Avatar: With Faith Like a Child

“You are like a child,” Neytiri tells Jake with disdain. “Stupid. Like a baby."

It’s nothing Jake hasn’t heard before. Back at base camp, in his real, paraplegic body, all he hears about is how his intelligence is nowhere near the level of his dead twin brother. “Let your mind go blank,” says Dr. Grace Augustine. “That should be easy for you.”

So it’s nothing new when Neytiri considers him below her. He’s below every being, it seems, both human and Na’vi. Hidden beneath his signature cockiness, there’s an attitude of humility. He knows he’s not the right human to become Na’avi, and he knows that he makes a pretty poor Na’avi in Neytiri’s eyes.

Eyra chooses him. She doesn’t choose Dr. Augustine or Norm. She chooses the one who isn’t ready, isn’t trained, and isn’t knowledgeable. She chooses the one who Neytiri calls an uncomprehending child.

Though his intentions are murky at first, Jake enters the world of the Na’vi with genuine humility. If he had let his pride get in the way, Neytiri or her betrothed would probably have killed him before the story progressed far. But he humbled himself before Neytiri first, and then the remainder of the clan.

He had faith like a child. The cockiest avatar became the most humble Na’avi. And he became the greatest Na’vi.

Jesus said, “Let the little children come unto me and forbid them not, for such is the kingdom of heaven.” It is that kind of humility – a childlike ignorance and acceptance thereof – that leads to choosing, using, and raising by God. Eyra chose Jake, the child. God wants to choose you, but you must humble yourself like a child.

If you are already broken, and you feel as if you could never walk again. If you have nothing, if you know you are unlearned. If you know you are untrained, and you are sure that you are unready, then you are in the place where God can raise you up. You are in the place where God finds His chosen ones.

Neytiri thought very little of Jake when she first met him. When she first saw him, she saw him as an invader and, thus, a target. But she listened. She saw the seeds of Eyra, first on her arrow and then on Jake, and she acknowledged them.

Do not disdain the lowly and poor. Do not look down on the humble. The greatness that God has in store for them is unequaled in your imagination, so humble yourself and follow the Spirit's leading.

It is very hard for the proud to be raised up because they think they already touch the clouds, but the humble shall be anointed to fly among the stars.