First Reading: Zechariah 9:9-12
9Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion!
Shout aloud, O daughter Jerusalem!
Lo, your king comes to you;
triumphant and victorious is he,
humble and riding on a donkey,
on a colt, the foal of a donkey.
10He will cut off the chariot from Ephraim
and the war-horse from Jerusalem;
and the battle bow shall be cut off,
and he shall command peace to the nations;
his dominion shall be from sea to sea,
and from the River to the ends of the earth.
11As for you also, because of the blood of my covenant with you,
I will set your prisoners free from the waterless pit.
12Return to your stronghold, O prisoners of hope;
today I declare that I will restore to you double.
Psalm: Psalm 145:8-14
The Lord is gracious and full of compassion. (Ps. 145:8)
8The Lord is gracious and full of compassion,
slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.
9Lord, you are good to all,
and your compassion is over all your works.
10All your works shall praise you, O Lord,
and your faithful ones shall bless you.
11They shall tell of the glory of your kingdom
and speak of your power,
12that all people may know of your power
and the glorious splendor of your kingdom.
13Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom; your dominion endures through-out all ages.
You, Lord, are faithful in all your words, and loving in all your works.
14The Lord upholds all those who fall
and lifts up those who are bowed down.
Second Reading: Romans 7:15-25a
15I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. 16Now if I do what I do not want, I agree that the law is good. 17But in fact it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me. 18For I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh. I can will what is right, but I cannot do it. 19For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do. 20Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me.
21So I find it to be a law that when I want to do what is good, evil lies close at hand. 22For I delight in the law of God in my inmost self, 23but I see in my members another law at war with the law of my mind, making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. 24Wretched man that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? 25aThanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!
Gospel: Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30
[Jesus spoke to the crowd saying:] 16“To what will I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to one another,
17‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance;
we wailed, and you did not mourn.’
18For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, ‘He has a demon’; 19the Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’ Yet wisdom is vindicated by her deeds.”
25At that time Jesus said, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants; 26yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. 27All things have been handed over to me by my Father; and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.
28“Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. 29Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”
Children’s Sermon: Let’s review one of the fun fables about how the zebra got his stripes. It goes back to creation.
At creation, all the animals looked the same with four legs, one tail, and brown fur. One day God realized how dull and boring his world was because all the animals were the same. Why not ask the animals their wish for size, shape, and color?
“I want a long neck,” said the giraffe. So it became.
“I want an enormous nose,” said the elephant. So it became.
“I want sharp claws and huge teeth,” roared the lion. Wish granted.
Finally God came to his last brown animal. “Who are you and what would you like?” asked God. Zebra was not sure if he wanted to be black or white. He asked to be white, and it was so. But then he said, “No, wait, I want to be black.” God changed him to black. Zebra wailed and said, “No, wait, I want to be white.” God sighed. He changed the zebra to black and white stripes. Even today zebra is known by his stripes.
Let us pray. Lord, may the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable in your sight, my Rock and my Redeemer.
SERMON
Last week we finished three weeks of Jesus’ instructions to his followers about being disciples. We pondered the rewards of being a disciple, a modern day prophet. It is an honor to represent God, our creator, who reaches out to us through Jesus Christ to restore relationship. Prophets often are rewarded receiving a “prophets reward,” kind of like a tip. And thirdly prophets invest in the future as people turn to Christ and become righteous, our world becomes a better place. But as we come to today’s text, John the Baptist, a prophet in his time, has been seized by Herod and put in prison. He has not yet been beheaded and has sent his men to ask if Jesus is really the one. He is not being honored, rewarded or appearing righteous in the moment. Jesus himself is not being honored as he is criticized for whom he associates with and questioned about his teachings. In fact, even we encounter trials that can challenge our faith. With that backdrop, Jesus turns to speak to the crowds, to us ordinary people. He asks us, “To what will I compare this generation?
It is like children sitting in the marketplaces
and calling to one another.”
We are no longer sheep without a shepherd but children in a marketplace. At that time, there were two living models, John and Jesus, but they were so different. We have two living, dynamic examples of faith but “it’s complicated” we might say to indicate whose camp we are in. John the Baptist called the people to repentance. He might have been classified as a “hell, fire and brimstone” preacher. Jesus, on the other hand, was critiqued for associating with sinners. “Advocacy” proponents might use him as their model. The crowd’s faith temperature seems to vary with surface circumstances. Children in the marketplace call to each other, “Come look at what I found!” They run from one captivating scene to another. Are we also sometimes white and sometimes black like zebra, running around the marketplace looking at all that is available to us today?
Jesus is using a picture from an urban setting we can identify with. My second son was in Istanbul this week and sent me a picture of the market that was so similar to the open markets in Kenya. It looked like our farmers’ markets. Vegetable stands line the walkway with little cafes and people walking along looking. Marketplaces are places with lots of energy, activity and choice. “Marketplace” has now become synonymous with finding medical insurance. But whether you want medical insurance or walk the malls for exercise or go to the mall to get out of the house, you will encounter diversity, alternatives, activity and your senses can become overloaded with choice. Like children, our “wants” often speak louder than our “needs.”
