Take Heart

In my teenage years, between the stars plastered to my ceiling, I wrote verses with a Sharpie marker. They brought me direction when I was given options to take. My favorite verse, that still sticks strongly with me today, is:

O Lord, you alone are my hope. I’ve trusted you since my childhood.

Psalms 71:5

When I was three years old in Vacation Bible School making paper pineapples, I was given the invitation to meet my teacher’s best friend, Jesus. She explained who He was and is. I understood exactly what she was talking about. I knew immediately what I wanted to do. I wanted Him as my best friend too. With less than a three minute conversation to convince me, I knew I wanted to accept Him into my heart. My choice, my invitation, my greatest decision ever made…

I look back on that experience now and smile at the courageous and humbling ability that lady had; to know to honor a child with an invitation of the greatest opportunity. A group normally looked over for their immaturity to understand, Ms. September (who for some reason I will forever remember as Ms. Autumn) knew that a three year old class would understand her invitation to know her best friend.

Last week my niece, Savannah (4 years old), and I were pulling dead flowers in the freezing cold while Ryder played on his bike. She was telling me about her fear of drowning in floods (we had a hurricane last fall that made her terribly nervous due to the flooding it did in my neighborhood and her’s). She was discussing how she would feel if it happened again. I told her not to worry because she knows how to swim. Then she asked what would happen if she got tired and drowned. It took me a half second to respond to her, as I would have responded to anyone else, “Well, you know where you are going if you died, right?” To which she responded, “No.”

I could have stopped there. But I didn’t. I proceeded to tell her about my closest friend, who has been with me since I was three and how my life is better because of Him. That I make mistakes and I don’t always know what to do, but because of Him I am never alone in whatever happens. Her response,

“Well. If He is that great, I should ask Him into my heart right now!”

I stopped pulling dead flowers and looked that baby girl in the face and asked her with equal seriousness and excitement,

“If that’s what you want, that’s what we will do. Is that what you want? – to ask Jesus into your heart, to be your best friend?”

She simply said,

“Yes.”

Right there, in the freezing cold, the world stopped and my niece repeated the most important prayer she will ever pray in her whole life. I was so honored to be with her.

We talked about what it means to be a friend of Jesus and what a responsibility it is. About not knowing all the answers. About His Book. She was soaking in every word.

And then, just like that, her childhood, and all it should be, fluttered back in like a sweet butterfly taking her attention to what is important now – riding bikes, pulling flowers, and playing with cousins. But the difference was now in her heart. She was so excited that she said,

“I want to tell Ryder! Let’s ask Ryder if he wants to know Jesus, too!”

 

“Well okay then,” I thought. “This could be interesting.”

We have been reading the bible at breakfast the last month or two. He knows about it, but is he ready to truly understand it? My mind was racing. My heart was excited. But my thoughts were skeptical.

He wouldn’t repeat every word she prayed with him and so I chalked it up to him not being ready. As important as this is to me, it’s equally important it be his choice. Yet in Sunday school the next day he was telling his teachers that he knows what the Bible is and that Jesus lives in his heart…

“…it happened yesterday,” he said.

His teachers were blown away asking me about it.

My heart swells. The amazing complexity of Jesus’ love is not to be hindered by the simplicity of His invitation to know Him. The journey to learn the details and grow are one thing, but the invitation to get on that path is much simpler than we often think.

I think accepting Jesus doesn’t have to be complicated, it can simply be authentic. Do not over think an opportunity, but rather let that opportunity be lead by the heart. Accepting Jesus is powerful in the sense that it confounds the mind, and that’s the complexity of it. But the simplicity comes from the understanding in our hearts that awakens when we hear His voice. Children understand this and I am honored to be a part of it.