Trinity Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)

Sermons 

Title: "Behaving Like Children … of God"

Text: Mark 10:13-16

Before I begin,

I must credit a long-ago group of college students

with helping me to write this sermon.

We did a Bible study on this passage –

that is, the last one-third of it –

because I wanted to hear what they had to say

about being like children.

I was so impressed with their variety of responses

that I kept the notes from that study,

and I’ve referred back to them from time to time

when this passage has rolled around for our consideration.

I was interested in their thoughts, in part,

because college is a time when many of us

try awfully hard to prove how adult we are.

We’re old enough to do things we couldn’t do before …

we’re much freer from parental control,

and we’re tempted just to cut loose!

And sometimes we do some pretty childish things

in our attempts to prove how grown-up we are!

Anyway, I wanted to find out from college-age folks

- recent adults -

what it means to them to be told

that they must be like children.

What characteristics do children have

that we as Christian adults or almost-adults

ought to try to imitate?

Well, one of the first things they came up with

was children’s energy.

I guess enough of them had younger brothers and sisters,

or nieces and nephews,

or perhaps lots of babysitting experience …

But it’s interesting to me that even those of us

who don’t have children of our own

recognize that as one of their primary characteristics!

Some of you I have told this before,

but I’ve been impressed – and depressed –

by the results of a study done several years ago

on children and their energy.

Several football players were hired

- men in tip-top physical condition -

and their job was to follow a two- or three-year-old around during the day,

and do everything the child did.

If he sat on the floor and built a tower with blocks,

the football player sat on the floor and built a tower.

If the child drew pictures,

the football player drew pictures.

If she ran 57 times around the dining room table,

so did the football player!

The study was never actually completed,

because all of the football players quit

after two or three or four hours.

They were exhausted, and could not finish out the day.

One has to wonder

how much more we Christians could do

if we had the energy to behave like children.

How many more people could we bring to Christ?

How many more hungry could we feed?

How many more sick could we visit?

How much more could we do

to make this world more kingdom-of-God-like,

if we had the energy of our children?

Another thing they thought we ought to learn from children

is their curiosity.

Now, I admit there are times

when children are curious to a fault.

Like, tasting the funny-smelling stuff

in the bottle with the skull and crossbones on it!

Or asking, "Why? Why?"

after everything you say.

But many of us lose even a healthy curiosity

as we grow up and grow older.

We learn what we need to know to do our job,

and then we quit.

Not good!

Because the more we find out about the world,

the more we learn about the God who created it.

Even as adults, we need that curiosity,

that openness to learning and discovering new things.

What we find is likely to stretch and strengthen our faith,

not to pull the rug out from under it.

The group also commented about how trusting and dependent children are,

and how contented they are to be that way!

Most of us un-learn that pretty quickly!

And we feel uncomfortable when we must

be dependent on someone,

even if it’s just for doing us a simple favor.

How hard it is for us to re-learn that we can and must

trust and depend on God.

Our society still teaches us

that we should grow up to be independent,

self-sufficient, invulnerable.

And we’re harder on men than we are on women

in this regard.

But we nearly all fight the idea

that we must be dependent on God,

vulnerable to God.

We’re afraid others may think we have failed

to "make it on our own"

as an independent creature.

How much better our lives would be,

and the lives of those around us,

if we could learn to delight in

our trust and dependence on God,

like children,

instead of fighting God off

and pretending that we are on our own.

We’d probably also benefit

by learning from children in their honesty.

Several different kinds of honesty ought to be considered:

truth about others and about ourselves, and

truths which are both negative and positive.

So often when we hear the word "honesty,"

we think of telling someone else a painful truth

about him- or herself.

Now that’s part of it,

and one would hope that we could do such things

with more tact than most children can manage!

But there’s far more to "honesty"

than just negative comments about somebody else.

Children are normally pretty good

about being honest about themselves.

They’re unpretentious –

they’ll admit when they don’t know something

or can’t do something.

They will also tell you

when they’ve learned something new

or done something right!

Children are pretty good about being truthful

about the good things about themselves, too!

Most of us are not;

we’ve had it trained out of us.

We’re afraid we’ll seem egotistical

if we ever speak or even think well

of ourselves and our accomplishments.

But think about it theologically for a moment:

If we are created in God’s image,

and if we are given gifts and talents by God,

then we ought to celebrate what we do well,

because by doing so we glorify God!

