The King's Children
Christ, our King • Sermon • Submitted
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· 85 viewsWhy the kingdom belongs to those with child-like faith
Notes
Transcript
Introduction
Introduction
This morning, I wanted to introduce our fall series of messages. Over the next 10 weeks or so, we are going to be looking at what it means to make Christ, Lord and King of our hearts and how we can live for His Kingdom. For modern believers, these terms may seem a bit formal and maybe even unfamiliar to us but they are central to our understanding of biblical Christianity. Unfortunately, often times in our effort to present a more palatable gospel, we talk about Jesus being our savior, or our friend, but it’s rare to talk about Christ as our King. Discussions about kings and kingdoms seem so much like a fairly tale and divorced from the reality of life and perhaps this is precisely why Jesus says “Unless you become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven and the kingdom belong to the children.” Given the fact that this is Bless our Schools Sundays and we’ve spent the weekend praying for children in the city along with our kids in our church, this is actually a perfect introduction to our entire series.
At that time the disciples came to Jesus, saying, “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” And calling to him a child, he put him in the midst of them and said, “Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.
“Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me, but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea.
Then children were brought to him that he might lay his hands on them and pray. The disciples rebuked the people, but Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven.” And he laid his hands on them and went away.
We know that the central theme of the four gospels is the kingdom of God. To that end, every reputable theologian, academian, and bible scholar would generally agree to this fact. Not everyone would accept Jesus as their king but it’s hard to refute that this is the primary subject that Jesus came to teach us. We are told to make the kingdom of God, the priority in our prayers. This is why the first supplication in the Lord’s prayer is “Your kingdom come, your will be done.” Christians are commanded to seek the kingdom of God first above everything else. We are also told that this kingdom is being prepared for those who believe and that the King will return one day to fully establish his rule and reign. There are parables after parables that disclose the mystery of the kingdom. And yet despite the centrality of this message, it’s largely dismissed as being irrelevant in our modern world and that we need to address more pertinent topics. But before we can tackle any of these other subjects, I believe a proper relationship with Christ the King is precisely what we need to talk about in the church today.
As our nation begins to fracture politically, we see Christians dividing along the same lines. As the world struggles to get the coronavirus under control, we find ourselves fearful and divided about how best to respond. As unthinkable world events start to unfold, Christians are again divided on how to interpret these signs. Sadly, everything that has happened in the last 6 months has served to divide the church rather than unite it and in a time when our unity matters the most, we have fallen short. Not to despair, there is still time for us to put the pieces of our brokenness together and become a witness of God’s love to the world but in order to do that, we first have to establish Christ as the king of our hearts and head of the church.
In the book of Judges, we see that the main cause of division in human society is a lack of a king. Near the end of the book, the people of Israel find themselves picking up the pieces of a divided nation after a brutal civil war and the last verse of Judges summarizes the reason for the conflict.
In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes.
A good, loving, benevolent king serves to unite people of a kingdom together. Even today, we see the reverence and homage given to imperfect leaders like the king of Thailand or the emperor of Japan. These figure heads don’t have political power but they still serve as a focal point of national pride and unity in these countries. And if that is the case for the kingdoms of the world, how much more should Christians revere and unite around the very King of heaven who has all power, dominion, and authority. Could it be that the division that we are experiencing in churches across the nation is because we have forgotten this remarkable King that we bow our knees to? And so my hope for this series of messages is that you would meet Jesus in such a profound way that He would be king over your life and secondly, that we would align ourselves to His purpose, His vision, His will as opposed to our own.
If there is any chance of Christians becoming united through these tumultuous times, it will only come as we acknowledge Christ as the King of kings, that every nation belongs to Him and our political stances are secondary to that. He is the King of history, nothing happens without his permission and decree, so even this coronavirus serves His purpose. He is King of the church and we exist to serve Him and our personal opinions about what church should or should not be doesn’t really matter. But before we tackle those bigger topics, we need to address the prerequisite conditions for life in the Kingdom and this is where our children serve as a real living example of what we need to become if we are to live for the King. There are two main points I want to draw out from the passages that we read today.
Child-like humility is required to enter the kingdom of God.
Jesus bestows every child with honor.
When we look at our children, hopefully you are able to see both the good and the bad qualities about them. As parents we can’t afford to ignore the bad things about out kids such as their selfishness, stubbornness, and sinful behavior. That is the responsibility of godly parents to correct and guide their children in the ways of the Lord and ultimately bring them to salvation. But we also know that it’s not all bad and that there are good things, some very good things, that our children can teach us.
NT theologian DA Carson points out this fact in his commentary on Matthew where he writes:
“The child is a model, in this context, not of innocence, faith, or purity, but of humility and unconcern for social status. Jesus assumed that people are not naturally like that; they must change to become like little children.”
