1 Corinthians 13:11 When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me.

Maturity is a strange thing. We desire it, but at the same time we almost seem to fear it or even regret it. The two terms, childish and childlike, reflect that ambivalence. We know, on a logical basis, that being childish is not good, but at the same time we elevate being childlike to a place of honor. That gets all the more complicated by the fact that we have trouble defining either term concretely. One clear component is the matter of patience and tolerance for delayed gratification, as many psychologists have pointed out. The more we have of that, the happier everyone is! However, too much of that would bring progress to a grinding halt, because we would stop pressing for improvement. Thus, the Serenity Prayer, “O God, give us the serenity to accept what cannot be changed, the courage to change what can be changed, and the wisdom to know the one from the other,” is actually a prayer for maturity. So what are the things we admire about being childlike? I think it’s a matter of innocence of evil and delight in good. The world being what it is, we become all too familiar with evil all too soon, but we can still delight in good. I’m reminded of a video of a family that thought they were pranking their young son by telling him an empty cardboard box was his present. (I don’t remember if it was for a birthday or Christmas.) The tables were turned when he absolutely delighted in the box, immediately thinking of all sorts of things he could do with it. Putting aside the whole matter of whether it was wise or nice of them to try to prank him like that, his response to the box was in my eyes the epitome of being childlike but not childish. As children of God we should be constantly maturing, and part of that should be in seeking to maintain a childlike delight and wonder at our Father’s goodness toward us. As a refrigerator magnet we once had said, “Happiness is seeing a beautiful sunset and knowing Whom to thank.” God can turn even air pollution into something beautiful!

When people comment on my supposed “youthfulness” at my age I generally say that the secret is that I never mature, but I actually hope that isn’t the case. I desire to be a mature child of God, able to be trusted to do as He tells me, but I certainly want to keep delighting in Him, even in difficult circumstances. A friend of mine was recently told that his wife has three to six months left because of her metastatic cancer. Hearing that was like a punch in the gut for me, but I know that she is certainly ready to “graduate,” and he is increasingly ready to allow her to do so. At this point he is rejoicing in the cessation of the side effects of the chemotherapy drugs that she has now stopped. That is maturity! When my wife just had her 76^th birthday yesterday, and she has a litany of ailments, that hits very close to home. I too desire the maturity to rejoice in my Lord whatever is going on around me, resting in the assurance that His plans are always good, acceptable, and perfect. (Romans 12:2)

Father, thank You for this reminder. Thank You for all You had planned for Cathy’s birthday yesterday. Thank You for Your plans for today. I pray that every one of those plans would be fulfilled as You desire, drawing people into Your family and defeating the plans of the devil, for Your glory. Thank You. Praise God!