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Grace, mercy, and peace be unto you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
Brothers and sisters in Christ, the text for this morning comes from the Gospel reading where the goal is reconciliation, how we love one another. Our parish family is of such a size that it’s easy for us to recognize faces that we’ve seen here frequently. Amen. And it’s also of such a size that we can recognize faces that we haven’t seen here frequently. Well, at least if you go to the 10:40 service and you’re at 10:40, because if you go to the 8:15, you’ll go, who are those people? Or if they were to come to this service, they’re going, I had no idea those people were people. It’s all a part of our trying to find out about one another.
But being the size that we are and being the ability to see faces, this is a blessing. Because it enables our responsibility to one another a whole bunch easier than if we were in a huge church. Where people can come and go and we never do anything about them. Anonymity is more the norm rather than the abnorm. And that’s a gift you’ve been given in this parish family. But the responsibility of which is easier because of our size is staying engaged relationally with one another.
Staying engaged relationally with one another. You have to work very hard at it as a son or daughter to stay engaged with your mama and daddy. Calling them, checking on them, writing them. It takes an effort. It takes a great effort as a parent to be engaged relationally with your children, especially when they move out. They’re not at the dinner table all the time, and you’ve got to call them or write them or text them and email them and so on. But it takes an effort to remain engaged relationally with them.
Well, you husbands and you wives know it takes an effort to be engaged with your spouse relationally. It’s easy to kind of pull back and go into one’s shell, but it’s effort to engage relationally with people like that. Those are hard relationships which take a great deal of effort. It doesn’t take nearly as much of an effort to engage with someone that you don’t know that well. But it’s a great gift to do so. You see, we have to kind of think about how we relate to each other. Do we engage one another relationally or do we let them go on their way and we never really do know them? And they don’t really know us.
Yes. See, there’s where we lack faithfulness. We’ll probably not lack faithfulness as much with our son or daughter or our parents or our husband or wife, but where we lack faithfulness is you and me engaging each other relationally. That’s where we do lack faithfulness because we don’t know one another that well. But isn’t it interesting how we yearn to be known? Because if someone doesn’t acknowledge us, it hurts. And you know how that feels. You’ve been in that situation. But you also know what it’s like to be engaged and how good it does feel.
Now, you can’t and I can’t fall back and go, well, but I’m not vivacious like those people. I’m not as outgoing as those people. I don’t think Jesus said in the text… In order to be the greatest, you’ve got to be outgoing. I don’t think he said in the text, you’ve got to be vivacious and gregarious to be a child because children come in two kinds. You’ve seen them. Some children, they don’t know a stranger. And we as parents are going, please, you’ve got to realize there are some people you just can’t go up and say, hi, my name is, and here’s where I live, and so on.
And then there are those children that you and I notice who hide behind their mama’s skirt or their daddy’s leg, but do they still want to be acknowledged by someone with whom they’re still scared? Yes, yes. Now, even though we may not feel like we’re crafted in that way by our God, it still is our responsibility as a brother and sister in Christ. It’s not an option, it’s a responsibility. You see, being joined together at this font and this time…
The Lutheran Christian sermon. Children are not the little ones. The children that God makes very obvious to us in this 10:40 service, sitting among us, are these kind of people. These are the people that we need to take note of because they’re the most obvious ones who have had new adjustments. They’re the ones who have new routines in their lives, and it challenges them. They’re the ones who have a brand new set of concerns that they’re just getting used to and all kinds of expectations. These are the newly baptized and confirmed among us. Those are obvious children among us.
They’re also the newly wedded. That’s a new challenge, brothers and sisters, and to try to balance it all is difficult. They’re new parents. If that doesn’t challenge and stretch you, there are very few things that do. They’re children among us who need us to reach out and be engaged with. They’re people who have been healthy for years and all of a sudden stricken with some difficult health issues because they haven’t had to have that challenge before. They’re the children in our midst.
They are those who are newly graduated and stepping out on their own because you know how scary, you remember how scary that was. They are people who just moved into town and are trying to figure out this Austin that maybe many of us grew up in. They’re the children among us. They are those who maybe worked for this one company for many years and now they have no longer, and they work with this company, a brand new set of people to get to know. It’s scary, isn’t it?
They are the obvious children in our midst. They are the ones with which we need to be engaged relationally. There are also others that are more hidden. There are still children among us. There are still the needy, the helpless, the ones struggling. They are the ones who are struggling. Who are the ones that are a little bit more hidden, sitting with you in the pews? They’re the long-time members, whose demeanor doesn’t show struggle, but if you take time to talk with them, they’ll tell you.
