Children Are Our Role Models

I have spent my whole adult life with children–aiding, being a stay-at-home mom, and teaching. On occasion I have wondered what my life would have been like if I had taken a different career path. Who knows? But there is one thing of which I am sure. I would not be the person I am today. Children are role models for how we should live our lives.

Children are hoping, believing, engaged, contributing, loving, creative, forgiving, enthusiastic, exuberant, unafraid, humble, trusting, and I could go on and on. How could we ever learn these things without children? They are our role models.

Jesus said children were our role models of faith. When his disciples tried to keep the children away from him, Jesus became livid, “Don’t push these children away. Don’t ever get between them and me. These children are at the very center of life in the kingdom. Mark this: Unless you accept God’s kingdom in the simplicity of a child, you’ll never get in.” (The Message, Mark 10:13)

And another time, he warned them: “…if you give [the children] a hard time, bullying or taking advantage of their simple trust, you’ll soon wish you hadn’t. You’d be better off dropped in the middle of the lake with a millstone around your neck. Doom to the world for giving these God-believing children a hard time! (The Message, Matthew 18:6)

What a humbling and sobering warning! I try to take this warning seriously as I learn and grow with my students. (And praise God for his grace when I make mistakes.)

Overall, today I am just feeling so lucky to be spending my career with children.