The Greatest Knight of All

 Children need Jesus and Jesus himself said “Let the children come me” (Matthew 19:14), but the greatest hindrance to them knowing the gospel truth of grace is adults prescribing and enforcing laws and rules all the time which sends the message that God will only be pleased with them if they are good little boys and girls. Jesus came for the exact opposite reason, that it’s impossible for them to be good boys and girls, just as it’s impossible for adults to be good. Not one of us can “follow the rules” because our hidden inner worlds are a mess of narcissistic selfishness which we may be able to hide from others, but it is never hidden from God. “Both adults and children are radically sinful and radically loved” (Elyse Fitzpatrick). Christianity has often been presented as a moralistic law following club that neglects to acknowledge that God doesn’t need anything from us; He is God who is completely whole in Himself. Us striving to have good behaviour in order to be loved completely denies the death and resurrection of our Saviour.

“The Bible is most of all a story. It’s an adventure story about a young hero who comes from a far country to win back his lost treasure. It’s a love story about a brave prince who leaves his palace, his throne, everything, to rescue the one he loves. It’s like the most wonderful of fairy tales that has come true in real life.” 

Sally Lloyd-Jones

This is what children need to know. They will sin constantly, they will suffer the effects of other people’s sin constantly, there will be sickness and suffering in their lives because nothing in this world is as it was originally meant to be. However, Jesus rescued them from the punishment, and will continue to pursue them all the days of their life like the line from the song based on Psalm 23 “your goodness is running after, it’s running after me”. He does chase after us no matter how much we try to hide our sin, run from Him and chase numerous idols. The best thing children can see is weak adults leaning on Christ, and in turn allowing children to see they also need Christ. I love in classes when children have prayer requests because in that they are saying “this is hard, and I want to ask God to help or provide comfort in this situation.” There’s no greater thing for a child to be taught than handing all their needs to God and then resting in the truth that God hears their every need and cares deeply; for them to truly learn to “cast their cares” upon Christ- the One who took all upon Himself in sacrifice out of love for us.

“Since it is so likely that children will meet cruel enemies, let them at least have heard of brave knights and heroic courage.” (C.S. Lewis) The Bible is an adventure story about the God/ man who entered our world to save us. Let them hear this story over and over again. Children understand magical stories of heroes. Kids know Percy Jackson and Harry Potter and Captain Underpants and any number of heroes. Often Bible stories are presented as faultless people who lived perfect lives for God, but they are full of mess. May children be taught that the greatest heroes of the Bible also lied, stole and murdered. The ugliness wasn’t omitted from the Bible, it was kept there for a reason. 

“Now the story of Christ is simply a true myth: a myth working on us in the same way as the others, but with the tremendous difference that it really happened.” (C.S. Lewis). Life is hard and kids know it- they need to know the brave knights, and may they point to the true myth about the greatest Knight of all, Jesus.