Praising God for the Little Ones

July 16, 2025 - Wednesday of the Fifteenth Week in Ordinary Time

Matthew 11:25–27

Jesus was a man of prayer. He prayed in the morning and late into the night. He prayed on mountaintops, in the desert, and in the middle of busy crowds. Prayer was the rhythm of His life—and in today’s Gospel, we get to hear His voice lifted not in petition, but in praise.

“I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth,” He says, “for hiding these things from the wise and learned and revealing them to little children.”

It’s a stunning prayer. Jesus, the Son of God, turns to His Father with joy—not because of a miraculous healing or a dramatic conversion, but because of who can see the truth. Not the religious scholars. Not the experts. Not the self-assured. But the little ones. The humble. The open-hearted. The ones who still have wonder in their eyes.

Jesus calls God “Abba”—an intimate, tender name, like “Daddy”—yet also calls Him “Lord of heaven and earth,” the majestic Creator. Both names belong together. This is the mystery of faith: the God who holds the galaxies in His hands also stoops low enough to whisper into the heart of a child.

And what is the truth that God reveals to these little ones? It is the truth about Jesus Himself. That in this carpenter from Nazareth, crucified and risen, we meet the very face of God.

But not everyone sees it.

When Paul preached the Gospel, many people in both Jewish and Greek circles scoffed at the idea of a crucified Savior. It was too foolish, too weak, too beneath them. And yet Paul wrote to the early Christians:

“God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise… so that no one may boast before him.” (1 Cor 1:27,29)

Faith isn’t something we climb up to with intellect or credentials. It’s something we receive—with hands open, like a child.

There’s a story told about Yuri Gagarin, the first human in space.After his orbit around the earth, Soviet propaganda claimed he had looked and seen no sign of God. But, a four-year-old girl, after the birth of her brother, asked her parents to be left alone with him in a room. The parents agreed, but they were ready to enter anytime. They listened at the door and heard her whisper, “Tell me what God is like—I’m beginning to forget.”

Jesus ends His prayer with these words:

“No one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal Him.”

Faith is a gift. A mystery. A grace. It’s not unfair, but it is humbling. We can’t control who receives it. But we can become the kind of people who are ready to receive—simple, open, small in our own eyes.

The truth hasn’t changed. God still hides Himself from the proud and reveals Himself to the lowly.

So the question remains:

Are we wise enough to become little?