Suffer the little children...

"The wolf will live with the lamb, and the leopard will lie down with the young goat; The calf, the young lion, and the fattened calf together; and a little child will lead them." -Isaiah 11:6

Sometimes, it seems, the purity of a child’s heart bears more wisdom than that of an adult, scarred by the seasons. They understand unconditional love and devotion. A child gives love selflessly and without judgment or expectation of favor, and, for an all too terribly short while in their lives, they forgive transgressions easily, even forgetting their very occurrence. Their sincere desire for security and peaceful resolution may, at a glance, seem naive to an adult who’s caught up in the complexities of life. But it is the heart of a child that most closely resembles what God wants us to be. They are wholly and utterly dependent upon their provider. They love. They forgive, and, though sometimes reluctantly, they obey. Their worries are shortsighted. Trifling not with the obstacles of tomorrow, they are concerned about the “here” and the “now”.

My children want us to forgive and make up….just forgive the other. “It’s easy”, they say. It is biblical, after all….right? “Why can’t you just work it out?” “Why can’t you just forgive and love each other again?”…Why, indeed? Why can’t the wolf live with the lamb? Why must we choose the heavily trodden path of least resistance and take the easy way out by just quitting? Perhaps, instead of expending so much energy deciding the easiest way to get to where we want to go, we ‘ought look down at the little one tugging our shirt tail and listen to the wisdom of a child.