Children

“Jesus loves th’ little children…” Boy, I love that song! ‘N it’s
true, too. Jesus has a real special place in his heart fer th’
little ‘uns’ Y’all remember how them disciple fellers wuz tryin’
to send everbody away that wuz tryin’ to bring their young ‘uns
to Jesus. Now, don’t git me wrong. I ain’t sayin’ they wuz cold
hearted fellers, uh-uh. Their intentions wuz good. They wuz worried
about Jesus ‘cause they knowed he was plum tuckered out ‘n they
wuz tryin’ to help him, that’s all. But anyhow, he stopped ‘m in
their tracks ‘n said, “Let the little children come to me and do
not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as
these.” (Matthew 19:14) Now, he wuz’n sayin’ that everbody in
heaven is a baby, no, sir. Whut he wu sayin’ wuz that if you’re
plannin’ on gittin’ to heaven in th’ first place you might better
have a little bit of baby in you. Now, I don’t mean the baby parts
that soil their pants or cries when they don’t git their way or
gits jealous if some other baby gits a bigger lollipop or sumthin.
I mean the baby parts that trusts their daddys with everthing they
got. That’s the kind of faith God wants. He wants a faith that
believes no matter whut it sees. He wants y’all to look some little
ol’ demon right in th’ eye ‘n say, “My daddy can whup yer daddy!”
‘N He wants y’all to love like little babies. Little babies love
even when it don’t hardly make no sense. When they git stuck with
a diaper pin they cry and cling to the very one that stuck ‘em.
God wants that. He has to stick y’all ever now ‘n then. He has to
discipline you. Fact is, if He don’t discipline you then you ain’t
His child. Says so in that Book of Hebrews. But He don’t never
discipline you ‘cept he does it with love. He don’t never correct
you jus’ to show you what a failure you are, but to show you what
a success you can be. ‘N when He sticks you He wants you to cry
‘n to cling to Him who stuck the pin in you in th’ first place.
Yep, there’s some ways He really wants y’all to be babies.

I remember how Eve loved her young ‘uns. They always give her so
much hope, ‘cause God had promised that one of her young'uns would be the one who beat the devil. So ever time she brought one into th’ world she thought, “Tbis might be the one.” ‘Course, she didn’tlive to see it happen. Not on earth, anyhow. Y’all’ve heard about a few of ‘em. Cain ‘n Abel, fer sure, how Cain got jealous ‘cause
God thought more of his sacrifice than He did Cain’s. Shoot! God’s
gonna always accept a gift of life before He accepts a gift of death!
But anyhow, Cain killed his own flesh ‘n blood. Broke Eve’s heart, of
course. But it couldn’t break her hope. She had a few more, mostly notreally worth mentionin’, ‘n mostly like Cain. But then come Seth.
Seems like he jus’ wanted to follow th’ Lord from the day he come
out of th’ womb, ‘n it wuz in his day that people started lookin’
to God agin’, like they’d fergot to do all them years. Now, he weren’t
eh’ one neither. But he sure did remind Eve that the one wuz comin’.
‘N ever time Eve looked at ol’ Seth her hope jus’ swelled up like new.

Reckon I’ll talk to y’all later. Think I’ll go tune up the ol’ horn ‘n
play that song agin.