Like a Little Child

The neighborhood is changing and I love it. Not that I don’t love my longtime neighbors; but I am delighted to see the bikes and scooters and strollers on their way past our house as the young families move in. Next door and across the street we have two brand new baby boys, each with a precious, barely-bigger big sister learning the ropes of growing up herself. The curiosity, the excitement exudes from their sparkling eyes.

In the redo of Priscilla Shirer’s 2005 He Speaks to Me study* I was reminded of my need to come like a little child to hear from God. You see, in the days when the word of the LORD was rare God spoke to a twelve-year-old Samuel instead of to the priest Eli (1 Samuel 3:1). Come to think of it, neither was Jesus silent about us having the faith of little children to hear His voice. Indeed, it was to God’s good pleasure to reveal His things to the little children rather than to the wise and learned of the times (Luke 10:21).

So how to have the “simplicity of a child”* to hear from the Lord? It begins with genuine fear. Fear wraps itself around our imaginations in a number of ways. Yes, we wish to avoid the displeasure and discipline of God. But He is really asking for the kind of fear that envelops us in awe and reverence, bringing us into the place of true wisdom.

If I know God and I fear God and I trust God to the utmost, I will be able to depend on Him with the calmness of a little child. So I will begin by wiping out all those worldly things I have embraced, and I will learn His ways. I will come into His presence day by day with the eagerness of my precious little neighbor girls.

To God be the glory!

Nancy P

*Priscilla Shirer, He Speaks to Me, Lifeway Press, 2005, p.8

All Scripture quotations are from the NIV Translation 1973, 1978, 1984, unless otherwise noted