Verse 14
THE FRIEND FOR LITTLE CHILDREN
‘Suffer the little children to come unto Me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of God.’
This is inexpressibly touching; it is one of the most beautiful passages in the life of our Blessed Lord.
I. Jesus loves little children.—Rightly has the Church inserted this narrative into her service for the Public Baptism of Infants as her warrant for the dedication of children unto the Lord. If Jesus says, ‘Suffer little children to come unto Me, and forbid them not,’ who shall gainsay His word?
There are those, unhappily, who from prejudice or ignorance make the Christian Church less merciful even than the Jewish Church, and whereas in the latter the little ones were brought within the covenant of Israel on the eighth day, refuse the same privilege to the children of the Gospel Dispensation, and leave them outside the fold of the visible Church, until such time as in after years they seek the baptism which has been denied them in their infancy. Of course such people do not mean to be unkind or cruel to their children, but unkind and cruel they are nevertheless.
( a) Is it not a comfort to you to think that you have already dedicated your children to Christ?
( b) See that you keep your little ones in a sense of their responsibility as God’s dear children in adoption and grace.
( c) Do we not seem to see a special Providence watching over little children? They are so surrounded by peril and danger, they are so weak and helpless, that unless God did especially watch over their tender years they would never come safely through their infancy.
II. The entrance to the Kingdom.—We must enter the Kingdom of God as little children, or not at all. We are to be little children in
( a) Our faith.
( b) Our understanding of our weakness.
( c) Our simplicity.
( d) Our innocence and purity.
As the aged servants of God grow old they likewise grow young, like little children in thought and feeling, because they are ripening for the Kingdom of Heaven.
Illustration
‘In one of the wards of a children’s hospital was lying a little boy. He had met with a fearful accident that shattered his frame, and caused him such terrible anguish that he had no rest night or day. All around him were lying on their tiny beds his little companions in suffering. A strange fatality seemed to hang over the hospital at that time, and one by one the children were called away by the Messenger of Death. One evening this boy was heard talking to a little girl who was lying in the next bed: “I cannot bear this pain any longer. Jesus goes up and down the ward and calls other children to Himself, and yet He always passes me by. I want to go to Him so much; I am in such pain that I wish to be at rest. To-night I shall hold up my hand, so that when Jesus comes He may see that I want to go to Him.” The night closed in, and the ward was quiet and dark. At the break of day the sister in charge made her rounds to see whether any of the children stood in need of her. When she came to this poor boy’s bed, there was a thin, white hand held up above the clothes, and on turning down the sheet the little wan face was seen at rest in the sleep of death. He had signalled to Jesus, and the Lord had seen his faith and had taken him to Himself.’
(SECOND OUTLINE)
CHILD-RESCUE
Our Lord’s estimate of the worth of the children, and the part which they played in His ministry, ought to restrain the violence rained upon those whom Wordsworth felicitously describes as coming from God—
(1) ‘Some of you may have seen the celebrated clock in Strasburg Cathedral. Every day in the week is represented by the figure of a particular animal. As you look at this marvellous mechanism towards the evening of one day you can see already the head of the succeeding emblematic figure of the next day appearing. So it is with the children of a people.’
(2) ‘Who bids for the little children,
Body and soul and brain;
Who bids for the little children,
Young and without a stain?
Will no one bid, says England,
For these souls so pure and white,
And fit for all good or evil,
That the world in their page may write?
‘Oh, shame, said true religion,
Oh, shame, that this should be;
I’ll take the little children,
I’ll take them all to me.
I’ll raise them up with kindness
From the mire in which they trod;
I’ll teach them words of blessing,
I’ll lead them up to God.’
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