Innocent Hearts

Most of us think our children are innocent. Don’t we? Of course we do, because they are! When they are young, they see things through innocent eyes and pure hearts. While at our family gathering at my mom and dad’s house on Christmas, Sophie was playing with her new Princess Ariel and Prince Erik Barbie dolls. She had them close together as if they were hugging or dancing. She has seen this on princess movies like Cinderella where Cinderella and her prince dance at the ball. She also sees her Dad and me hug a lot.

Our entire family of about 25 was sitting around my parents’ den talking and checking out each other’s Christmas gifts. I watched Sophie as she played. After she laid the dolls down, I asked her if they were dancing? Nathan heard me and said very loudly, “It looks like they are dancing lying down!” All of the adults burst into laughter including myself. The innocence of his comment was what made it so funny. He had no idea why we were laughing.

I love that about my children. They are still so innocent. That hasn’t happened by chance though. There is enough out there in this world to steal their innocence even at their young ages. Steve and I purposely work to keep that from happening. We monitor what they see on television, they only play educational and age appropriate video games and we only listen to Christian radio. They never watch movies with anything above a PG rating. Even then, we pay close attention to the contents to make sure it is OK. Those magazines at the check-out lines with headlines that make even me blush get turned around quickly to shield Nathan and Sophie from reading the vulgar content on them.

I’m not bragging by any means. I’m just learning more and more that it takes a concerted effort on a parent’s part to protect their children from indecency or things that are too mature for little minds and hearts to understand. I love a quote from Corrie Ten Boom’s book, The Hiding Place.  When she was still quite young, Corrie asked her father about something he didn’t think she was ready to know.  This was his wise response:

“It would be a pretty poor father who would ask his little girl to carry such a heavy load. [speaking of his tool case] It’s the same way, Corrie, with knowledge. Some knowledge is too heavy for children. When you are older and stronger you can bear it. For now you must trust me to carry it for you.”

Oh, how much wisdom did this man have! We need to preserve our children’s innocence as long as we can. They should be able to just enjoy the innocence of childhood. They will learn the troubles of adulthood and the perverseness and violence of the world soon enough.