So my eight-year-old daughter and I were discussing some theological concepts in a bible verse (John 5:24 if you’re curious enough to look it up) specifically about everlasting life, death, and the enormous word ‘condemnation’.
We were discussing each piece of the verse so that she could understand it a bit better and she was doing great.
Kids are pretty pragmatic, really. I explained that when everyone’s born to this world, they would die at some point; it’s the way this reality works. She nodded, unsurprised. By the time you’re eight you’ve noticed that death is a part of life (unless you’ve been very sheltered).
Her take on ‘everlasting life’ when I asked what it meant was that we’d be “POOM! Outta here!” as she smacked her hands together with the top hand taking off like a rocket for heaven. Her smile was huge.
‘Condemnation’ was a little tougher and I explained that when buildings are condemned it’s because someone has inspected them and declared them no good, useless, not able to do what they’re designed to do.
When I explained that the Devil likes to try to say that about us she was pretty indignant with Lucifer and expressed tartly, “That old devil shouldn’t say mean things about us!”
I agreed, however, “But sometimes he’s telling the truth. When we sin we do prevent ourselves from being the person we’re meant to be.”
“Yeah,” she said intensely, “like yesterday when some of the bigger kids stopped our kickball game.” She went on to tell me what happened with some heat.
Stifling a grin at the apt, if somewhat offbeat illustration we went on.
“So we don’t want to sin, right?”
“No!” She agreed vehemently, “Like kicking your brother in the butt! That keeps us from being the person we’re meant to be.”
The bus came at just that perfect moment.
With a big grin I kissed her goodbye, waved, and laughed all the way back to the house.
It really lifted my spirits to have the weighty subject of sin reduced to:
Thou Shalt Not Kick Thy Brother in the Butt!
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