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We're All Just a Bunch of Big Babies - March 13, 2011

We're All Just a Bunch of Big Babies

Matthew 19:13-15

March 13, 2011

Rev. Dave R. Garwick

Then little children were brought to Jesus for Him to place His hands on them and pray for them. But the disciples rebuked those who brought them. Jesus said, "Let the little children come to Me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these." When He had placed His hands on them, He went on from there. Matt 19:13-15

Today’s passage falls into what I call the “No-Duh?” category. Jesus loves little children. “You THINK?” Well OF COURSE He does! Who would ever think otherwise? MOST people love little children. That’s how babies survive. Even people who generally don’t like people often like little children.

For a number of years I taught preschool special education in the Minneapolis Public Schools. Since we worked with the students who were at the bottom of the pecking order, our program was at the bottom of the pecking order. So every year the District would stick us in whatever space no one else wanted. One year they placed us in a building down the hall from another program which was also at the bottom of the ladder. That was a last chance program for dangerous teenagers whose next stop was prison. We thought that THAT made sense – handicapped preschoolers down the hall from teens who wanted to kill people!

To be precise these teens did not want to kill people in general – just those in authority. Like teachers. Like us. We teachers would do anything to avoid having to walk through the valley of the shadow of death, anywhere near those highly motivated older students. Once I was down the hall with one of my little ones when one of those older kids fired a jumbo paperclip at me from the end of the long corridor. I placed my hand in front of my student’s face and took the paperclip through my hand. The guy’s aim was amazing: he was not meaning to hurt my little one, just me.

What we discovered was that these dangerous teens were actually very protective of our little ones – so much so that when one of us teachers had to walk through the valley of the shadow of death, what we would do is take one of our little ones with us for PROTECTION! As long as we could hide behind one of our three year olds, we were safe. In fact, the love that these older kids had for our little ones proved so reliable that we actually took some of them with us on neighborhood field trips like picnics in the park.

So, if the Good News is simply that Jesus loved little children, then I would say that this must be a pretty slow news day. People always say that the big deal is that Jesus himself was such a big deal and what a remarkable thing it is that Jesus would take out time even for little kids. Again that is something that even political candidates do – so what is so special that Jesus did as well?

Like I said, just about everybody loves little children because things are designed that way in order for little kids to survive. I say that because there is no other human being who could get away with what little kids do.

I am a new grandpa and I am absolutely head over heels with my little Oliver. He has spit up all over me, upchucked on me, he drools on me, his nose cold stuff gets all over me and last week mommy and daddy asked me to come over and take care of Ollie because he could not go to his family day care with his ……. highly contagious, highly aromatic, and highly productive diarrhea. I said, “Sure! I’d LOVE to!” I meant that I would love to spend the day with Ollie. But you get the whole package. In this case, literally.

Little kids are cute. But there is something else about them. Martin Luther used to say that what sin is really about is curving in on one’s self, sway from God and away from others. From that perspective there is no other mortal more curved in on itself than a baby. If you have questioned the church’s teaching that ALL humans are born with inherited sin from our first parents, just LOOK at babies. As far as a baby is concerned there is nothing else and no one else in the entire universe but them …. they are not only the absolute center of the universe, they are all there is in the universe. Until they are hungry. Until they want something. THEN they all of a sudden want you. And if you do not do WHAT they want, IMMEDIATELY, and exactly the WAY they want it, they may not be nice about it.

And it’s not just what they do. It’s also about what they DON’T do. Infants do not say one nice world to anyone. They do not do anything FOR anyone else except for those things we deliberately read in …. “Oh, he’s sharing his peas with me.” No, he’s just getting rid of them: you are the disposal.

I have to apologize to all of you who have ever been nice enough to ask me about my little guy. You always get more than you asked for. Beginning with every photo I have loaded onto my phone. And all the cute things Ollie did in the last six months. You are so gracious in acting like it is always such a remarkable thing. “Awww … he sat in your lap! Isn’t that something?” “Oh, isn’t that just the most AMAZING thing in all the world? He said ‘more kitty.’ Actually it’s usually just the women who do that – most of you guys just start looking at your watch.

When I act this way toward my grandson, it is understandable, since I can be excused on the grounds of …. being a grandpa. But Jesus is different. The whole reason He was here was because of our sin. Yet whom did He bring to the front of the line? The very ones who are most naturally turned in on themselves, the very ones who probably did less for others than anyone else. When it came to adults, He did the very same thing as we learned last week about Zacchaeus: the very one who had the biggest sin problem is the one with whom Jesus stayed.

Jesus loving little children was not about Him being all sentimental like some grandpas I know. It’s about Him having a special love for those who need Him most, especially those like Zacchaeus who was trying to get to Him, most especially like those little children who others were trying to bring to Him.

What did Jesus conclude about Zacchaeus? “Today salvation has come to THIS house.” And what did Jesus say about the little ones? “To such belong the Kingdom of Heaven.”And finally, what did Jesus to the so-called grown ups? “I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it."

Think about this. To the Son of God who was there at the beginning of creation, to the Christ who walked this earth eighty generations ago, who is now preparing a place for in heaven where a thousand years is just a day, how old do you think you really are? According to that thousand year formula, my sixty years n earth time works out to something less than two weeks of age in Jesus’ time!

We ourselves are just a bunch of big babies. Babies are how we all started. When it comes to the most fundamental things about us, we are just as infected with the sin we have inherited as any of the little ones. And every single one of us in this sanctuary is here because we have come to Jesus. We ourselves are no less in bondage to sin than the little children who were brought to Jesus. How He received them is how He receives us, big babies that we are!