Jesus tells us, “Truly I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” (Matt 18:3). We tend to think that this is because there’s just something special, something innocent, about children.

In his book The Beatitudes, Simon Tugwell points out that the ancients were not sentimental about children or childhood; and any parent who is paying attention knows that small children are neither innocent nor virtuous.

Rather, the essential thing about little children is that they have no past. They have no achievements. They have no competence. They can receive nothing on their own merit; all that they receive they must receive as pure gift.

And so with adults as well. We can only receive God’s grace, God’s salvation, as pure gift. But because we can achieve things on our own in the purely human realm, we presume that we can do so in the spiritual realm as well. We cannot. All depends on the Lord.