From Graham Cooke:
http://grahamcooke.com/index.php?fuseaction=e4_news.display_full&news_id=76
Jesus’ own sense of wonder surfaced whenever He saw others who walked in innocence and purity. One of the few times Jesus said “behold”—or, as we would term it, “wow”—was when He first met Nathanael, a man who later became one of His disciples. “Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile!” Jesus exclaimed in John 1:47 (King James Version).
What did Jesus see in Nathanael? He saw a man without deceit. The Message version of the Bible translates Jesus as saying, “There's a real Israelite, not a false bone in his body.” Jesus saw his innocence and loved it.
Innocence is a quality we are born with and then slowly lose through the experiences of our life. Every time we have one of those bitter experiences, as we call them, a part of our purity erodes away. The way we think and perceive things in the spirit withers as we become guarded, wary, mistrustful, and suspicious. When another bitter experience occurs in our life, another layer of grime is placed on our sense of wonder. Given enough time, we become unsure that we were ever innocent. Meanwhile, we look at everyone around us and see the worst.
Jesus, the same Man who saw and loved Nathanael’s purity, also allowed Judas Iscariot to be close to Him. Jesus’ own sense of wonder about who God was allowed Him to be true to Himself and love the unlovely. He was a friend to sinners without being tainted by them.
Innocence is always under the threat of attack. But purity isn’t about what others can do to us, it’s about who we want to be. We can remain pure in heart and remain watchful for unscrupulous and disrespectful people at the same time.
We are in control of our own sense of wonder. Jesus dealt with this idea when, in Mark 7:6, He defined what He considered hypocrisy to be: “This people honors Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me.” When our hearts are bitter, hard, callous, unfeeling, cynical, judgmental, angry, suspicious, closed, wary, distressful, jealous, skeptical, derisive, contemptuous, pessimistic, unbelieving, sarcastic, or scornful, we hurt ourselves—these things are corrosive to innocence. The damage we do to our own purity is far greater than the damage we can inflict on anyone else’s. Giving in to impurity grieves the Spirit of God. Our hardness grows as we protect ourselves from people and situations. We get hurt and we swear an unholy vow: “I’ll never let that happen to me again.” Immediately, we begin to insulate our hearts from taking another chance on someone or something. We close ourselves off relationally.
As we can see from Luke 9:46-48, Jesus always knew what people were feeling in their hearts:
Then a dispute arose among them as to which of them would be greatest. And Jesus, perceiving the thought of their heart, took a little child and set him by Him, and said to them, “Whoever receives this little child in My name receives Me; and whoever receives Me receives Him who sent Me. For he who is least among you all will be great.”
Unless we become child-like in innocence and purity, we won’t be able to see the wonders God wants to show us. Jesus wanted us to throw away our pride and self-protectionism and live a truly spiritual life.