Honesty about the good and the not-so-good

is a child’s trait we might want to recapture.

Children are good about affirming others, too.

They’re normally very affectionate:

if a kid likes you, you’re going to get hugged!

This church is pretty good about

showing our feelings for one another.

There’s lots of hugs going on on Sunday morning,

and before and after meetings,

and fellowship gatherings, and the like.

That’s good!

But what we need to do now – and this is hard –

is to take our hugs out into the world.

Children aren’t just affectionate in church,

and we shouldn’t be, either.

But it’s hard, isn’t it, because we’re so likely to be misinterpreted.

If you start making an effort

to be more friendly to a co-worker,

he or she may wonder what huge favor you’re about to ask for,

or whether you’re after that job!

Female cashiers in one particular grocery chain

have actually sued their employer

because of the hard-and-fast rules about smiling faces …

They are constantly being hit on by male customers

who insist on interpreting their friendliness as a come-on.

I suspect it’s a sign that our world is mostly affection-deprived

when so many of us can’t tell the difference

between friendliness and seduction.

All of that ties in to another important characteristic of children:

their innocence.

It seems to me that

we need to cultivate some of that in ourselves.

I don’t mean innocence as a kind of "intentional ignorance,"

where we choose to ignore the world,

but as "calculated simplicity."

The world makes cynics out of most of us as we grow up,

and we would do well to un-learn some of that.

To accept people, and ideas, at face value,

instead of forever searching for hidden meanings, or ulterior motives,

or psychoanalyzing everything everyone says.

Don’t get me wrong:

it is valuable to be able to discern meanings behind words.

Lots of counseling depends on that!

But I think we do that to one another too much.

We have become almost too cynical about one another.

Jesus said,

"Be ye wise as serpents and innocent as doves."

Seems to me that’s a good guideline.

We do have to be wise –

we have to learn from our experience,

and the lessons are sometimes painful!

We need to be aware that things are not always what they seem,

or what they claim to be.

And perhaps in our minds,

we need to prepare ourselves

for the possible worst-case scenario.

But we need to begin by being innocent as doves.

Open, accepting, trusting of one another.

It’s amazing what a difference it makes

in the people you’re dealing with,

and in you.

Along with a child’s ability to accept things as they are,

is an equally impressive ability

to imagine things differently.

Imagination is a gift we need to recover from the child in us.

Tests show that over 95% of five-year-olds

are highly creative and imaginative.

Only about half of ten-year-olds,

and 10% of adults,

are rated that high.

The test is a very simple sentence completion:

The dog is (blank) .

And so we say,

The dog is black.

The dog is white.

The dog is running.

The dog is barking.

The dog is eating the cat for dinner.

A five-year-old will say,

The dog is singing.

The dog is writing a letter.

The dog is cooking dinner.

And so on.

Now, the cynic in us may say,

that test only proves that adults are more sensible than children!

But it took that kind of mental leap beyond the ordinary

to imagine training dogs

to be guides for the blind.

To imagine training cute little monkeys

who now cook for, and feed, and groom

people who are quadriplegic.

I guess I mention imagination last

because it’s the child-gift I most covet for the church.

The church in general, but, at this point in time especially,

this church in particular.

We are at a point in terms of our resources,

both financial resources and people-resources

where we can’t go on as we have before.

In a certain sense, we all know that.

But it is hard for us to imagine how to do things differently

without losing what’s most important to us.

And so we need to fire up our imaginations,

as any five-year-old could help us do …

We need to imagine what it might look like to be

a church without a building,

or a church without a full-time staff,

or something else that our imaginations

haven’t yet even dreamed.

As adults, we tend to look at such scenarios

and become depressed by them.

If we got back in touch with the child in us,

we might instead see them as an opportunity to do something extraordinary.

In the next year or so,

we’re going to need for every one of us

to spend at least some time thinking like a five-year-old.

One of my favorite quotations goes something like this:

"Some people see things as they are, and ask ‘Why?’

I see things as they could be, and ask ‘Why not?’"

We need to learn again,

how to see things as they could be.

Like children.

And to ask "Why not?"

and to do something about it.

Certainly, God needs faithful adults in this crazy mixed-up world.

But I suspect that the most good will be done,

the greatest difference will be made,

by adults who haven’t forgotten

how to behave like children … of God.

Amen.