God save the cylons!

” Amen I say to you, whoever does not accept the kingdom of God as a child will not enter it” Mark 10:15

So here I am pondering this quote, since it caught my eye in this passage and in one a chapter earlier, when I decide to join my husband for the event he has been waiting for, the series finale of Battlestar Galactica. Lo and behold the premise is that the survival of civilization depends on a child that is of mixed race (in this case Ceylon and human). The hero and heroine are “listening to the voice of God” and have angels that are their guide. To break the cycle of violence they must take a leap of faith and change the way they live and start over with a clean slate. At one point the hero says, “there is something much bigger at work here, we all know it….God doesn’t take sides.” HOLY COW! Jesus watches Battlestar Galactica?

Well, no I guess not. And it is all very convoluted since the girl ends up being the mother of civilization, (which I guessed an hour ago).

But it makes me think of the desire in all of us to start over again in some way and how we need a childlike trust that it can happen. What I hear when Jesus addresses the crowds through the children is that we are all called to be faith filled and obedient to the will of God. A child listens to the heart of his/her parents. They long to please, they are thrilled to be praised because we are proud of them.

Hannah, my five year old, is learning to read and has really taken off in the past couple of weeks. You can almost hear the click. The belly full of joy she expresses when either her father or I acknowledge her hard work is precious. She so wants to make us proud, (she needn’t worry). Sydney (9), has beams of light shoot from her eyes when she makes us laugh (which is often), and Meg (11), ever the perfectionist, needs to be reminded that it is her life and so not to give it over to our dreams for her…after all, she is entitled to her own dreams. As long as they don’t include tattoos and nasty piercings. 🙂 But I digress…

My point is simply this, the earnestness that they show pleasing us, makes me hear the need to be earnest when presented with the kingdom of God. The many faces of the kingdom. The people in the kingdom. To accept the kingdom of God is to be accepting of everyone, to be forgiving and to be willing to not be in control. Kids have so little power and yet have so much joy! Could there be something to that? Could the acceptance of the kingdom of God be by relinquishing some of our perceived power? Could that willingness to let go of ourselves be what it means to enter the kingdom of God?

I don’t know but I think it is worth a try. To let myself trust in God totally is to put away anxiety about things that are out of my control. It is to go to my well of worry, fill my bucket of concerns and dump it at the foot of the cross. It is to stop telling myself that I run the show when we all know that I’m just the caterer. But the caterer is important…as proven when there is no caterer.

So today, I say a prayer for all of those who take themselves too seriously, that they may have the heart of a child. I pray that I may have the heart of a child. I pray for the ability to trust in God completely, relinquishing any of my perceived power so that I may find real joy in the kingdom of God.