It always amazes me to see how much children smile. Just in general, it seems that they smile a lot more often than adults. They would be happy playing in the dirt or with rocks. It really doesn’t matter. I remember the days when I was a little lad growing up in Tifton, Georgia. It didn’t take much to entertain my sister Bethany, my uncle Benny, and me. We were all within two years of each other (yes, I know its strange, my grandma was older when she had Benny, so there) but we could do anything for fun. There was no loss of imagination. We could create whatever we wanted. We performed plays just for the three of us and it was wonderful!
Then, life set in. The days of youth were long-forgotten. We forgot what it was like to play make-believe. We forgot to imagine wild and crazy stories. We became full of logic and reason and not much more beyond that. Unfortunately, this very thing hindered me for so long. Its called “putting God in a box”. Yes, God gave me a brain to think and to reason, but he did not give me one to rationalize the incomprehensible things that he can do. After all, he is God.
I’ve been reading a book called The Celebration of Discipline by Richard Foster. In his chapters on the disciplines of meditation and study, God reminded me that the imagination is what allows us to know that God can do the impossible. I know it seems foreign to us who have “grown up”, but seriously, things that can be imagined or dreamt can actually happen! God is a big God. His ways are above any of ours, so I am not one to tell God that he can or cannot do something.
I say all of this to bring it back to the children. This week we spent several days visiting schools that had never seen foreigners in their village. It was incredible! We literally felt like movie stars signing autographs. The kids were so anxious to run up to us and have us sign our names for them. But the thing that impacted me the most was their smile. As wide as their little faces would let them, they beamed from ear to ear.
Even though they live in a place where the stamp of buddha is placed on them, you can see it in their eyes that they dream of something far greater, something that can satisfy them beyond measure. They are happy and they smile because they are children. They don’t fully understand buddhism. They just enjoy life and they enjoy imagining beyond the life that was given to them. There’s something more out there for them…and they love to smile.
Could it be that God put a smile upon their faces?
I believe he wants to call these children into his presence. I believe he wants to show them the satisfaction that can be found in him. In knowing that there is a big God who loves the little children. Please pray that their imaginations lead them to an understanding that God is bigger than buddhism. Please pray that they are led to the joy found in his son Jesus. Please pray that we, as older individuals, do not become hardened towards having an imagination, but that we believe in the ability that God can do the impossible!
He did. He does. And He will.
Blessings
