Growing Young In Christ

“A man growing old becomes a child again.”
 - Sophocles

“It takes a long time to grow young.”
- Pablo Piccasso

“Being young is a gift.

Growing young is a choice.”
- John Parkhurst

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   Perception is not always reality.  A violin player stood in a cavernous Boston subway, playing continuously for an hour.  Six people stopped and listened briefly; a few dropped money into a hat as they rushed by. 

   The violin player finished playing.  Silence.  Nobody noticed him.  No applause.  No recognition.  Joshua Bell, one of the greatest violinists in the world, had played an intricate piece with a violin worth 3.5 million dollars.  Because of the environment and his hat on the ground, he was seen as a street musician.  Perception.

   You may recall the movie titled The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.  Based on a story by F. Scott Fitzgerald, “It is the tale of a man who is born in his eighties and ages backwards…”

   I am a Christian Benjamin Button.  My birthday cake had fewer candles this year than last, and the last had fewer than the year before.  Rather than growing older, I grow younger.  Each year, as I draw closer to Jesus, as I see and hear more clearly God’s Word, as I clear each hurdle in the race toward eternity with my Savior, I realize that I am becoming, truly, a child of the Lord.

   Jesus said, In Matthew 19:14, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.”

   You see, I have been born again!  I am a child!  The old is gone!  One who looks at me for the first time sees a man of a certain age.  But that’s perception.  Not reality.  I’m young!  I have accepted Jesus!  Christ is patiently remaking me – teaching me wisdom and what it is like to be a child again with full trust in his Father.  The Holy Spirit fills my soul.  Life is beautiful and rich with heaven on the horizon!

   I have a new spring in my step and feel a great love and joy.  Each prayer, each Christian experience causes me to grow newer in the Lord.  God restores me, and I grow younger in spirit and in mind.  “Yes, like a small child is my soul within me,” says Psalm 131:1-2.

   Proverbs 6:31 states, "Gray hair is a crown of splendor; it is attained by a righteous life."   There is no fountain of youth, but, thankfully, there is God’s Word, God’s Spirit, God’s Son who give me life eternal.