Theology From A 3.9 Year Old

Yesterday, my 3.9 year old son Toby was jumping up and down on the couch.  As I was about to tell him to stop jumping on the couch he said, "Daddy can we have peace all the time?"  I was shocked and instantly overjoyed over how the wheels were turning in his head.  Only the Holy Spirit could have stirred up that question.  We then took a walk through the garden of Eden, and watched Adam and Eve choose to partake of the tree of "the knowledge of good and evil" and how the peace was broken.  That morning I had done a study on this passage and learned that the "knowledge of good and evil" does not mean just knowing right from wrong but rather DECIDING what is right and wrong, otherwise Adam and Eve would always do what is good because the result of doing good is always good. There was nothing evil about the tree besides the fact that God said not to eat it.  It was them deciding God did not know best, and them deciding they knew what was right from wrong that caused the fall.  I did my best to explain to Toby that we can only have peace with God because of what Jesus has done to forgive our sin and that Jesus has begun to restore the beautiful garden and relationship we once had with Him.  

The next day I brought up our conversation again and asked Toby what he had learned and he said, "Jesus takes the darkness and throws it in the garbage can."  I was astounded and was brought to tears as these were his own words to his understanding--  I had never used that metaphor with him.  At almost four years old he described the gospel in the most beautiful and simple form.  The garden was beautiful before the fall because God was there. Adam and Eve were under His loving rule and authority.  When they chose their own way it brought spiritual and physical death and darkness.  Thanks be to God for sending His Son to make a way for me to know Him once again and to be brought into fellowship with Him once again, to begin to see that His ways are wonderful.  I am saved, I am being saved, and one day I will get to see His face.  Until then........repentance and faith!