In the transition from childhood to adulthood, many of today's youth are resistant to grow up.
They are convinced that "growing up" means more trouble, more trials, and it just is not worth all of it. The prolonging of childhood seems like the way to go for most people.
About seven years ago, Time Magazine published a piece on the "Peter Pan" syndrome, in which college age youth were graduating, then moving back home with their parents. Instead of stepping out into the world to make the most of the hardships they may face and overcome the obstacles in their way.
Too many have gotten used to being taken care of, that all their needs are met, so why give up a good thing, right?
For them, the real freedom depends on not being tied down to anything.
The true story of Peter Pan would suggest why staying in childhood is not the freedom that men and women should desire. More importantly, the Word of God testifies that growing in grace and knowledge of the Lord not only engages people to achieve maturity in their lives, but grants them the freedom and life that most youth today hope to find in dependence on their parents long after they have graduated from high school, from college, or even when they have stepped out into their own careers.
Peter Pan's perennial, eternal childhood was not all that it was cracked up to be. In one account, whether from the original tales told by J. M. Barrie or not, Peter Pan finally catches Captain Hook, ties up him to a tree, and then uncovers a cannon.
"This is the end, Hook. No more games."
Peter Pan was going to finish off Captain Hook once and for all. Unlike the fanciful and fussy villain in the Disney animated movie, this Captain Hook was not afraid to die. Instead of begging for his life, he taunted to little boy he will never grow up:
"I have been a man. I have done great things. I have overcome much in my life. I am ready to die."
Peter than realized that all he had did not amount to much. A life of challenging everything, of resisting authority, of playing games, of doing what "he wanted" was not all that it was cracked up to be. Greater than Pan's power at that point, Captain Hook manipulated the Eternal child with shame. Pan ultimately let Hook go, and then sought out to grow old, to accomplish something, to add something more to his life than the same games that go nowhere.
"Forever a child" is forever empty. The needs of a human being go deeper than just getting by, than hoping for nothing but to "have fun". A man has a sense of eternity about him, and the times he spends doing very little but passing time eventually pass away into nothing of great importance. Something inside of a man wars against the endless and eventually mind-numbing "fun". There has to be something better than this.
Like Las Vegas, it's fun for a while, but the deeper needs of man go deeper, much deeper than staying busy.
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