I find explaining God to a three year old is an almost impossible task. I mean, I don’t even understand God and I’m 35. How can a 3 year old comprehend a concept beyond all of us?
But to me, the most important gift I can give my girls is to help them grow to love God and have faith even when they cannot understand. And so I take my little girls to church, say prayers with them at night and try to explain that God made us and loves us.
But really… it is a pretty hard concept to grasp. Don’t you think?
So, I try to explain. I tell Julia that it’s difficult for us to understand God. It’s a bit like the way Sophia is a baby and doesn’t understand that she grew inside of me and that I’m her Mommy. But just because she doesn’t understand, it doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. I love her and she loves me and that’s really all that matters. So it’s the same with God. We may not understand how He made us, but we know that He loves us and that’s really all that matters.
Julia seems satisfied with this explanation and nightly asks me to pray that she won’t have any bad dreams.
But one night, she decided to say the prayers herself.
Calmly and with complete reverence she prayed…
“Dear God, please fly down to my house. Sneak in the door and come up the stairs. Come into my room, open my mouth, reach down and pull out any bad dreams. Then take them with you and fly back to heaven.”
Trying not to smile, I kept my eyes closed and stayed with her until she fell asleep.
Then the next day we were out for a walk. As Julia rode along on her bike she made up songs as she often does. But this time, the song was a little different. She sang…
“God can fly. We cannot. We can only walk because we are people. But God can fly.”
Again, I tried not to laugh out loud. But I did let myself smile.
That is so cute!
How sweet!
I explain God and souls and such in this post.
http://tracey-justanothermommyblog.blogspot.com/search?q=balloon+theory
It helps them to understand the substance of something that they cannot hold, or see, but can feel all around them….
Love this post! And I love being able to view the world through my children’s eyes when they let me. 😉
That is so cute! My five year old had a lot of questions at dinner last night about God. It is very hard to explain. She wanted to know if God controls us or can make us do something. I explained about free-will, but how God can use the holy spirit to guide us. I told them that many of our questions will be answered when we get to heaven someday. Whew!! Some deep questions for a 5 year old.
Blessings,
Jen
Precious! What amazes and humbles me is that children have an inborn sense of spirituality and God. Nobody has to ‘convince’ them that God exists. They just feel His presence.
So sweet and precious! God is indeed the one and only true Superhero; He is omnipresent, omniscient, and omnipotent.
I love the faith of little children. This verse came to mind: when Jesus said, “Let the little children come to Me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.” Mark 10: 14b, 15
Don’t you just love the prayers of little ones?
The first few weeks of breastfeeding were quite painful for me this time around with my newborn. One night at dinner, my 2-year-old daughter prayed, “Dear God, please help mom’s boobs to feel better.” It was very sweet and very sincere.
Now, a month later, she’s still praying that (even though the pain is long gone and I’ve told her so)! Fortunately, she hasn’t done it in public yet! 😉
Yes, Tara, I agree… “the faith of a child is a beautiful thing”!
I absolutely adore the ease with which my kids accept God. The other day my 5 year old son said to me “Mom, the stories about God are true right?” to which I replied yes. Then he said “but the stories about Spiderman aren’t?” to which I also said yes. Then he said “well, that’s ok because God is bigger than Spiderman anyway” and off he went.
And my sons both ask me to pray they won’t have bad dreams each night 🙂
The faith of a child is a beautiful thing.
That’s so beautiful. I am often amazed at my 4-year-old daughter’s conversations about God. Occasionally my 5-year-old so will say something, but my middle daughter seems to have an amazing grasp, “understanding” (I use that word very loosely) and reverence for God.
What an adorable post! I love it.
Oh that is so precious. Today my five year old asked why some people get to go to heaven before others…she didn’t think it was very fair!
In my house I feel like Big Brother understands God better than I do. The other day he turned around and he said “Was that when I was in Heaven with God? Before I was born?” And then another time he said, “I don’t know what God looks like because I was just a baby when He was making me.” It is so simple and yet so true. But still we adults complicate it.
My almost four year old son thinks God is a superhero too. Possibly because I explain things in superhero terms, since that’s what he can understand. Hopefully that’s not blasphemy 🙂
Frankly, I think 3-year-olds often have a much better concept of God than we do. I know it’s true of my kids. 🙂
So sweet. I am still working on convincing my son that Jesus is a man and not a woman…all of the pictures in his story books show Jesus with long hair and he think that “he” is a “she.” Just when I think I finally have him convinced he changes his mind again a few days later!
What a sweetheart,I love how children think.I bet Grandpa W is smiling down with God.