I grew up in a big family. There have always been children around me to nurture and to play with. When I turned 18, I became a teacher’s aid at a preschool–a profession I stayed in for nearly 8 years, even through moving to different states. I spent so many hours each day communicating with 2-4 year olds, getting to know them, helping them, teaching them, and facilitating their play. After my husband and I tied the knot, we traveled to Africa where we spent 4 months immersed in a culture I was not familiar with, a language I couldn’t speak, and yet, I figured out quickly that the children laughed just as easily as they did in my home town half way across the planet. Today, I am a mother of two amazing children. My love and appreciation for children has grown even deeper as I have come to experience children in a whole new way.
In all my life, if there is one thing that I have learned as a universal truth it is this:
Children are a blessing.
Children are beautiful, full of joy, the radiant light in this dark world. No matter what part of the world, no matter what ethnicity or background, children are always a blessing.
Children remind us that we need to play more, love more, laugh more, and that we need to never stop learning. They remind us that the future and what we fight for now, is for them. And for their children. They remind us of the responsibility we have to provide and protect. They motivate us to do some of the most dangerous work there is to be done…because they are worth fighting for! They remind us that life is fragile and that life is priceless.
Children are always a blessing.
Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord,
the fruit of the womb a reward. – Psalm 127:3
Children are a gift from God. He has entrusted us with the ability to give the gift of life to another. We all are gifts from God, having been birthed by our mothers, having been children, and now as adults we have the privilege to experience this incredible gift whether by having children, adopting, or interacting with other children. This is life and it is mysteriously beautiful.
God, the Creator of the Universe, put thought into each and every one of us, knowing us intimately as He formed us in our mother’s womb. We are fearfully and wonderfully made! Children are fearfully and wonderfully made by the hands of the Lord.
For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them. – Psalm 139:13-16
When a woman is giving birth, she has sorrow because her hour has come, but when she has delivered the baby, she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a human being has been born into the world. – John 16:21
The joy should never leave our hearts for the children being born into this world. Each one gifted to us, entrusted to us, to nurture and to care for. This is life. This is humanity. Life reproducing life. It is wildly beautiful.
How lucky are we to get to experience this? To look into a child’s eyes beaming with excitement and feel loved. To listen to a young one tell a story from imagination, stuttering through their words, as if you can see cog after cog began to spin in motion, development and growth occurring right before your eyes. To answer their many “whys” and to comfort their many melt downs. To teach them confidence and hand them a heaping scoop of courage through words of affirmation, to see if they can really do it. To build sheet tents and pillow forts, pretend to be superheroes, to dress up, to tea party, to run fast just because. To tell them about their Creator and the great things He has done, because He loves us. To explore their many talents and to help them navigate their purpose and place in this big world. To jump puddles, to toss a ball back and forth, to sing silly songs that ignite a burst of joy that spills out everywhere. How lucky are we to be reminded to slow down, get down on their level, to see what they see, and experience life alongside them?
Children are always a blessing.
I wish this world knew the marvelous blessing that children truly are. I wish our culture as a whole protected them more. I wish those who have influence cared enough to leave a legacy of responsibility and morality, so that the next generations after them understood the importance of values and virtues, so that they believed that they are valued. I wish people fought harder for the value of life. I wish parents defended their marriages and family with a fierce passion to persevere. I wish humanity cherished the gifts God has given us. I wish I didn’t have to be afraid for the children growing up in the world today.
I commend, respect, honor, and appreciate those who do have great love for children. The ones who fight for them, rescue them, teach them, and encourage them to thrive no matter how old they are!
I am praying for this…that this world would come to know and experience the truth that children are always a blessing, a true and radical gift from God.
