After Jesus finished His work in Galilee, he determined to go to Jerusalem. He traveled south on the traditional pilgrimage route to Jerusalem west of the Jordan river, the shortest route that went through Nazareth in Galilee through Samaria to Jerusalem in Judea. The Pharisees avoided this route to bypass Samaria and usually took the long route through Pella on the east side of the Jordan river.
Once in Judea, the Pharisees caught up with Jesus and questioned him about divorce (Matt. 19:3-9). When Jesus had finished this discussion with the Pharisees, He apparently was taking a break from His ministerial activities when children were brought to Him, presumably small children (Luke 18:15), so that Jesus might bless them. It was the custom for parents to bring their children to be blessed by visiting rabbis. But Jesus’ disciples rebuked the adults who brought them and turned them away.
Jesus saw what was happening and He was righteously indignant toward His disciple’s unjust action. This is when Jesus told his disciples “Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven” (Matt. 19:14; see also Mark 10:14; Luke 18:16). We have three important questions that arise from this verse. First, were the adults who brought the children to Jesus within their rights and within proper propriety? Second, were the disciples acting properly in stopping the children from seeking the blessing of Jesus? And third, why did Jesus receive the children and bless them?
THOSE WHO BROUGHT THE CHILDREN
We are not told how many children were presented to Jesus or who brought them. But we do know that the children were young, even two years old and younger since they were small enough to be held in an adult’s arms. Luke refers to them as “infants” (Luke 18:15). Jewish parents commonly sought the blessing of prominent rabbis for their children.”[1]
These adults, whether parents, grandparents, guardians, or nurses displayed their respect toward Christ and showed the high esteem with which they viewed Jesus in the laying of hands and blessing their children. The laying of hands was a common proceeding in the Old Testament by fathers who blessed their children (Gen. 48:14). It is a ceremony of love and authority that expresses a sense of efficacy in the blessing.
These adults brought these children to Jesus by faith to glorify Jesus and with the expectation that his touching and blessing the children would be of great value and favor. They knew that the intercession by Jesus in their children’s lives would have a desirable effect in this world and in heaven.
Many parents brought their children to Jesus for healing of sickness. In this case it appears that these adults brought the children not because of sickness but they came simply for His blessings. We tend to ask for Christ’s help when we are in trouble, when we are compelled by trials and tribulations to come to Him. But we should seek Jesus out of our dependence on Him and in thankfulness and praise for everything he has done, does, and will do for us all.
These adults in these passages and all the saints have immediate access to our Lord and they had every right to go to Jesus with their children for blessing. “We cannot do better for our children than to commit them to the Lord Jesus, to be wrought upon, and prayed for, by him. We can but beg a blessing for them, it is Christ only that can command the blessing.”[2]
LET THE CHILDREN COME TO ME
Why Jesus’ disciples disapproved the approach of those who brought the children to Jesus and turned them back we cannot know for sure. Maybe they thought coming to Jesus at this time was rude and beyond proper propriety or that seeing children that weren’t ailing was too trivial for Jesus or that Jesus had more important things to attend to.
Nevertheless, when Jesus saw what His disciples were doing, He was righteously indignant toward what He considered an unjust action. And He criticized His well-meaning disciples for this. Jesus was making it clear to His disciples then and to all of us now that only Jesus decides who comes to Him.
Jesus makes it clear in this exchange that when adults come to Jesus, their children are welcome to come along. This should serve as a lesson to the minority of Christian denominations who forbid the children of believing parents from coming with them to the celebration of the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper and partaking of the elements if they are able to consume the elements on their own. And even if the child is too young to be able to partake of the elements, Jesus welcomes those children who accompany their parents as non-communing children. Jesus will bless adults and children alike who come to him in prayer or by way of the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper.
TO SUCH BELONGS THE KINDOM OF HEAVEN
The little children are citizens of His kingdom. “The children of believing parents belong to the kingdom of heaven, and are members of the visible church. Of such…is the kingdom of heaven; to them pertain the privileges of the visible church-membership, as among the Jews of old. The promise is to you, and to your children. I will be a God to thee and thy seed [Jer. 32:38,39].”[3]
The parents are the trustees of their children and when they bring, by faith, their children to Christ for the child’s benefit, Christ accepts those children who have been dedicated to Him by the parents and knows the children and lays hands on them and accepts them as His own. Christ looks dimly on those who block the children’s access to Him whom He has already accepted as dependent little ones who have a special title to covenant blessing (Matt. 18:1-6).
Jesus strongly reprimanded his disciples for trying to keep these children from seeing Him and He made it clear that it is He who decides who has access to Him. Jesus reminds his disciples and everyone that entrance into the kingdom of God is by God’s grace not by anything that a human being can do. And since these children were too young to exercise personal faith, by God’s grace he extends salvation to these children (until such time when each child is of the age of reason and are able to make a personal profession of faith) thereby accepting them into the kingdom of God. So, these children, being in the kingdom of God had every right of access to Jesus.
In the end, Jesus laid hands on each child and blessed them.
[1] The MacArthur Bible Commentary. John MacArthur, Matthew, n. 10:13, Thomas Nelson, 2038.
[2] Matthew Henry’s Commentary on the Whole Bible, New Modern Edition, vol. 5, Matthew to John, Hendrickson, 1991, 220.
[3] Matthew Henry, vol. 5, 220.
