Childlike Faith

I was doing my Bible study the other morning while my great-niece Carrey and my daughter Myranda were chatting in the kitchen. They were chatting about a snowball fight she had had with her daddy. Myranda asked Carrey who won and if she had fun playing with her Daddy (my nephew, Josh).... I could hear the smile and pure joy in little Carrey's voice when she said, "Yeah, it was FUN! I won because Daddy surrendered!" Myranda asked Carrey, "Do you know what surrendered means?" Carrey said, "Yup, it means put your hands behind your back!" "How do you know that, Myranda asked?" Carrey said, "Uncle Jarret and me play and he tells me 'surrender, put your hands behind your back!', so surrender means put your hands behind your back."

Do you remember playing these childhood games where you willingly gave in to someone because you trusted them and were having the time of your life playing? Well this put my mind into overdrive and I got to thinking...Think about one of your fondest childhood memories of playing this type of game and then continue to read with that in the back of your mind...

I bet that is how God would like us to picture surrendering to Him. Think about it...if we were completely surrendered to God with our hands behind our backs, we could not grab anything back that we had given Him. How often have we give a problem, trial, person or dream to God and then have snatched it back within minutes, hours or days? How many times have we prayed about something and God has given us an answer we do not want to hear so we kept praying for a different one? How many of us have prayed for a vision from God and then been too scared of what He had shown to us, so we backed off? How many times has the Holy Spirit spoken  to us and we did not respond immediately to Him because we thought, You want me to do WHAT?!

I think you get the picture by now. I know I have been guilty of these and more. What if we had the kind of childlike faith that put our hands behind our backs when God said, "Surrender! Follow Me and let Me lead! Be My captive and do what I tell you. Trust Me. You can trust ME. I love you and want what is best for you. I will not hurt you!" What if we truly gave things to God, left them in his hands and just followed his lead completely surrendered?

All the statements I made above are true...straight from God's Word! He loves you (John 3:16, Romans 5:6-8). He wants you to surrender willingly. He will not take your life forcefully. You have to let Him in (Revelation 3:20, James 4:8). He does not want you to be fearful or worry (2 Timothy 1:7, Matthew 6:25). He wants to lead you and will seek you out when/if you get lost (Matthew 18:12-14). He wants to give you good things! (Matthew 7: 7-11). Even the times of life that are difficult and hard He will use for good if you allow Him to (Romans 8:28).

So what if we had childlike faith? I guarantee we would have more peace, life would be more fun and we would be much more content in our daily lives. Does it mean we wouldn't have problems? Nope! Would we deal with our problems differently? We sure would, because we would have a Friend and a Confidant that we knew was working things out with our best interest in mind. How do I know all these things? I know them because I have experienced them! My Friend and Confidant walks through each and every day with me. Believe me there have been some rough ones, but He has never left me! I do not know His entire plan but I know He has my best interest at heart. The best but certainly not least is my eternal promise of spending eternity in heaven with Him.

Try on some childlike faith today. Have some fun and just wait to see what God will do. I can promise it will be more than you can ever imagine!

Keep Smiling! :)

This is Carrey the day she and Daddy had their snowball fight. Look at that grin!!!!