I love how often the children see what we cannot…
I love their passion…
… their enthusiasm…
… their unscripted response…
I love their curiosity…
… their bravery…
… their uncanny moxy…
I love their willingness to act…
… and their equal willingness to ask questions — even those seemingly “stupid” ones, that adults aren’t always courageous enough to ask.
Maybe that’s what I love most about children; they are not adults.
We allow things to get in the way.
To get in the way of what?
… of staying humble…
… of doing what’s right…
… of loving all others well.
We typically each love only a selected some.
So what actually gets in the way?
What keeps us from staying humble, doing what’s right, and loving all others?
Lots… understandably and unfortunately…
Hurt.
Disappointment.
A lack of forgiveness.
Bitterness.
And anger.
Sometimes intelligence, too.
As we’ve recently witnessed teens and tweens leading us in both prayer and peaceful demonstration, I keep thinking about how much each of us could learn from them if we, too, came together, humbly, worked across avenues and aisles, and committed to loving and listening to all others well.
Remember, too, therefore, who it actually is that leads the wolf, lion, and lamb well…
“The wolf will live with the lamb,
the leopard will lie down with the goat,
the calf and the lion and the yearling together;
and a little child will lead them.
The cow will feed with the bear,
their young will lie down together,
and the lion will eat straw like the ox.
The infant will play near the cobra’s den,
and the young child will put its hand into the viper’s nest.”
A child will lead them… the innocence of a child shall lead… no wolf nor goat nor lion…
They do not teach the wolf to eat the lamb nor the lion to devour the yearling. They instead teach them all how to lie down and work together.
Respectfully… humbly, too…
AR