There is a fascinating episode in Jesus' life, the meaning of which has long eluded me. And though I can't claim to understand it thoroughly, I've landed on an implication.
The Gospel writer Mark puts it like this:
"And they were bringing children to him that he might touch them, and the disciples rebuked them. But when Jesus saw it, he was indignant and said to them,'Let the children come to me; do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God. Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it.'" [Mk. 10:13-15]
Here we see people bringing children to Jesus, and being rebuked by his disciples. Impassioned, Jesus intervenes. "Let the children come to me!" And here's the astounding part, "for to such belongs the kingdom of God."
Jesus goes on to say something that he hints at elsewhere, "whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it."
In Matthew's Gospel, we read that we must "turn and become like children" in order to enter the kingdom at all! [Matt. 18:3] He is calling all adults to a form of repentance!
What can this mean?
I believe Jesus is alluding to what has come to be known as "the inner child."
Now I realize that the phrase "inner child" has become a satirical synonym for pop-psychology and the self-help industry. I remember reading an allegorical book on management and team-building, in which the main character disarmed her team during an off-site by assuring them that they weren't going to talk about the inner child.
Yet this idea is also embraced in serious circles of psychology. Carl Jung conceived of this as the "Divine Child" (a phrase I'll return to later). Others refer to the "wonder child", "child within" or even the "true self."
Here's the idea: each of us have been so formed during our upbringing that our conceptualizations from childhood live on into adulthood.
Another way to look at it is that we are all partially adult and partially child. Where our child has matured and grown, we are adults. Where he has not, we remain inwardly young.
The "grown up world" tends to be a harshly pragmatic place, yet this inward young-ness finds expression in our destructive and self-destructive coping mechanisms. So though we learn to act like adults, all the while this child lives on.
When we sense an offense, we lash out with irrational tantrums. When criticized or disappointed, we withdraw and pout. Stress drives us to escapism. Strife to avoidance. These are all childish responses, and we vaguely understand this.
Often the destructive effects drive us to introspection or professional therapy.
Psychiatrists (esp. psychoanalysts) will advocate a "nurturing of the inner child"--viz. a conscious comforting of those parts of us which remain young because of trauma, abuse or confusion. This allows us to more fully enter adulthood as whole people.
Ostensibly, one returns to the place of childhood in order to provide comfort and perspective to one's own self in order not to live out this episode again and again in our adult lives. (Which is what is happening in our destructive behavior and habits.) We must play the compassionate adult in our own lives, in lieu of those who harmed or failed us.
For example, a person who suffered abusive neglect as a child might react with surprising volatility to the sensation of being neglected or overlooked. They perceive how this is harming their relationships and creating undue strife and unreasonable expectations. Therefore, they think back on those episodes of neglects, putting their adult selves in the situation. They may then walk into the room with a plate of cookies and milk and say, "This is what you really deserve. I'm so sorry your mom locked you in here again. It's not right. You are a beautiful, valuable person."
This act of having compassion and of verbalizing truth is said to have a profoundly healing effect. Soon one is no longer experiencing life through the lens of spiteful neglect. They are liberated from the wounds of their past to relate freely with others.
Is this just the psychobabble of pop-psychology and the self-help industry?
Let's look more closely at this story from Jesus' life.
Why were children being brought to him? Probably in the hopes that he would invoke a blessing. (For this is what he ends up doing.) This may seem superstitious and peripheral to us--it did to his disciples--but it turns out that invoking a blessing over these children is something Jesus took surprisingly seriously. What is a blessing except a pronouncement of good over the person and life of an individual?
Have we ever considered the importance of such acts? (A time when someone--an adult whom you respected--pronounced good words over you? Maybe over-and-against many of the bad ones?) Who of us have experienced such an act?
Why did his disciples "rebuke" these parents (and, by association, their children)? They most certainly didn't grasp the value? Why?
Firstly, in this society--as in most--children are often viewed in an inferior light. This probably comes from utilitarian mentalities (i.e. that value is derived from valuable productivity). This, however, is not a Judeo-Christian concept! For we hold that the value of any person, from conception to death, is derived from their Creator [Gen. 1:27]. Nevertheless, we all often slip into such utilitarian mindsets. (This typically has been ingrained in us from our own childhoods.) Therefore, they didn't grasp the value of these children.
