Matthew 19:13

Friday, 1 May 2026

Then little children were brought to Him that He might put His hands on them and pray, but the disciples rebuked them. Matthew 19:13

“And they brought to Him children that He might upon-set the hands on them, and He might pray. And the disciples, they admonished them.” (CG)

In the previous verse, Jesus finished His words about eunuchs. They were the exception to those expected to marry. With His words concerning that complete, it next says, “And they brought to Him children.”

So, the progression in this chapter has thus far been the subject of divorce (with the implied sanctity of marriage), those who will not marry, and now it leads to children, the anticipated product of human marriage. These children were brought to him “that He might upon-set the hands on them.”

The word translated as child, paidion, indicates a small child, quite often in infancy, but beyond that, one that is no more than half-grown. It is also used figuratively when referring to infants or trainable people within the congregation (e.g., see 1 Corinthians 14:20).

The idea is that of blessing. They are not merely bringing children before Jesus to talk about their school grades, to question Him about the details of Noah’s flood, or to have Him sign an autograph. Rather, these parents obviously understand Jesus’ power and authority.

If He has the power to heal others and direct spiritual conduct, they have logically deduced that He has the power and authority to bless their children in anticipation of them having sound, faithful lives. That continues to be noted in the words, “and He might pray.”

When a person is having a bad day, he will call a friend or his pastor and ask for prayer. When a president is facing a national crisis, he will call a spiritual leader and ask for prayer. When a child is born, the parents will often ask for the pastor or the whole congregation to pray for their child.

These and countless other incidents occur because people believe others, especially those who are faithful followers of the Lord (the guy who calls his friend wouldn’t call Drinking Dan for prayer. Instead, he would call Righteous Ron), have a positive spiritual connection with God that allows them to have their prayers answered by God.

This was the case with Jesus. Having heard His teachings and seen the fruit of His ministry, they were fully convinced of His ability to bring a blessing upon their children. One would think this would be universally understood to be a good thing. However, it next says, “And the disciples, they admonished them.”

This is more definitely stated in Mark 10:13, “...the disciples rebuked those who brought them.” The disciples saw this as an annoyance to Jesus’ ministry, not wanting Him to be bothered with such trivial pursuits as this.

Life application: It is questioned where the power in prayer is. If God already knows everything, then why pray? The answer is that God already knows whether we will pray or not. If we don’t pray, then there will be no response to the prayer, because it wasn’t made.

Because of this, it is questioned where the power in prayer is. How can prayers have effective power in soliciting God if He knows whether we will pray or not? This is incorrect thinking. In all four gospels, it is recorded that Jesus told Peter he would betray Him three times before the rooster crowed.

Because Jesus said it was so, it was certainly so. The future had been written already. And yet, Peter had to live it out. The power of his denial was because he denied Jesus, not because God knew he would deny Jesus. Until it happened, it had not happened. Known outcome does not change the need for the process to take place.

We can have certainty that something will occur, but until it occurs, there is no actual cause and effect that takes place. The power of the response to pray is based on the prayer actually occurring. Think of a bear trap. We know of a bear that travels the same path every night. So, we put out a trap for the bear. We know the bear will go that way, and we know he will be trapped, but until it happens, there has been no cause and effect. Rather, the trap sits there without being snapped.

This may be hard to understand, but whether we consider prayer, salvation, or many other theological matters, without us exercising our free will to initiate the process, the event will not take place. If you want results from God, initiate the process. He is there to bring about the results if it is His will for those results to occur. If you don’t pray, nothing to initiate the process means no results will be forthcoming.

Lord God, we may not understand all the things that pertain to You, but when Your word tells us something is a certain way, we should faithfully accept that it is so. Help us to have such an attitude toward Your precious word. Amen.