faith

When I was a little girl, I had this nighttime routine where I would tell each one of my dolls and/or stuffed animals “goodnight”…I would tuck them in on whatever makeshift Shelf Home I had made them and it was just a whole ‘thing’ for many nights at that stage of my life. I was trying to think back on those nights recently and the farther back I journeyed in my dusty old memory bank, the more I began to remember…and those memories started to awaken my spirit in such a weird way. I began to reminisce on how lovely those nights were…how sweet and how precious they were to me. It wasn’t just that I remember being an innocent kid with my big imagination either because when I began to think back, I realized I could actually remember the feeling of those nights…as if the neurons in my brain began to light up from the recollection…my sensory processing rebooted and a jolt of remembrance lit up in my frontal cortex. 

I didn’t just believe those dolls were alive, now reflecting back on it, I remember it as if every single thing came alive in that room… because what I had forgotten all this time, was that I was always talking with God during those nightly bedtime routines…I was tucking in my babies, while He was tucking in His. Im sitting here now remembering what sweet times those nights were with God…He was so tangible in that room with me…I remember He was so near…and I remember feeling so safe, so loved and so certain that I was the daughter of a King! I remember feeling Him so close, my faith being so infinite…

Childlike faith is just that…it isn’t just a naive silly belief system…its an impenetrable trust in a palpable good good Father. It’s the kind of faith that allows your whole bedroom to light up with life, a fearless devotion that doesn’t shake when something goes wrong… it’s a thoughtless, natural, type knowing of your Creator. 

I believe the Lord was so familiar to me then because I allowed Him the space to be around…but also I know that every day I woke up, in “real life” when I wasn’t in my own little world in my own little bedroom, I had an earthly father who resembled my heavenly one so beautifully. I wasn’t necessarily given the gift of faith when I was born like that amazing sister of mine…but I was given an advantage of faith with the family God gave me…He was so kind to allow me parents who loved each other and loved Jeffie and I so whole heartedly. He allowed me aunts and uncles, grandparents, cousins and neighbors that only added to that advantage. I say advantage because that foundation of family gave me so much time to really get it…my faith got to be well nourished and was allowed to grow and grow.

 Somewhere along the way though, my room stopped glowing with life and my dolls ended up in boxes somewhere in the attic…and like all of us…I finally grew up and as I did, I stopped having date nights with God, I forgot how to talk to Him like He was right next to me, and eventually forgot about those supernatural evenings all together. 

C.S. Lewis once said “God wants a childs heart, and an adults head.” Lewis isn’t wrong, but he is making something very difficult sound incredibly simple (which is Lewis’s MO anyway honestly)…because it is simple…but yet still so hard to do. I haven’t gone back to that little girl heart of mine in such a long time but the last few days have brought so many unknowns into my world, that I couldn’t help but feel like a child all over again…and with that child like spirit abound in me, I began to remember that unblemished, unshakable faith. Like my childhood, that seed was able to grow in minutes because of the family God has encircled me with…family that reminds me who God is, how we know Him personally, how real and substantial He is when you allow Him to be. He is never changing and He still longs to be a part of my routine, so I invite Him and Im expectant to see His wonders once again.

 “The childlike faith that asks not sight, waits not for wonder or for sign, believes, because it loves, aright, shall see things greater, things divine.” -John Keble

“Truly I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child, will not enter it at all.” (Luke 18:17)