Today,
after my morning prayers, I had to drop my daughter to school. This is an
everyday job, but of all days, my daughter asked me today – Daddy, when I look
at the sky, I see the blue sky and the Moon following me, why is this happening
?. I paused for a moment, and I also realized that this is a question from a
little child, so what am I supposed to stay ? The answer I gave is as following:
Baby,
please understand that God is very Good and he is so good that he gave us the
Sun to shine for us during the day and in the night he gave us the moon and the
stars so that we don’t remain in the dark. God has created all this around us
just because he Loves us so much. And when you see the moon in the morning, it
means that God is showing us an even greater measure of his Love. I quickly
helped her to remember the Psalm that we pray at Vespers in the Orthodox
Church. The Vespers service in the Church always begins with the chanting of
the evening psalm: “…the sun knows it’s time for setting, Thou makest darkness
and it is night…” (Psalm 104: 19-20) This psalm, which glorifies God’s creation
of the world.
I thank
God today for the grace to respond to my daughter. I also believe after this
experience, why Christ actually told us in Matthew 18:3 – “Truly I say to you,
unless you will be converted and become like children, you will not enter the
Kingdom of Heaven”. How can a grown up man/woman be converted or transformed
like a Child? I am learning all these points from my 2 daughters. They are my
teachers everyday. May you all learn from Children as well.
The
following points will help us to become like Children:
- Learn to be happy with simple things
- Live life in a simple way
- Don’t be scared to try out new things
- Be Innovative
- Be Creative
- Failure is normal, it is not the end of the
world
- If you fall, get up, if you fall again, get
up again
- Explore new possibilities with people, even
with yourself
- Talk to Others
- Don’t be judgmental
- Forgive quickly
- Ask for forgiveness
- Don’t remember wrongs that others have done
- Play – It is normal
- Sometimes bad things happen, they are not
always happening, move on !
- Some arguments are good, but don’t allow it
to last long
- Experiment with different things
- If you get bored with monotony, do something
different
- Make others laugh
- Show your love to others
- Don’t be rigid with yourself or others
- Animals, Butterflies, Birds and plants are
your friends, atleast admire them
- Sing Songs to God
- Never Give Up
- Last but not the least, Pray in a Simple way.
The list
is endless, you must transform and become like little Children to enter into
the Kingdom of God.
Through your prayers,
Fr. Silouan Benedict
Source: http://orthochristian.com/76417.html
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