kingdom of Heaven were people like this (Mt.18:1-4)...He was saying that the people who get into heaven are people who, like children, don't worry about it too much....who live with their hands open more than with their fists clenched...who are so relatively unburdened by preconceptions that if somebody says there's a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, they are perfectly willing to go take a look for themselves.

Children aren't necessarily better than other people. Like the child in "The Emperor's New Clothes," they are just apt to be better at telling the difference between a put-up job and the real thing.

Now that I have little children, this rings so true. I have a renewed desire to be more LIKE my girls, while praying for the wisdom to raise them to be adults who have childlike faith.

And at the very moment when I was wondering if I had a sweet picture of my girls to attach to this post, Evelyn got up from her nap, came downstairs and announced to me, "Mommy, I just peed in your bed." Well, if that isn't just a quick shake back into the tangible realities of life! :)