I love people, at all different ages. I like to know how old someone is exactly instead of grouping their age, not sure why, I just do. But I see that I often, maybe like most people, see age groups (seasons) instead of individual ages. I particularly love the season I am now. I have learned so much just by watching others that have gone before me. I have learned what to do and what not to do. Paying attention to every move of every mentor I have ever had, although pretty much all of them have been for a very short time. But the other day, I realized there is an age group that could quite possibly beat them all.
I love working as a server. You get to interact with people of all ages and seasons in life. From the older couple who comes in and spends an hour at dinner because they are there to have a night out together and enjoy each others company, to young adults who eat and run leaving little time for conversation. Then you have the little kids who ask for about 6 chocolate milks that you have to make for them with slight annoyance but then you give it to them and it makes it worth it.
She walked in right infront of her mother as her father opened the door for the both of them. This young Asian couple following their joyful cute daughter of about 3 or 4 years old wearing little gold thong sandals, a cute little jean skirt, a cute frilly top with her long black hair half braided into our resturant. We could not stop looking at her telling eachother how freaking cute she was. Ellen was lucky and got to serve them. But I'm learing to find the kingdom in the little children, so I meandered about the dining room cleaning off my table right next to thiers, paying attention to her how she acted and interacted with her parents.
As I was cleaning my table off she looked at me with the cutest smile I have ever seen and a giggle that instantly made me want one just like her! I raised my eye brows and opened my mouth wide as I gave her a little wave (I love doing this to kids b/c it totally opens them up to you because a fun faces are a great communication tool ... you should try it sometime and watch what happens). Anyway, she waves right back with out hesitation. So I waved right back and then she started to play peek-a-boo. Acting suprised as she removed her hands from her little eyes sent her into the cutest giggle mode I have seen in the longest. We played for about a good 3-4 minutes and then her love broke through. She started blowing kisses.
I love children. This pure, unadulterated child love shown through her like the bright sun through the clouds. She had no idea who I was, yet she played peek-a-boo with me and blew me kisses. How wonderful it is to become like a child. To love a stranger without wanting anything in return. To be dependent on a parent to even eat the spaghetti infront of you without slopping it on yourself as you stand on your highchair leaning over the table for a good bite. To laugh and laugh and laugh at a simple funny faces because you do not have an anxiety in the world that is holding your joy back. To walk out of a resturant not even knowing, because you are a small child, that you totally impacted someone just because you are being the tender age that you are.
The kingdom was wrapped up in her life, and I got a small glimpse of it. She was fully dependent on her parents, the joy she had and the laugher she shared, the trust that she knowlingly or unknowingly had as she realized I was playing around with her since I was a complete stranger, and the pure love that she freely gave to someone she had never met was a wonderful experience of His kingdom. No wonder when Jesus talks about the kingdom He talks about children .....
Matthew 18:3
And he said: "I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven."
Matthew 19:14
Jesus said, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these."
Comparing what I saw in that little girl to what I am .... woah. I have quite the ways to go. And what happens to us as we get older? We get tainted by the world and hurt by ones who are susposed to keep us as children. But then what does Jesus do? He messes us up! and makes us like children again, as we yield to His spirit to flood every aspect of our lives. He shows us our disparity and how much we need Him and His spirit to come and clean all of that mess up, to make us like little children. Ha, its like He calls us His children and then somehow makes us grow down in age, acting like chidren again. Being 100% dependent on His spirit or sometimes it may feel like we might die with out it and when we get it, makes us completely and ridiculously joyful that quite possibly may make a lot of things funny b/c of our realization of His greatness and our smallness. Then the love indwelt by the spirit draws us to trust and follow. No wonder Jesus says in order to receive the kingdom, we must become like little children and maybe that's why I love them. His is in that. He is there. He is trying to show us how we need to be. Through little people and their cute little smiles.