May I suggest that our religious scene in the United States is also a marketplace of denominations, worship styles, programs and gifted speakers. We often act like children. That which glitters attracts us. We are like a child standing in the cereal isle at the grocery store. We are kind of like the zebra, we don’t know if we want to be black or white
White shows the dirt but black feels awfully dark! We come to church but many times we are asking in our hearts what is in this for me. A miracle? A healing? A good, entertaining sermon? A fantastic choir? Perhaps a financial handout for the needy. We know we don’t want another sermon on money. The question in our heart might be what we can get from church rather than what we can give. Worship can become superficial.
Perhaps, though, Jesus compares us to children because children have the ability to love mother and love father, to love all sorts of friends. They can throw their arms around John the Baptist and around Jesus and the different styles don’t bother them. They have not reached the age of commitment to a single spouse. They can embrace diversity. I think of the song in South Pacific,
“You’ve got to be taught, To hate and fear,
You’ve got to be taught, From year to year, In your dear little ear
You’ve got to be carefully taught.
You’ve got to be taught to be afraid, Of people whose eyes are oddly made,
And people whose skin is a different shade, You’ve got to be carefully taught.
You’ve got to be taught before it’s too late, Before you are six or seven or eight,
To hate all the people your relatives hate, You’ve got to be carefully taught!”
But children are easily distracted and undiscerning. Like the zebra they often want to be black and to be white. The newest fad grabs their attention.
17‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance;
we wailed, and you did not mourn.’
The crowd’s response to John the Baptist or Jesus speaks to our own fickleness in going to church. It seems that churches today are trying to engage people who are shopping, that are looking for something. We use the language, “seekers.” It is easy to depend on our entertainment, our “dance.” We may not be surprised when we are rejected for a bigger church that offers more programs. We might sigh and pray for a bigger ministry but we err when we loose sight and become discouraged about who we are. Maybe if I were white, then people would come. No, probably we ought to be black. And like the zebra, we might be doubtful of who God wants us to be at this moment in our context.
So again why does Jesus compare us to children? How do children act in the marketplace? When we were in Minneapolis checking out a possible assignment we dropped our five children at the Mall of America with money. We picked them up afterwards and none had bought anything! Coming from Africa, it was all new and overwhelming to them. They spent the whole time looking, open to the new experience. They looked but did not commit. “Openness” and “curiosity” characterize a child. Jesus is sending his disciples out to places that will look very different from the synagogues in Jerusalem and they will need to be open and curious. They are going to have to be willing to try to dance to new tunes and they are going to have to be able to mourn. Children in the marketplace must decide which item is of value and which vendor is honest. They are going to have to go beyond the glitter to find the gold that God has placed in every culture. The question is not whether the zebra is black on white or white on black but whether it is alive and living out the purpose God made it for.
So if we are children in the marketplace, Jesus may be asking us in our text if we are just being entertained by church or are we open to the diversity we are being led into and are we able to love all sorts of people who are his creation. Jesus next turns to God to pray and suddenly the children become the heroes of our sermon.
“I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth,
because you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants;
Discipleship and faith is not about education and intelligence. It is not about quoting Scripture. Wisdom is important. Children have the ability of being able to run to the parent, to God, for protection, with their questions and fears, and with their doubts when they don’t know if they should be white or black as a zebra. The picture of children sitting in Jesus’ lap comes to mind and their open nonjudgmental love of him. Jesus tells his disciples, “‘Let the little children come to me, and do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of heaven belongs.’ (Matthew 19:14)”
In this text Jesus says, “Yet wisdom is vindicated by her deeds.” Children are spontaneous and transparent. When they are hurt they cry and when they are happy, they laugh. Children can be very selfish grabbing a toy for themselves and they can be very generous. Normally children are devoted to those they love. Are we as transparent in living out our faith as a child is? Children are many things but we do not think of children usually as wise. Wisdom comes from God and the work of the Holy Spirit. Wisdom comes from age, experience, and God. Like children we must learn to listen and obey.
“Come…”
I must end with the closing paragraph of our text today. It is exhausting being a child. Our eldest son would refuse ice cream for desert and curl up on the couch and go to sleep by 7 pm after a hard day of play with his village friends. The marketplace is exhausting. We often come home just plain tuckered out. Keeping up with all the family activities of a church can be exhausting too. Those tough days when we hold on to our faith by our fingertips challenge our faith and we become weary.
Our generation is not that different from the one at the time of John the Baptist. The marketplace of freedom we celebrated on the 4th this week allows the message of faith to be broadcast. But today we may actually feel exhausted trying to figure out which church best fits us or how to help our church “dance” more attractively. Jesus closes with one of the greatest promises in the Bible,
28“Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. 29Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”
The zebra could not decide if he wanted to be white or black and ended up with a bit of each. Jesus invites those of us dancing in the “white zone” and those of us mourning in the “dark zone” to come to him, not to a doctrine or a theology. We need his forgiveness when John’s message calls us to repentance. We need his grace when Jesus’ message calls us to follow him. Jesus calls us to a personal relationship that brings peace. The zebra is beautiful. You never see a skinny zebra. As we worship together with all our gifts and come to Jesus, we are beautiful too and free to appreciate each other’s uniqueness.
Let the people of God say, “Thank you, Lord!”
On the Way to Wonder 