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From The Lips Of Children and Infants...


 From the lips of children and infants you have ordained praise because of your enemies, to silence the foe and the avenger (Psalm 8:2)
       Kids aren't the sort of people who are generally credited with wisdom or eloquence. You might use a kid as a spokesman for the cuteness factor, but I doubt there are many people who would go to an auditorium to listen to a two year old give a lecture. I certainly wouldn't want to pay for the tuition credits to take a course with a four year old instructor. I wouldn't seek financial advice from a six year old or medical recommendations from an eight year old. At the same time, kids sometimes see through the nonsense that adults don't and they sometimes have not developed the filter that adults have, so things are said that are not politically correct or socially polite. This is why most leaders, especially those of the time this passage was written, would not seek such praise. It is precisely the opposite of what was expected and the sort of thing for which a ruler would have been ridiculed. That is the first thing that makes this passage surprising.
            The second thing is the use to which the children's praise is put. It is their "eye witness" testimony in a court hearing. As C.S.  Lewis put it, God is "in the dock." He's on trial and it's a capital case. There were a number of cities in Israel to which someone who had killed another person accidentally could flee. A member of the dead person's family could come to the refuge city and plead his case that the killer should be turned over to him so that he could avenge his dead relative. Elsewhere, the Israelites were told that a matter had to be judged on the basis of two or more witnesses. Women and children were not considered good witnesses. The witnesses speaking in God's favor were not socially or legally acceptable, and yet they are precisely the witnesses that silence the ones making the accusations.
            So, when you are tempted to think that you don't make an effective witness for God and that you don't know enough to speak on His behalf when someone judges Him unfairly, remember, infants and children can silence His accusers and so can you. In fact, you'll probably be better at it than someone who seems to be qualified.

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