The current Christian “it” book is called “Heaven is for Real”.
Now, I’m the kind of person who will avoid reading a book / watching a movie / listening to a band / eating at a restaurant / wearing a certain style for the sole reason that it’s popular. But. Last week, I found myself on a cruise ship in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico reading “Heaven is for Real”.
The premise of the book {in the event you’ve been floating through a cave in an inner tube or something. Not that I’ve done that in the past week… well ok, I have. But that’s another story for another blog post.} is that a 3-year-old boy was in surgery and was close to death. He “visited” Heaven during this time, and the book talks about the discussions he’s had with his parents since that experience. It outlines the things he saw, learned, and experienced in the 3 minutes he was there.
He spoke of Heaven in detail, and as concretely as if he were telling about a playground he played on, or a swimming pool he visited. There’s no way he was making this stuff up. Kids speak matter-of-factly and they have no filter. They say what’s on their mind. And the details of his story remained consistent over the course of 2 years. That’s hard to do for even an adult. Unless it’s true.
This boy didn’t question anything he saw. He didn’t think twice about the fact that people had wings. He didn’t bat an eye at the fact that God is “kind of blue”, as he put it. He didn’t argue the fact that Jesus has a horse that’s all the colors ever, plus millions of other colors.
Instead, he embraced it. He remembered fondly everything he experienced. He allowed that 3 minutes to infiltrate who he was as a person. And most importantly, he communicated the messages Jesus told him to bring back to his family.
Why do we doubt?
It’s so easy to become complacent, to view God as a faraway being. A concept rather than an entity.
But that’s not the case: God has an active and direct hand in our lives. The kid in the book said that he saw God shooting down power to his dad when he preached.
There’s a chapter in this book called “Jesus Really, Really Loves the Children”. Apparently that love was so evident to the kid that he wouldn’t shut up about it. His parents eventually got so annoyed with it that they told him, “Ok, we get it. You don’t need to keep reminding us about how much Jesus loves the children.”
What is it about the children? What makes them favored in the eyes of God?
I learned a lot about childlike faith over the past week.
When you have Crohn’s disease, it’s absolutely 100% foolish to put yourself in a situation in which you won’t have quick easy bathroom access. But I chose to zipline in the rainforest of Belize anyway. For over an hour, there was no possible way I could use the bathroom. I had been feeling sick that day, but I didn’t want that to stop me from taking advantage of the day I had in Belize, and the incredible opportunity that presented itself to me there.
So I ziplined.
Before I started, I asked God to help me not have to be sick while I was up in the trees.
See, my big problem is that I ask God these things, but then I doubt so thickly that I make myself sick anyway.
“Ask, and it shall be given you.” —Matthew 7:7
Why don’t I believe that?
Sure, I believe it. But I don’t believe it.
You know, the kind of belief that requires trust. Belief that necessitates faith.
Faith.
Childlike faith.
Is it the literal children who Jesus favors?
Or does He simply want our reckless, unabashed faith and trust?
I can’t become a child again. I’m not Benjamin Button.
But I can up the ante when it comes to trusting like a child does.
“Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the Kingdom of Heaven.” —Matthew 18:3
