A sermon based upon Mark 10:13-16.
Pentecost 18 Year B October 8, 2006
In the name of Jesus; amen.
September 27~ A drifter took 6 teenage girls hostage at their high school in the small mountain community of Bailey southwest of Denver. After sexually assaulting them he shot and killed one girl then turned the gun on himself.
September 29~ Congressman Mark Foley, Chairman of the House Caucus on Missing and Exploited Children resigns after ABC News reports that he had been sending sexually explicit email and instant messages to a 16 and 17 year old congressional pages.
October 2~ A milk truck delivery driver storms into a one room Amish school house, sends the boys and adults outside then opened fire on the dozen girls, killing 3 and fatally wounding several others before killing himself.
Two weeks ago~ up in this pulpit I read the following statistic from John and Sylvia Ronsvalle's book, Behind the Stained Glass Windows: Money Dynamics in the Church:
“We live in a world where it is estimated that thirty-five thousand children under the age of five die daily around the globe, most from preventable poverty conditions and many in areas where no church has been planted to tell them of Jesus' love. We can be confident that such conditions are not God's will: Perhaps one idea that would not be debatable in any part of the church is that Jesus loves the little children of the world. The financial cost to end most of these child deaths, it has been proposed, is about $2.5 billion a year, which is the amount Americans spend on chewing gum.”
And this is nothing. I could fill up the next hour with stories from in this country and around the world detailing horrors that occur in the lives of children and only scratch the surface. So I don’t find it all ironic or coincidental that (what I read of) the gospel from this morning reports a story about Jesus’ disciples speaking sternly to people who were bringing their children to be blessed by him.
I don’t find it at all ironic or coincidental that when Jesus sees this taking place he becomes indignant.
I have been downright angry by the news stories of the last two weeks. I have been angry and depressed and filled with sorrow. I’ve found myself crying, unable to listen anymore and unable to stop listening the way a parent listens when you hear things like this. Because as a parent you can only hear these reports so clearly before shutting down your emotions.
According to dictionary.com, Indignant is: -adjective… a feeling, characterized by, or expressing strong displeasure at something considered unjust, offensive, insulting, or base.
Jesus gets indignant only once in scripture and it happens when little children are prevented from being brought to him in order that they might be touched by him, the good kind of touch, the kind of touch which is blessing.
This Gospel couldn’t have come at a better time. This story of how Jesus cares for the little children of the world is a word of condemnation for the way children are treated and abused in this day and it’s a word of comfort assuring us that God does indeed care about what happens to children.
I don’t want you to get me wrong. There is forgiveness in the gospel for those who abuse and neglect and harm. God also loves the sinner and God loves those men who did these horrible things. God loves Mark Foley and God loves Charles Roberts. We need to know that because we are also sinners in need of God’s love and forgiveness.
You don’t believe me, talk Marie Roberts, Charles Robert’s wife, who has been embraced by the Amish community, whose children are being supported because the Amish Elders insisted that a fund be set up for them.
I don’t know if any of these crimes could have been prevented. How do you stop a person who has issues like these from doing the unthinkable? But I do know that this congregation cares about children. I do know that this congregation takes the indignation of Christ seriously when children are prevented from receiving blessing.
We said so in our mission statement: To proclaim Christ through worship, fellowship, and caring for our neighbor with an emphasis on families, children and youth, the elderly, and the poor.
We say so at the table, because no child is kept from the bread and the wine which are Christ’s own body and blood. We say so in our Sunday School where children are taught about God’s love throughout the entirety of time.
We say so in worship, because children are not made to sit silent, but encouraged to sing out and lead our praise and thanksgiving to God. We say so in the way we give to our camper-ship fund and our vacation bible school. We say so in the food we give to the food bank that services the families of this community.
We say so! But we need to say more. We need to say it in the way we vote, in the way we joke, in the way we interact with our friends, in the way we spend our money, in the way we do our jobs, in the way we raise our own children, and care for other people’s children.
We need to speak Christ’s indignation to a world which still sees children as throw-away property.
I want us to be indignant like Christ and continue to welcome the little children of the world into blessing. Not because they are innocent, or precious, or the future, but because Christ was innocent when he died for us, Christ is precious to us and because Christ is our future!
We can report a different story. We can proclaim this gospel to the world because the world needs it to be shouted from the mountaintops and throughout the valleys.
Jesus loves the little children!
Amen.
Sunday, October 08, 2006
Welcome the Children
A sermon based upon Mark 9:30-37
Pentecost 16 Year B September 27, 2006
In the name of Jesus; amen.
Then he took a little child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, "Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me."
I want to explain myself and something that I have been doing ever since I came to this church; actually, it is something that I have been doing ever since I became a pastor. I want to explain why I offer communion to small children who haven’t gone through First Communion Classes.
I want to do this because I know that some people have been wondering about it and it seems to me that today’s gospel provides as good a reason as any to talk about it as any other time.
Jesus was again traveling with his disciples and teaching them about his suffering and death in Jerusalem. On the way they were having an argument; the argument is about which one of them is considered the most important disciple. When they arrive at their destination that Jesus asks what it was they were talking about and none of them will say.
It sounds as if the disciples just didn’t get it, but I think they were beginning to. If Jesus was going to suffer and die then the disciples wanted to know who his number two guy was. Who was going to take over after he was gone?
What happens next may not seem like a big thing; in fact, it might seem rather sweet… the kind of thing one would paint in a picture.
Jesus says "Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all." Then he took a little child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, "Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me."
Jesus takes a little child and puts in the middle of them, then takes it into his arms.
Of course we have all seen pictures of Jesus doing exactly that sort of thing, but what you might not know is that things like that never happened in the first century world. According to the New Interpreters Bible…
... the child in antiquity was a non-person (cf. Gal 4:1-2 My point is this: heirs, as long as they are minors, are no better than slaves, though they are the owners of all the property; but they remain under guardians and trustees until the date set by the father). Children should have been with the women, not hanging around the teacher and his students. And in another commentary about Mark it says, “In ancient culture, children had no status. They were subject to the authority of their fathers, viewed as little more than property.”
What Jesus did in these simple actions was acknowledge that children had value far beyond what society believed. He did the same with women. Boundaries changed with Jesus, the value of each person changed each time he touched them, or healed them, or spoke to them. It turned the world around.
I want to read you another quote from John and Sylvia Ronsvalle's book, Behind the Stained Glass Windows: Money Dynamics in the Church:
“We live in a world where it is estimated that thirty-five thousand children under the age of five die daily around the globe, most from preventable poverty conditions and many in areas where no church has been planted to tell them of Jesus' love. We can be confident that such conditions are not God's will: Perhaps one idea that would not be debatable in any part of the church is that Jesus loves the little children of the world. The financial cost to end most of these child deaths, it has been proposed, is about $2.5 billion a year, which is the amount Americans spend on chewing gum.”
So why do I give communion to small children? I remember going through First Communion Instruction, I remember having to wait until I was all done learning everything my 4th grade mind could retain, I remember wearing a special dress and I remember feeling as though I had accomplished something that made me special enough to eat the Lord’s body and drink his blood.
In seminary I remember questioning congregations who had first communion instruction in 2nd grade; how on earth could a second grader understand Holy Communion enough to be able to take it?
And then I had my daughter, who last night informed me that the theme for today should be “Plans for Our Church.” I don’t know if she was even two years old when she went up for a blessing one Sunday and put her hand out for the bread. Suddenly I realized that there is nothing one can do to earn the right to take communion and the only special knowledge on has to have is this: “I want some too.”
It’s the thing about children, they often ask for things we adults don’t think they are ready for. And yet, in church, in God’s house everything is grace and we aren’t meant to be stingy about it, or choosy about who does and doesn’t get it.
Children are worth more than chewing gum and to Jesus they were of such great value that he would use one child to explain the point of greatness to his disciples.
And of all the things we do on a regular basis on Sunday morning, taking communion is jam packed with God’s grace. God’s table is the one place we go where we know, unequivocally, that we are all of us, of great value. It is meant to be that way. It is meant to be a place where we do not doubt God’s love for us or his immense and wonderful grace. And when we commune children, even the littlest of children, we say something about that love and about that grace: we say that it really is meant for everyone because everyone is of value to God.
Jesus took a little child into his arms to make a point about greatness and the value of his love; that it is meant for each of us. We are so loved, each one of us, young and old, that Jesus feeds us with his very own body and blood.
It is a thing to celebrate and be joyous about. And perhaps because children are so good at celebrating they will lead us in an even greater understanding of just what we do in this place.
And that’s a good plan…
Amen.
Pentecost 16 Year B September 27, 2006
In the name of Jesus; amen.
Then he took a little child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, "Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me."
I want to explain myself and something that I have been doing ever since I came to this church; actually, it is something that I have been doing ever since I became a pastor. I want to explain why I offer communion to small children who haven’t gone through First Communion Classes.
I want to do this because I know that some people have been wondering about it and it seems to me that today’s gospel provides as good a reason as any to talk about it as any other time.
Jesus was again traveling with his disciples and teaching them about his suffering and death in Jerusalem. On the way they were having an argument; the argument is about which one of them is considered the most important disciple. When they arrive at their destination that Jesus asks what it was they were talking about and none of them will say.
It sounds as if the disciples just didn’t get it, but I think they were beginning to. If Jesus was going to suffer and die then the disciples wanted to know who his number two guy was. Who was going to take over after he was gone?
What happens next may not seem like a big thing; in fact, it might seem rather sweet… the kind of thing one would paint in a picture.
Jesus says "Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all." Then he took a little child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, "Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me."
Jesus takes a little child and puts in the middle of them, then takes it into his arms.
Of course we have all seen pictures of Jesus doing exactly that sort of thing, but what you might not know is that things like that never happened in the first century world. According to the New Interpreters Bible…
... the child in antiquity was a non-person (cf. Gal 4:1-2 My point is this: heirs, as long as they are minors, are no better than slaves, though they are the owners of all the property; but they remain under guardians and trustees until the date set by the father). Children should have been with the women, not hanging around the teacher and his students. And in another commentary about Mark it says, “In ancient culture, children had no status. They were subject to the authority of their fathers, viewed as little more than property.”
What Jesus did in these simple actions was acknowledge that children had value far beyond what society believed. He did the same with women. Boundaries changed with Jesus, the value of each person changed each time he touched them, or healed them, or spoke to them. It turned the world around.
I want to read you another quote from John and Sylvia Ronsvalle's book, Behind the Stained Glass Windows: Money Dynamics in the Church:
“We live in a world where it is estimated that thirty-five thousand children under the age of five die daily around the globe, most from preventable poverty conditions and many in areas where no church has been planted to tell them of Jesus' love. We can be confident that such conditions are not God's will: Perhaps one idea that would not be debatable in any part of the church is that Jesus loves the little children of the world. The financial cost to end most of these child deaths, it has been proposed, is about $2.5 billion a year, which is the amount Americans spend on chewing gum.”
So why do I give communion to small children? I remember going through First Communion Instruction, I remember having to wait until I was all done learning everything my 4th grade mind could retain, I remember wearing a special dress and I remember feeling as though I had accomplished something that made me special enough to eat the Lord’s body and drink his blood.
In seminary I remember questioning congregations who had first communion instruction in 2nd grade; how on earth could a second grader understand Holy Communion enough to be able to take it?
And then I had my daughter, who last night informed me that the theme for today should be “Plans for Our Church.” I don’t know if she was even two years old when she went up for a blessing one Sunday and put her hand out for the bread. Suddenly I realized that there is nothing one can do to earn the right to take communion and the only special knowledge on has to have is this: “I want some too.”
It’s the thing about children, they often ask for things we adults don’t think they are ready for. And yet, in church, in God’s house everything is grace and we aren’t meant to be stingy about it, or choosy about who does and doesn’t get it.
Children are worth more than chewing gum and to Jesus they were of such great value that he would use one child to explain the point of greatness to his disciples.
And of all the things we do on a regular basis on Sunday morning, taking communion is jam packed with God’s grace. God’s table is the one place we go where we know, unequivocally, that we are all of us, of great value. It is meant to be that way. It is meant to be a place where we do not doubt God’s love for us or his immense and wonderful grace. And when we commune children, even the littlest of children, we say something about that love and about that grace: we say that it really is meant for everyone because everyone is of value to God.
Jesus took a little child into his arms to make a point about greatness and the value of his love; that it is meant for each of us. We are so loved, each one of us, young and old, that Jesus feeds us with his very own body and blood.
It is a thing to celebrate and be joyous about. And perhaps because children are so good at celebrating they will lead us in an even greater understanding of just what we do in this place.
And that’s a good plan…
Amen.
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