A child's eyes hold so much wonder and imagination... Do I lack that in my eyes? For so long, I've felt like I lost my innocence, but when did I lose it? Did somehow the simple process of growing up rob me of it? Is there an age of accountability? Or, was I never really innocent to begin with?

I've felt intense pain over some internal loss that I perceived externally in aging since I was almost 13. Yet, I've felt a need to be younger since I was 10. Only in this last year has it finally begun to fade (oddly, at the same rate as my attractions). I've been lying, exaggerating, or keeping secrets since I'm not even sure when. I stole something (my first and last time in my life) when I was only 3. It wasn't that I was young and naive (though I still get called that from time to time). I knew it was wrong and I hid in the bathroom feeling too guilty to eat it I stole some Life Savers candy). I finally broke down and confessed to my mother and she took me back to the store and made em apologize.

Many people perceive the innocence of children and blame their parents for whatever their children do. Yet, at what age do we become responsible for our own sins? Are we born saved, then fall out of grace?

The Bible says we're all sinners. We've all sinned even from the earliest of childhood. Only God is perfect. Many people these days do more than hold parents responsible for their children's actions. They blame the sins of adults on their parents. Why? Because we simply don't want to take responsibility for our lives. We can't. Our sins are too great. I see many people my age who have been driving since the day they turned 16. They speed out of the back parking lot, screaming out their windows while booming loud music. They want the freedom of driving, the power and control, but they don't want the responsibility. And until they're 18, they aren't always required by law to have it. Yet, did God spare even the young children when He destroyed cities of sin and evil, like Sodom? Were the children evil? Were they capable of doing the things the children of today have done? We right away want to blame the parents or television, but who can we then blame for ourselves? We are responsible for our own life. We have free will and we've had free will since before birth. We were born with it, making this our life and our responsibility.

I guess I've always wanted to see innocence in something tangible, like an angel of light, but I have to face it. It's the only way to break free. I was never innocent... and I can't protect people from themselves... and I can't protect myself from me... I can't take the responsibility alone, but I have to and it's mine alone; a weight so strong it brings eternal death. Yet, I may not be perfect, but Jesus is... That is the return to innocence I have sought; a time when this sin cursed form fails from entropy and my eternal soul finds a way home. Only then, by the grace of God, through Jesus, will I finally truly be innocent at last.