(Above: A man nicknamed "Nita" in a rural area of El Salvador, along with his newest family addition. Nita is very poor, and works in fields as a daylaborer, and also runs -- remarkably -- a "nutrition circle" for moms, so they can learn how and what to cook for small children, plus learn basic hygiene for taking care of their kids. Moms there were thrilled that their kids are now gaining weight. Nita does it because he loves God.)
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Little kids are cute. Babies are cute. But, as Jerry Seinfeld says, make no mistake: They are here to replace us.
We make a big deal out of little kids these days. If you're not a parent yet -- just wait: The number of products to ensure your child's safety is mind-boggling. It's good that they're all online, because a physical catalog of them could, if it fell off a high shelf, knock an entire daycare unconscious. And each product carries with it a little threat: If you don't buy this, your kid may suffer mightily, and it'll be all your fault. Or, as the mafia says, "Give us your money, or your kid gets it."
But really, we're not making a big deal out of little kids these days. We're making a big deal out of some of them. A select few: Our kids. We like our kids a lot, which is quite normal, and there's nothing wrong with that. And really, genetically-speaking, it's also a nice shorthand for "We like ourselves a lot", which is also quite normal. So here's to me, and miniatrure versions of me!
Overall -- and this is hard for us to imagine, I think -- little kids are actually NOT highly valued. History shows this, in living color, or at least it would, if children even merited much mention in the annals of history. They simply don't. They are, traditionally, and across cultures, sacrificed, abused, and beaten. If you think I'm over-speaking or exaggerating, I encourage you to research it yourself.
Little children have never had much status. Infanticide is one of the constants of human existence, and ritualistic child sacrifice is not a thing of the ancient past. It happens now, in many countries. In Uganda, for example, there's an uptick in child sacrifice, to the gods of success and wealth. This is not exceptional in history. It's rather the rule.
And here comes Jesus...
And he subverts this. His words are revolutionary, but we can miss them, in our own cultural context. When his followers wanted to usher children away from him, he took the opportunity, in front of the Best Religious Folks, to let them know how the Father sees children. He told them if they wanted a place in the Kingdom, they needed to become like children. Not the other way around. The Kingdom turns the world on its head.
I love God. I'm able to say this now, confidently, in large part because of this very sort of thing. Because I want to serve a God, and choose to obey a God, who is like this. I marvel at the men I met in El Salvador who, forsaking machismo, choose to spend hours, when not day-laboring, helping little kids understand who God is. They see value where the world does not, among the weak, the poor, the outcast.
They understand they serve a God who does not sacrifice His children, but sacrifices Himself for them.
I love a God like that, and if that's real Christianity -- and I believe it is -- I want more of it. While other men of the neighborhood may stare, or make jokes, these men say "Bring the children to me." That, my friends, is Christ-ian.
We hear, at least those of us in the Christian subculture, the term "Godly" used quite a bit. "I want to be a Godly man". Well, "man", be the way God is, then, according to Psalms: A champion of widows. A fatherless to the fatherless. A lover for the scorned.
THAT is "Godly".
Human history, and the present, says that poor children, vulnerable children, the weak, the less-than-impressive, the marginalized just... don't matter as much. They're expendable. The Kingdom, however, operates by very different rules. From now on, and with our very lives, let's play by them.
