Children Coming to Christ (Matthew 19:13-16)

This meditation was given at the Grace Church Guildford Prayer Meeting on 15 February 2023.

On Sunday night past, we heard that Matthew 19 involves Jesus’ teaching on the family, not the spiritual family as in Matthew 18, but the physical, biological family: on marriage, singleness, and now from 19:13 on children.

Now, as we will think about this coming Sunday evening, the primary point of these verses is not to teach us about Jesus’ attitude towards children. As we shall see, they are primarily about the attitude of children towards Jesus, with these little ones being held out as good examples by Jesus of those who come into his kingdom, which we shall see sits in such sharp contrast to the Rich Young Ruler who comes to Jesus in 19:16, who cannot come into his kingdom. However, I think these verses at a secondary level, can still be instructive and illustrative for us on how, as Christ’s people, we should handle and look on children.

Indeed, this is the lesson that Jesus explicitly teaches his disciples in 19:14 – Let the little children come to me. Though it is not Matthew’s main lesson, it is certainly a very real lesson that is given to Jesus’ disciples here, and as his disciples today, we should not fail to learn from this as well.

Three brief observations from this incident about how we should relate to children as Jesus’ disciple, his kingdom, today:

1.     We should welcome children

This seems to be what the crowds understood of Jesus. v13 simply says they come. Jesus doesn’t need to explicitly invite them, call them to bring the children, but it seems that his manner is clearly inviting enough. Parents looked at Jesus, watched the way he talked and acted, and seem to have assumed that he would be glad to hold their babies in his arms, that they would find a warm welcome if they brought their children to him.

And as a church, we should surely seek to give the same impression.

Our building should be designed and maintain in such a way, that it is inviting for people on the street to bring their children into it. And when a family with children do come through the door, they should be greeted warmly, and the needs not just of the parents, but the children should be met. The next time you go over to speak to that new family, remember to not only chat to the parents, but also to talk to the kids, make sure that the whole family feel welcome and wanted here.

Similarly, we should conduct our life together in such a way that it is safe for children to be among us. This is one of the reasons we should take safeguarding training and procedures so seriously, and should publicly signpost and make people aware of that policy. Every time that safeguarding slide goes up on the screen before the service, it is like a giant sign telling parents that we care about the safety of their children, and are doing all we can to protect them. And that is going to help them feel like children are wanted, and are welcome, among us.

This is also one of the big benefits of all the kids activities we run (whether HBC, or TC, or Activate, or Explorers). By doing these things we show that we want children to be part of our church life, that they are welcome to come and be among the church family. These activities are signposts pointing to the fact that children are welcome here at Grace Church.

However, this welcome shouldn’t just apply to our kids activities, but it should apply to all our church services. Afterall, the best place for a child to learn about God’s Word is by being amongst God’s people, watching mature Christians around them model how to worship God, and listening to the songs, prayers and readings, listening to God’s Word being taught whether it is in the children’s slot or, whenever they become able, the sermon itself.

Children should always be welcome in our services, and the various side effects of that, like the occasional crying baby, trantrumming toddler, or fidgety child, should be lovingly and patiently endured. Indeed, they should be turned into reasons for thankfulness. Afterall, there are many churches who would do almost anything to hear such sounds – for the fact that they have few families, and few children gathering with them, is a source of great sorrow and worry.

Like Jesus, we must always welcome children, think carefully about whether we are ever acting like these disciples, doing anything to unnecessarily hinder them from coming to Jesus.

2.     We should pray for children

In v13, we see that is what these parents come to Jesus for. [READ].

This would have been common at the time – bringing ones children to an important rabbi for a blessing. And as we see, Jesus was more than happy to follow such a tradition, take the time to pray for each little infant that they set into his arms.

It is likely that they were infants, Luke even uses the word ‘babies’ in Luke 18 to describe them. Certainly they were too little to come to Jesus themselves, they needed to be brought by their parents. Which I think brings out an important point. For long before a child is old enough to come to Christ, we can still bring them before Christ. Present them to him through our prayers, ask him to bless our little ones, in the same way as our parents in the passage do.

That is of utmost importance for us in our families – to pray for our children and grandchildren in this way. And it is also the case that this is something we must seek to do as a church – praying for the children of members on the prayer diary, praying for the regular kids activities of the church, and praying for special events (like HBC) in the way we will do this evening.

Of course, the prayers of a parent do not guarantee the spiritual health of a child, just as the prayers of a parent do not guarantee the physical health of a child. And many of you will know this from painful personal experience. You have prayed for your children or grandchildren for years, and they still seem to be far from coming into the kingdom.

Nevertheless, we see here modelled to us what we should do. Bring our children to Jesus, place them in his hands, and ask him to bless him. Trusting he will do so in the way and time that he sees to be best.

3.     We should evangelise children

I imagine that the first two points we have made would be largely endorsed by many in our society today. Even from a secular perspective, you can see how it can be socially beneficial for children to be part of a welcoming church community. And there can hardly be any harm in praying for children, even if is it simply reduced down in a secular worldview to wishing well for them.

However, where we are going to experience the most tension and pushback in our world today is from the fact that we not only want to welcome children, pray for children, but we want to evangelise them. We want to see children converted, convinced of the truths of Christianity, of both God’s goodness and their sinfulness, of his love and their being lost, and turning from their sin and trusting to Jesus at an early age.

We should not only desire them to be welcome here in our church, but for them to actually belong to it. To not only be part of our earthly families, but to belong to God’s heavenly family. And so, we should evangelise them, explaining the Gospel to them at every opportunity, and calling them to come to Jesus themselves as soon as they are able to do so.

And we see that as children, they are able to believe at a very young age. We know that from experience – statistically most of us here this evening will have come to Christ as children. And we know this from our passage as well. For looking at this group of children, Jesus says that the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to such as these.