For an answer Jesus called over a child,
whom he stood in the middle of the room, and said,
“I’m telling you, once and for all,
that unless you return to square one and start over like children,
you’re not even going to get a look at the kingdom, let alone get in.
Whoever becomes simple and elemental again,
like this child, will rank high in God’s kingdom.
What’s more, when you receive the childlike on my account,
it’s the same as receiving me.
Matthew 18:2-5 The Message
***
A child kicks his legs rhythmically through excess, not absence, of life.
Because children have abounding vitality,
because they are in spirit fierce and free,
therefore they want things repeated and unchanged.
They always say, “Do it again”;
and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead.
For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony.
But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony.
It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun;
and every evening, “Do it again” to the moon.
It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike;
it may be that God makes every daisy separately,
but has never got tired of making them.
It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy;
for we have sinned and grown old,
and our Father is younger than we.
G. K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy.