Matt.18 At that time the disciples came to Jesus and said, “Who then is greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” 2 And He called a child to Himself and set him before them, 3 and said, “Truly I say to you, unless you are converted and become like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven. 4 Whoever then humbles himself as this child, he is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. 5 And whoever receives one such child in My name receives Me; 6 but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble, it would be better for him to have a heavy millstone hung around his neck, and to be drowned in the depth of the sea.
Jesus makes it very clear to his disciples and those who were listening to him, that if they were going to explore all the wonders of the kingdom of God they would have to change and start thinking and acting like a little child. He wasn’t calling them to emotional immaturity or childishness, but He was calling them to the simplicity of childlikeness. He said unless you are converted and become like children. The word converted literally means to turn or to change; therefore, He was saying that the status quo of where they were in their thinking would not work if they wanted to explore all there is in the kingdom of heaven. Notice what he said in verse 4. He said that they must humble themselves as this child. He later, in verse 6 declares that little ones “believe,” and it’s important that we don’t cause them to stumble into unbelief with our mature reasonings, and cynicism. Again, I asked the question, in what way did this child humble him or herself. I believe the answer is very simple. There was something about this man Jesus that this little child trusted to the point that when Jesus said to the child to come to Him, the little child in simple faith obeyed. I believe that’s the humility this child demonstrated; the humility that simply obeys what Jesus asks us to do because we trust Him. This was a little child (that’s the Greek word used here) and I assume Jesus was a relative stranger, but when Jesus called the child to Him, there was something about Him that this child trusted, so that the child did what Jesus said. That how we explore the Kingdom of Heaven. We simply hear His voice, and because we trust Him we obey Him.