As a Little Child
Writer Author Sylvia Huffnagle
Christian Article
:
Christianity
- Fiction No
Most Christians need to learn to be a child--God’s child.
Part of becoming as a little child and part of humbling yourself before God is to see yourself as a child of God. You must realize that you have much to learn just as a little child in the natural does. When you miss the mark, you must acknowledge your error and ask your heavenly Father to forgive you and you must forgive yourself, knowing that you are only a child in God’s eyes.
You are not a spiritual adult, you are only a human adult of the species. Many people let the devil harass them because their parents and teachers expected more out of them than they were capable of comprehending at a given time and put them down verbally, so when they miss it with God they think they must face His disapproval. No. You only face His disapproval when you deliberately choose to disobey Him.
In that case if you want to get up and try again, you must repent and turn away from your sin and be more resolute. But I’m addressing how to handle the situation when you have just failed to achieve what was expected of you. Know that you are a child just learning to do things right. Ask God’s forgiveness and ask Him to help you learn to do better. Picture yourself as a child in His eyes. A child that is learning, but hasn’t arrived yet. If shame and guilt persist, know that it is either a shadow of your past experience that is to be rebuked. Or you are in a subtle form of pride. Yes, pride. It’s pride that causes you to think you should be smarter, stronger, better than you are.
You see, pride always exaggerates things. Pride is self-centered, therefore the person in it’s grip cannot see the complete picture. They cannot recognize their true position. The enemy--Mr. Pride himself--the liar who listened to the lie he conjured up, does the same to others. He gets them to see themselves out of proportion. Either he will badger them with thoughts of how bad they are, or how stupid they are, how clumsy they are, etc. Or if they are pleased with themselves, he will cause them to think they are more than they are--smarter, better, prettier, richer, or more important than they really are. This is the root cause of most of the things people fuss about.
So, child of God, don’t think more highly of yourself than you ought. You too are just learning, growing, and maturing. Even if you have been an adult for many years, even if you have gone to church for many, many years, even if you are old and gray, God sees you as a child who has a lot to learn. You may know all that your pastor can teach you. You may know your Bible better than anyone you know, but you don’t have all the answer. You still have areas that need work and God knows and understands. So, if you are trying hard to be a good Christian, pleasing in God’s sight, know that you are pleasing your heavenly Father because He looks on the heart.
Picture a loving Father dealing with His five year old who has just wielded a stick and hurt another kid with it. Picture the five year old being appalled that he hurt his friend and that he got into trouble. Some fathers may yell at the kid and even spank him, but a loving father is going to understand that it was just a foolish, childish error and as the child is begging for understanding and saying he is sorry, the loving father is going to hold him close and calmly discuss the mistake and it’s consequences with the child so that he will understand what not to do next time.
The child may make the same mistake a number of times until he matures to the point where he has learned not to wield a stick without being sure there will be no ill consequences because of his action. The Father is not upset because he knows the child is trying to do right. That’s the key phrase here--the child is trying to do right.
Sylvia Huffnagle
Editor's Comment:
About the Writer Author
State:
Pennsylvania
Country:
United States
Email:
huffnagl@verizon.net
Website:
www.straightpaths.truepath.com/about4.html
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