Secondly, they didn't grasp the value of the activity. (The invocation of blessing.)
Jesus grasped both, so much so that he became indignant. To borrow a phrase from a children's book, "That's 'fancy' for real angry."
When I hear "indignant" I hear the narrator of Thomas the Tank Engine saying, "Sir Topham Hat was cross." But the reality is that Jesus was furious and publicly called out his disciples.
Why did Jesus become so indignant--so angry?
These truths were not mere abstractions to him. There was a battle being played out in that moment. (Incidentally, this battle plays out in countless ways around this earth each day.)
What does Jesus say? "No, you need to become like them!" And what is he saying? Simply put, there is something that children possess that allow them to enter/receive "the kingdom" which the rest of us do not. Since we were all once children, it is clear that it is something we all have but lose.
In that moment, Jesus intervened because it was being lost, attacked, compromised. He stepped in because, in the rebuke of his disciples, the message was being sent.
The clear message being sent was that "children are unimportant" (a message which eventually evolves into the question, "Am I important?" in the heart of every person), therefore blessing children is unimportant (a message which eventually evolves into the question, "Am I blessed?" in the heart of every person.) No amount of adult productivity can ever fully answer these questions.
Do we recall that shortly after our Maker declared that we were "made in his image", he went on to bless? [Gen. 1:22, 28] He essentially declared, "you have a divine value and divine purpose!" Jung's term "Divine Child" is very pregnant, and is synonymous with Winnicott's "true self". Indeed, one might combine the two as one's "True Divine Self."
The cause and the effect of the fall were to create confusion regarding this, thus when Jesus came to proclaim "the good news of the kingdom" it was met with the adult skepticism of those raised in a fallen world.
This is the crux of the matter. Our fallen "adultness" has damaged kingdom receptors. The news of the kingdom is "good news", yet we've become jaded by life. We have developed "too good to be true" filters as a form of self protection. Faith, hope and love must be functional for the kingdom to be received and lived in its fullest form.
Is this what Jesus is really saying? I believe it is. Have you ever considered the fact that in Jesus' parable of the sower/soils, it is the soil along the path that cannot receive the message at all? Why? Because the soil is rock hard. Why is it rock hard? Because the path has been trampled daily underfoot. The good news of the kingdom cannot penetrate such soil, and the gospel itself becomes "trampled underfoot" [Luke 8:5].
What makes adults different from children in this regard? Mainly the fact that they have been tread underfoot for a longer amount of time! Thus the soil of their hearts is virtually impenetrable.
Now you may say, "Doesn't Jesus actually commend to us the humility of children?" [Matt. 18:5] In other words, isn't Jesus merely saying we ought to be more humble?
The answer is no. Jesus does call us to "humble ourselves like a child", but it is not because children are humble. It is because it is humbling for adults to become like children.
Children trust and hold out hope and give and receive love very freely. These are acts of emotional vulnerability. Adults are skeptical and pessimistic and slow to give and receive love--waiting to understand the conditions. Adults are emotionally self-protective. Are we willing to let down our guard--even if it has been conditioned through relentless repetition on this earth? The degree to which we can do so is the degree to which we can experience the kingdom.
Three brief points of application:
(1) Presumably Jesus would have you, "turn and become like a child" in order to "enter" more fully into the realities of the kingdom. Ask yourself, "how has the skepticism, pessimism and guardedness borne of life in this fallen world prevented me from fully embracing the kingdom?"
(2) It may be that your own worth was "rebuked" during childhood, and no adult might have been lucid or whole enough to intervene. Jesus tells us that his Spirit is a companion to be preferred even to himself! [Jn 16:7] and that he is our Helper/Counselor. Whereas psychoanalysts might have you nurture and comfort your own inner child (a very worthwhile thing that most of us really can do!), what would it look like to reflect upon those episodes of misguided rebuke and ask Jesus' Spirit to intervene; to tell you what is actually true? In other words, invite Jesus, through the ministry of his Spirit, to undo the harm done--to invoke a blessing where there has been a lingering curse?
(3) Finally, what might it look like for you to be an intervening presence in the life of another (child or otherwise)? Can you use your voice to contradict the message of the world? To awaken faith, hope and love? To invoke a blessing? To affirm their True Divine Self?
Thanks for reading. Please supply your feedback!
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