JULY 6, 2008  SERMON ARCHIVE

The text for our meditation this morning is the Gospel reading from Matthew 11. You have that text before you and we will be dwelling on two verses especially. There we read:

At that time Jesus answered and said, 'I thank You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and prudent and have revealed them to babes.....Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.'

Dear Friends in Christ!

Usually it is not a very good thing for an adult to be labeled 'childish' or to be looked upon as one who behaves like a child. When an adult does something that is considered to be beneath them, that is beneath their years of wisdom and maturity, they are said to be behaving 'childishly.' If their offense is even more noticeably childish in nature they are told 'stop behaving, or stop acting like a child!' How many of you have heard that before?

It is really sort of an interesting use of the word 'child.' I don¡¯t think that when the word is used in such a fashion we intend to demean children by it . After all we were all children at one time in our lives, and even today we love little children. The point is though, we really don¡¯t want a person to be child forever

There comes a time when a person is supposed to finally 'grow up,' when they are supposed to behave like an adult, stop driving Jeeps and playing with cars and the like. There comes a time when a person is supposed to gain some maturity, perhaps even some wisdom and understanding, when they are supposed to be above being 'childish.'

But, the question for us today is, 'is it always a good thing to be so wise and understanding, particularly in matters of faith?' At one time or another, most of you have been confronted by those who question, or even outright reject the practice of infant Baptism. Young children, they argue, don¡¯t know what is even going on when they are being baptized; they have no way of understanding the Christian faith, and no means of making a personal commitment to Christ. No one should be baptized, they say, until they have grown up enough to decide for themselves, until they can understand and discern right from wrong.

On the surface, it sounds like a pretty good argument. As if it were just plain common sense. But, what does the Word of God say? What does Jesus say about children and about faith? Does He say, 'let the 'grown ups' come to Me, for the Kingdom of God belongs to such as these?' No. Does He say, 'unless you grow up and become like an adult, you will never enter the Kingdom of God?' No.

Rather, our Lord demonstrates on several occasions that little children are the model and example of faith; for 'anyone who does not receive the Kingdom of God like a little child (Jesus says) will by no means enter it.'

In the Gospel reading for today too, Jesus praises the Father that He has revealed Him and His Gospel to babes, and not to the wise and learned. (By the way, the English translation we have before us this morning says, 'babes,' which isn¡¯t a bad translation. Others though say, 'little children,' which is not quite as good. The word here is literally 'infants' or 'babies.') And so, Jesus praises the Father that He has revealed Him and His Gospel to babies, to infants and not to the wise and to the learned.

Which means that you must become like infants, like helpless babies if you are to enter the Kingdom of God. Nicodemus, in John 3, when told that he must be born again said, 'How can a man be born when his is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother¡¯s womb and be born?' With the text this morning you might ask the same question.

What does it mean that you are to be like infants, that you are to be like helpless babies, if you are to enter the kingdom of God? Well, obviously, it doesn¡¯t mean that only physical babies will know God. No, for you to become 'infants' is simply another way of describing the nature of faith. And I might add it is a very good way, perhaps the best description of all.

Over the years God has graced us here at Bethlehem with new births in our congregation. A few in the last several years, but many since the congregation began. For those parents and even for those who are not parents, but who see the little children, it is always a bit shocking to see the utter helplessness and the frailty of a tiny newborn. Someone has to do absolutely everything for an infant. (Well, almost everything. There are at least a couple of things that babies are good at doing on their own, right?)

But, at any rate, children are helpless. Someone has to feed them, someone has to clothe them, clean them, hold them, rock them and comfort them - twenty four hours a day. Otherwise, it is brutally simple, the child will die.

And that my friends, is where you stand in relation to your heavenly Father each and every day of your lives. In a physical sense, for you to survive God must do absolutely everything for you. He must feed you, clothe you, and comfort you; otherwise you will die. And so youmust look to Him for all that you need to support your body and life.

In the words of the Psalmist: 'The eyes of all look to You, O Lord, and You give them their meat in due season; You open Your hand and satisfy the desire of every living thing.'

In the same way, by faith, you are to look to God, to Christ Jesus for the forgiveness of sins, for spiritual life and salvation. And that is what it means to be an infant before God. For life, for eternal life, you are completely dependant on Christ, even as you are dependant on Him for all of the other things that you need in life.

However, because of sinful pride, because of a desire to be wise, learned and mature, desiring to grow up, do you sometimes rebel against the father / child relationship. The Prodigal Son said to his father, 'Father give me the portion of goods that falls to me.' And then as a 'man ' he went out an squandered all that he was given. No longer willing to sit as a child at his father¡¯s feet to learn and to receive his father¡¯s gifts, the man decided it was to time for him to 'grow up.' Unfortunately, for him, growing up meant being less dependant on his father.

Have you been there before? Have you striven (if I could use that word) to be so mature in your faith, so wise and learned that you no longer might be thought of or seen as 'childish' in the eyes of God? Desiring to see yourself as one who is supposed to be 'mature' in the faith, have you begun to sense more intensely the burden of sin that you thought would diminish as the years went by?

If so, then you are among those who 'labor and are heavy laden,' the 'weary and the burdened,' those whom Jesus invites to Himself in the Gospel reading this morning. His words, in the language in which they were given, describe those who are worn out from their labor and toil, and burdened with a load of responsibilities. I think we all know the feeling.

As 'mature' Christians there are things that you may truly believe should not trouble you anymore. There are sins and temptations that you may believe you should have overcome long ago. And yet, they continue to weigh heavily upon you. You labor and are heavy laden with those things. Like the prodigal son, in your quest for maturity, you think you have reached a point where you had it all figured out, but then your conscience reminded you that as self sufficient as you thought you were, you were still so utterly dependent on the God who forgives you and who loves you despite the way you behave.

For sure, as the prodigal came to his senses, with a heart that was heavy laden with sin, he turned to his father and he set his sights toward home. Being a child in the father¡¯s household was not such a bad thing after all. Being one who is dependent on his father for his life and his very being was not so bad.

And when he came to the edge of town and the father saw him there the father opened his arms and he received his wayward child. 'It is right (he said) that we should make merry and be glad, this son was dead and is alive again, and was lost and is found.'

The Parable of the Prodigal Son as we read it in Scripture and as we experience it in our own lives rings so very true for us, for Jesus confirms the Father¡¯s care for His children in the words of this Gospel this morning. The Father¡¯s house remains open to us, and His arms are always stretching out to bring us back to Him. Time and time again, our Savior tenderly calls us to Himself.

'Come unto Me,' He says, 'all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest!' By those words your Lord gives you the cross, His cross, and the forgiveness earned therein. He offers yoy a lighter load to bear. And by His grace, He makes you pleased to be 'child-like once again, infants cradled gently in His arms, safe and sound forever.

And it is good to be childlike in His arms, because Christ Is Risen.

In Jesus¡¯ name. Amen.

The peace of God that passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus unto life everlasting. Amen.