The ones that are a little bit less obvious are also the long-time married because now you’re dealing with empty nest, retirement, health issues as we grow older, or you’re dealing with someone who isn’t laying down beside you in that bed. Right? Oh, I’m going to call them. I’m going to check on them. They’re the less obvious. They’re going to keep up that austerity, that everything is fine, because to open up that is to open up something that’s hard to stop. Sometimes the emotions come tumbling out, and they’re sitting among you in the pews with which we need to be engaged relationally.
Some others of the less obvious are the ones who have worked so hard in this job, and now they’re retired. And we think retirement is great. It’s hard because it’s a change. And every change in our life is difficult. Oh, we love to say, oh, retirement’s great. I’ve got all this free time. Yeah, I’ve got all this free time to do what with this between my ears? Think, ruminate, like we talked about in Bible class this morning. These are the less obvious children among our midst.
So when you put together the obvious children among our midst, and you add that with the less obvious children among our midst… Who’s left? That pretty much covers us all, doesn’t it? That pretty much covers us all. Well, how? How do I find out? How do I step out of my comfort zone and engage them? Don’t think so hard. It takes one to know one. It takes a child to know a child.
It takes a child to know a child. It takes you who have endured difficult situations and have prayed and have prayed and have prayed and still are waiting for an answer. And to say to that person as you walk with him, I don’t have all the answers. It’s not some super Christian who’s seen all these glories come to pass. It’s not some person who said, I know that God is always good no matter what. It’s someone who is a child and knows their limitations.
It takes you who have been driven to your knees so often that you know what it’s like to have those prayers come across your lips. And wait upon the Lord, knowing that his answers aren’t always in the way and fashion that you want. So why did Jesus take a child and put him in the midst of these apostles to teach them something? Here’s why. He’s teaching them to be aware of who they are as God’s children. How did the text begin? Who’s the greatest in the kingdom of heaven? Because you and I look at one another and we compare and contrast and set up a pecking order.
We either are above someone, we’re below someone, we’re in front of someone, behind someone, but we’re not always with someone. And if there is one place in your life where you are with someone, it’s here, at that rail, where you stand with someone. A fellow child of God. Not someone who’s better than you, but equal. Not someone who is broken less or broken more than you, but as broken as you. Quit comparing. We’re all the same.
It’s Satan who wishes us to compare. In fact, for us to think of ourselves in any other way is to completely deny what Christ is saying. He’s reminding these disciples of their weaknesses, of their lowlinesses, and of their struggles for the sake of binding them together so that they walk together. Not ahead of, not behind, not above or below, but together they walk. Paul said it a different way in Galatians. He said it this way. He says, Brothers, if any of you is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of love, gentleness.
It’s the same thing our Lord is saying here. Sometimes we look at this Matthew 18 and we think it’s only about church discipline. It’s really how to love one another. How to love one another. When Jesus set that child in his midst and we think as well we should become like children, let’s first remember what children are like. You’ve had them. You were once one. You’ve had them. Children are fickle, flighting here and there. Children are foolish. They have to be taught wisdom because they don’t come by it honestly. And children are forgetful. Doesn’t change as we grow older, does it? Still forgetful.
And the things about which we’re fickle, the things about which we’re foolish, and the things about which we’re forgetful are the things of God. And the good news is this. The person sitting behind you and in front of you, in the back and in the front, is not. Our children, just like you, they’re fickle too, no matter how we wish to cover it. They’re foolish too, no matter how we wish to cover it. And they’re forgetful too, no matter how we wish to cover it. And we walk with one another, not having all the answers.
Because Paul said it in his text this morning, Owe no one anything but L-O-V-E. That love is not an abstraction. Love is a concrete commitment. Of you and of me continuing to bring and grow that relationship with one another, especially the people we don’t know. That’s walking together. So what did Jesus do, but walk with you? What did Jesus do, but walk with you, and every time you were fickle, he wasn’t? Every time you were foolish and did not wish to admit your childishness, He confessed it all the way to the tree. And every time you and I forget who is our daddy, he bowed in humility before him and gave up his spirit for you, that you would be cleansed.
You have tasted that forgiveness. You’ve received that forgiveness. You’ve also given it many times in your life. But it is our own childishness that we’ve got to go back to to admit we still need it and can’t live without it. For that’s what we have to give to one another. As we walk with them. Not ahead of them. Not behind them. Not above them or below them. But with them. This is the point of this text. How to love one another. So that you can be reconciled.
In the name of Jesus. Amen. The peace of God which passes all understanding. Keep your hearts and your minds on Christ Jesus to life everlasting. Amen.
