13Then they brought little children to Him, that He might touch them; but the disciples rebuked those who brought them. 14But when Jesus saw it, He was greatly displeased and said to them, "Let the little children come to Me, and do not forbid them; for of such is the kingdom of God. 15Assuredly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will by no means enter it." 16And He took them up in His arms, laid His hands on them, and blessed them.
We are all taught that God is like a loving Father to us. The part I hadn't thought about as much is that this probably implies that we are to be as loving children to Him. But how are we to be as loving children?
Our relationship with our parents changes throughout our lives. When we are little infants, we have total dependence on our parents and trust that everything will be given to us as needed. Our love for our parents is such a natural thing we hardly even notice it. When we reach the terrible twos, we start our first attempts at independence. We want to establish ourselves as individuals, but know we still need our parents for everything. As we reach adolescence, we feel we know everything and our parents know nothing. We feel they can't possibly relate to what we feel and are going through. And when we reach adulthood, we still love our parents, but we have finally reached independence. We can do things for ourselves and provide for our own needs.
This is our natural order of development and maturity. Are we taking our relationship with God through these same stages? If so, we need to back up a few stages. According to this verse, He wants us to remain as little children in our love and trust in Him. We are to accept and receive God's love and grace as freely as it is given us. The hearts of little children are as yet uncorrupted from worldly cares and are open and accepting. We should be that free in loving God.
It makes me wonder. God is the One who created us. He designed us to go through our natural progression that helps us achieve independence from our parents. Why did He do that when He wanted our relationship with Him, our Father, to be as a parent and child and yet remain as that of little children? He does not want our growth for independence from Him.
Again, I think it is because He wanted us to achieve the childlike love for Him through our free will, our own freedom of choice. We must first achieve independence from our parents in order to choose our relationship with God. Hopefully sometime during that search for independence, we as parents show our children some of the unconditional love and reason for full trust that we want them to be able to turn to God for when they reach their state of independence.
Watch an infant in their love and trust in their parents. This is what we are to model in our love and trust in God.