Become Like Babies

As we go about our kitchen remodel this month, we’re making surprising decisions. Put up a rail by the stairs. Make a spot for cleaning supplies on a high shelf. No low glass cabinet doors. These are all precautions we cleared out of our lives years ago as the babies we raised in this house became adults, but they’re back in as we anticipate grandchildren in the next five years.

I’ll reacquaint myself with babies and all their lives revolve around. Recently reading through Jesus’s words about children, I started to wonder exactly what the business of these anticipated babies is. What do their lives revolve around? What’s their chief goal in life? Babies mostly do a few things: grow, change, explore, cry, eat, and poop. They learn quickly to make their needs known to those they trust because their dependence is incontestable. Babies won’t last long on their own. Their reactions to the world are joyous to watch since everything is a source of newness and wonder.

In the gospels, we’re told to be like them. How, though, does a full-grown adult do that?

“One day some parents brought their little children to Jesus so he could touch and bless them. But when the disciples saw this, they scolded the parents for bothering him. Then Jesus called for the children and said to the disciples, ‘Let the children come to me. Don’t stop them! For the Kingdom of God belongs to those who are like these children. I tell you the truth, anyone who doesn’t receive the Kingdom of God like a child will never enter it.’” (Luke 18:15-17, CEB)

Part of the answer to the puzzle, I think, lies in the disciples’ beliefs versus Jesus’. Those following Christ appeared to think children were beneath the notice of an important teacher. Jesus had status—these children had none. Jesus was a busy person. He rarely had time for anything but healing and teaching. Crowds of people and religious leaders besieged him wherever he went. He received notices and invitations everywhere. Why waste such precious time blessing babies?

Not coincidentally, the disciples’ own status revolved around that of Jesus. If their teacher welcomed unimportant people (which he had always done, so I’m not sure where the element of surprise is for them), they, by association, were unimportant. I suspect this is the real issue for the child-dispersing disciples. How would they get to be the greatest in the kingdom if Jesus spent his time with little kids?

Jesus’ warning that the kingdom of God belonged to those who became like children, then, has to be understood in the context of the disciples’ lack of humility. Babies know they’re dependent. They aren’t too proud to make it clear that they need the help of others. They don’t care if you’re a queen or an unhoused person so long as you’re kind to them. In that, they’re the opposite of the disciples here, and Jesus makes the contrast clear.

So what does becoming like children look like for us as singles, parents, community members, employees/ers, students, etc.? It means to be as unconcerned with status and power as babies are. To revel in the people and places God created and gave us to explore and appreciate. We engage with curiosity, remember our dependence and smallness, trust the Provider, never stop growing and learning, welcome vulnerability and lowliness.

It’s the opposite of the scheming for power and lack of trust displayed in our culture-war religious spaces. Jesus is clear—the kingdom of God doesn’t belong to those who engage in behavior devoid of humility and dependence. We’re to become smaller, not bigger.

It might mean to:

Engage that neighbor whose house or yard is a mess. If we think we’re better than that person, we’re missing the kingdom of God.
Admit we are that neighbor and stop being too proud to allow others to see us as we are, for who we are, with all our mess.
Question the people who tell us the only way to get what we want, or to be “victorious” believers, is to consider others less-than.
Give over the need to have or do all the things or live in the right neighborhood in order to matter.
Recognize our dependence and hold our plans loosely in favor of God’s plans.
Tell God what we need and be willing to tell others, too. Ignore the voices telling us we can’t be that vulnerable or needy.
Try new things that force us to explore God’s world and move out of comfort, accepting that fear will attend us but so will the Lord.
Raise others up, giving thanks publicly for their worth and achievements.
Lead those we may be over with curiosity and trust rather than authority.
Give the benefit of the doubt before forming judgments.

As we potentially welcome babies into this kitchen that has housed them before, I hope they remind me to have the humility of Christ, who, “Though he was in the form of God, he did not consider being equal with God something to exploit. But he emptied himself by taking the form of a slave and by becoming like human beings” (Phil. 2:6-7, CEB).

If God could become a baby, spanning the great glory between heaven and earth, surely we can, too.

Jill Richardson is a writer, speaker, pastor, mom of three, and author of five books. She likes to travel, grow flowers, read Tolkien, and research her next project. She believes in Jesus, grace, restoration, kindness, justice, and dark chocolate. Her passion is partnering with the next generation of faith. Jill blogs at jillmrichardson.com.