SAINT HENRY (OPTIONAL MEMORIAL)

Although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned you have revealed them to the childlike. 

Think about the amazing advancements in technology that have come about in the past century. Computers that once took up entire rooms now fit on your wrist. People once doomed to die from horrible diseases now go on to live for many happy and healthy years. Airplanes and high-speed trains have made the globe much smaller. And yet the same problems that have dogged us for centuries—poverty, war, crime, abuse—are still around. Why can’t all this incredible knowledge help us tackle these issues?

The problem is that technology cannot reveal the most important truth of all: that we are all children of God. Those whom Jesus calls “the wise and the learned”—the ones who rely only on brainpower—can’t quite understand this (Matthew 11:25). They can surmise that there is a God, but only God can reveal himself to us. For that to happen, they have to be “childlike” and ask him to show them.

What does it mean to be childlike? It means acknowledging that we were created to have an ongoing relationship with God as our Father: a relationship of love, trust, and dependence. It means believing that God is committed to us as a father is to his children. It means keeping ourselves open to the promptings that our Father gives us.

Here is one way that you can work on being more childlike. Try to take time every day to slow down and sit quietly with Jesus. It’s easy to fill our days with activities, chores, and obligations and miss out on deepening our relationship with him. Of course, there is much that we have to do each day, but it’s also vital that we not let it consume us.

So spend time just enjoying God’s presence. Sit outside and absorb the sun, and thank your Father for the gift of its warmth. Or close your eyes and imagine yourself taking a leisurely walk with Jesus. Put aside all the “grown-up” thoughts for just a short time, and simply enjoy the Lord. Be like a child, and see what your Father reveals to you.

“Father, thank you for calling me your child! Help me to know you, not just as the Almighty, but as my own Father.”

Isaiah 10:5-7, 13-16
Psalm 94:5-10, 14-15
Matthew 11:25-27