“Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it.” – Mark 10:15
This certainly sounds important! Who doesn’t want to enter God’s Kingdom? Assuming you do, be sure to receive it like a child. But what does that mean??? Let’s first understand what it doesn’t mean. When they hear these words of Jesus, many people immediately think about the so-called innocence of children, believing they must be innocent like that to enter God’s Kingdom. No way! Children are many wonderful things but they certainly aren’t innocent. They may be sweet, spunky, honest, and naive about the evils of the world but they still sin. Jesus knew that. Anyone who spends much time around kids knows that. We are truly sinners by nature! So, good news, you don’t need to be perfectly innocent to get into God’s Kingdom!
However, there are two actual attributes of little children that seem very relevant to entering God’s Kingdom. The first is that little kids are utterly dependent on the adults in their lives for everything. They receive all their food, shelter, clothing, comfort, and education from their parents, grandparents, teachers and others. Little children bring nothing to the table and shamelessly receive everything from adults. Though they may try to help, that help only slows things down.
The Kingdom of God is EXACTLY like that! We can do nothing to help save ourselves or get into God’s Kingdom. We can do nothing to earn or deserve admission into God’s perfect, holy Kingdom. We’re trapped in our sin and utterly dependent on Christ’s work on the cross to save us. He suffered and died so that our sins could be forgiven. There’s nothing we can add to that! If we wish to enter God’s Kingdom it’s only through utter dependence on God’s grace given through faith in Jesus Christ.
That’s the second child-like quality we must embrace to enter God’s Kingdom—faith. Little children implicitly believe anything and everything their parents tell them. They have absolute faith and trust in their parents (at least until a certain stage of development). We must likewise have simple faith and trust in Jesus if we’re going to enter God’s Kingdom. We must believe to receive. The Kingdom of God is a kingdom of grace given through faith alone. There’s nothing we must do other than trust in the Lord. There’s nothing we can do other than trust in the Lord. In this, we’re truly like little children. #FollowJesus