Saturday, March 14, 2015
Today’ Scripture: Matthew 18:1-5
"’Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?’ He called a child, whom he put among them, and said, ‘Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.’” (Matt. 18:1-3)
Unless you become like a child, Jesus said, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven, and maybe part of what that means is that in the long run what is good about religion is playing the way a child plays at being grown up until he finds that being grown up is just another way of playing and thereby starts to grow up himself. Maybe what is good about religion is playing that the kingdom will come, until - in the joy of your playing, the hope and rhythm and comradeship and poignancy and mystery of it - you start to see that the playing is itself the first-fruits of the kingdom's coming and of God's presence within us and among us. — Frederick Buechner, Now and Then (HarperCollins, 2010), 73.
“They are essentially people of the heart. When they meet others they do not have a hidden agenda for power or for success. Their cry, their fundamental cry, is for a relationship, a meeting heart to heart. It is this meeting that awakens them, opens them up to life, and calls them forth to love in great simplicity, freedom and openness.
When those ingrained in a culture of winning and of individual success really meet them, and enter into friendship with them, something amazing and wonderful happens. They too are opened up to love and even to God. They are changed at a very deep level. They are transformed and become more fundamentally human.”
The disciples once again in our scripture today are showing their over eagerness to shine as Jesus’ best ever disciple, so they want to know, “Who is the greatest in the kingdom.” They want to make sure they are doing the right things to measure up, be the best, and become an overachieving disciple. We all want to do our best and shine at whatever we do, but accomplishments, awards, recognition don’t always get us to the desired destination. They may not allow us to enter the kingdom.
As adults we have a tendency to over think things, we want to be the best of the best, and tend to complicate the simple. In Alcoholics Anonymous they have a saying, “this is a simple program for complicated people.” Jesus by using a child as an example is trying to get the disciples to understand the simplicity of entering the kingdom.
Jesus is saying that the people who get into heaven are people who, like children, don't worry about it too much. They are people who, like children, live with their hands open more than their fists clenched. They are people who, like children, are so relatively unburdened by preconceptions that if someone says there's a pony on the other side of the hill, they are perfectly willing to go take a look for themselves. Children have a clearer and more honest way of looking at their world. They are better at telling the difference between a put-up job and the real thing.
Sometimes children can process problems on more than one level. Consider the English teacher who wrote on the blackboard: "I ain't had no fun all summer."
"Now, Sidney," she asked, "What shall I do to correct this?"
"Go get a boyfriend, Ms. Hughes," Sidney replied.
The reality and functionality of the kingdom of God is present in action, in compassion, and grace available with and through the person of Jesus. That is Jesus’ gospel. Our scripture today makes plain that this kingdom is not something we accept today and enjoy later when we get to heaven. The kingdom is something we receive and enter now and it changes who we are and how we relate to our neighbors, friends and family.
Back in 1993, Dr. Bernie Siegel wrote a book called, “How to Live Between Office Visits: A Guide to Life, Love and Health.” Siegel writes, “When doctors become involved in their patients' lives, they can cure in ways they may not expect. One doctor told about a woman and her child who had come to see him. He wrote some prescriptions for antibiotics and then asked, "What's going on in your life?" He learned that the woman's husband had left her. After listening for a while, he realized that what she needed was to speak to Legal Aid. They spoke for a time, and so he gave her the telephone number, and she forgot to pick up her prescriptions. When she came back a week later, she was beaming and healthy, as was her child. The visit to Legal Aid had solved her problem. The antibiotics turned out to be unnecessary. Someone cared and responded, she felt hope, and she could go on.”
What had been impossible for these patients to experience became possible when someone cared and loved enough to get involved and they entered the kingdom that Jesus spoke about to his disciples.
Today’s Lectionary Readings
Morning: Psalms 43; 149
Evening: Psalms 31; 143
Jeremiah 13:1–11
Romans 6:12–23
John 8:47–59
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