Faith of a Child

It was on that first Christmas that God Himself came to earth, in human form, to be with US and it is during this advent season that we prepare our hearts for Him.  That takes on special meaning for us this Christmas.

You see, a few things have been happening the last couple of months with our first born son.  First, he's been increasingly interested in God and spiritual things.  And second, he's been increasingly stubborn and naughty and at times willfully disobedient.  I am certain that the second thing is just a phase, a stage he's going through.  I'm sure some of it also has to do with not being the baby in the family anymore and I am certain that a lot of it has to do with testing his boundaries!

So, that's what has been happening the last couple of months with Eli.  And then recently Lily brought two little sticker booklets home from school that shared about the birth of Jesus.  She was encouraged to keep one for herself and to give the other to somebody that might not know Jesus. At lunch that afternoon she said that she wanted to give her extra one to Eli.  Eli seemed to take great offense to this...claiming loudly that he had, indeed, already invited Jesus into his heart.  So a little bit later I talked to him about it.  It was then that he said that he wasn't sure if he had ever asked Jesus into his heart.  After a little more discussion he said that he wanted to do just that, but that he wanted to do it later.

The next day we had a bit of a challenging afternoon with Eli (he broke the baby's wooden toy gym by hanging on it...which he had been told many times not to do).  Then that night Lily and Liam were asleep- leaving a great opportunity for Eli and I to have a good talk.  So we sat in his bed and basically talked about the Gospel and what it means for him.  We talked about how he is sinful and about how we are all sinful (this was easy for him to understand after the afternoon we had).  We talked about how the punishment for our sin is death (and being separated from God when we die).  And then we talked about how much God loves him, and how God doesn't want Eli to die or to be separated from Him...and that's why He sent His son, Jesus, to die in our place and to take our punishment for us.  And finally I explained that all Eli needed to do to be forgiven was to pray and tell God that he believes in Him and His son, to ask Him for forgiveness, and to ask Jesus to come into his heart.

You should have seen Eli's face light up when he understood this!  I haven't seen a smile on his face like that in a long time!  And then right there on his bed we prayed together.  I prayed and he prayed right after me...asking Jesus to come into his heart!  It was INCREDIBLE!!!  Praying with my son to receive Christ was possibly one of the biggest privileges of my life.  And after we finished praying Eli (still grinning from ear to ear) asked it I could share with him again about what it means to ask Jesus into your heart (I think he was just so amazed by it that he wanted to hear it again).  So I shared about the gospel with him again and then we talked more about heaven...and it was amazing!

Sure, Eli doesn't understand all of the finer aspects of the Gospel, but he has come to God with a child-like faith and I believe that God will honor that faith and I pray that God would grow it in Eli over the years.  I am thrilled to watch my Eli grow in his faith and I can only praise the Lord that He would willingly sacrifice His own son to give life to mine!