And this is what Jesus is highlighting to the disciples as they ask Him the question of who is the greatest in the kingdom. Even after walking with Jesus for nearly 3 years, his closest followers were still arguing about who would hold the higher status after Jesus establishes His rule. And it probably didn’t help that right before this conversation, three of the disciples went up to the Mount of Transfiguration and saw Jesus in all of His glory talking with Moses and Elijah. Could you imagine the conversations after an encounter like that?
I’m sure that Peter, James, and John were really excited about what they had just experienced and the other 9 disciples, who missed out, instead of being genuinely happy for them, they are probably jealous, maybe a little insecure, and wondering where there place is in this new kingdom that Jesus is promising. And it’s usually from this place of insecurity, comparison, and the fear of missing out, where we derive so much of our discontentment, unhappiness, and our unhealthy ambition.
In the adult world, we are always trying to measure each other up, to see what the pecking order of life is. Almost subconsciously, we scan the people around us to see who is the smartest, the most put together, the most successful. We wonder why we don’t have what others have. Even in church, we try to evaluate who is the most spiritual, who has the most bible knowledge, even who cares the most about social issues. It’s no wonder we are so unhappy because when you are constantly competing against others, you cannot be genuinely happy for them but more importantly, you will never be happy with yourself.
This past week, I had a chance to go to a small retreat with the west coast AMI lead pastors and Pastor Keith, who is the head our group of churches, asked a very BTS like question. He asked each of us if we truly loved ourselves and if you don’t get the reference, a key message of BTS is that you have to love yourself. I never thought that I would ever hear my pastor ask this question because it seems so worldly but he was asking the question in the context of “Do you love yourself, apart from your performance, your accomplishments, your status, the size of your ministry. In other words, do you love yourself unconditionally as God loves you in Christ?” And the answer to that question for most people in their 30s and 40s is an unequivocal, no! We are too wrapped up in competing and comparing ourselves against others and that is a problem because if we cant’ love ourselves as God loves us then it’s virtually impossible to love others in that way.
The pursuit of worldly greatness robs us of experiencing genuine love and ironically the happiness that we all say that way we want. Think of when you were the happiest in life, it was probably when you were a child, laughing with your friends, enjoying time with your family, absorbed in whatever caught your attention. When children grow up in a somewhat stable homes, they don’t worry about their social status. They don’t wonder why their parents don’t have a BMW or Mercedes, they don’t care about the size of their home, they aren’t consumed by the rankings of their elementary school, because they are not concerned by what others think about them. The only thing that they care about is that they have loving parents who care for them. That is it! That is the bottom line.
And so when Jesus tells us that we cannot enter the kingdom of God unless we have this childlike humility before God, he is asking for an improbable if not an impossible change of heart. Where we don’t put our hopes and happiness on anything else but the fact that God our Father loves us and He sent his Son to demonstrate that love for us. That is the heart of the gospel and adults simply cannot become like this unless there is radical transformation, which the Bible describes as being born again.
When Nicodemus, the religious leader, comes to see if Jesus is the real deal, he begins the conversation by testing the waters.
This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.” Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.” Nicodemus said to him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?”
And Jesus cuts right to the chase and tells Nicodemus, you cannot even see the kingdom, let alone enter it unless you are born again. And some of us today will have the very same objections that Nicodemus makes, “How can anyone be born again? How can we start over in life? And see the world with the eyes of a child? And Jesus would tell us, “You can’t do it but the Spirit of God can! The Spirit blows wherever He wants and He radically transforms hearts as He moves.” And maybe this morning, you are not there yet but you are convicted of the fact that you are driven by selfish ambition, living for social status, concerned only about how you can get ahead in life. That is the Holy Spirit working in you and all you need to is ask the Lord to change your heart and to turn it back to Him. That is a good but also a dangerous prayer.
Now, we know that as the only begotten Son of God, Jesus embodied this child-like humility. He had no need to compete or to compare himself with anyone, after all there is no comparison and no competition. Therefore social status and the worldly pursuit of greatness meant nothing to him. And that is the freedom that He offers to us as the adopted children of God. We don’t have to follow what the world considers to be the right path to greatness, we are free to follow the path of God, the path of true greatness.
And its because Jesus had no concern for social cache, he freely associated with people and causes that did not benefit his social status. One of those causes, was Jesus love for children. In the second passage from Matthew, we see that Jesus bestows honor to every child. And this may seem like no big deal in our current culture but the honor that Jesus gave to children during his earthly ministry was unheard of in his time. The Roman Empire was known during that time for its cruelty to children. Infants that were born with physical defects, or seemed weak, or the wrong gender could be left outside to die from exposure with no criminal penalty. Children were brutalized, sexualized, and murdered on a whim.
For Jesus to take a child and to proclaim that the kingdom of God belongs to the children was a statement against the injustice faced by the most helpless members of society, that they are every bit as important as adults. If we are going to talk about being a voice to the voiceless, the rights of children have to be near the top of that discussion. Every year millions of children die of preventable diseases caused by malnutrition and lack of clean water, an untold and unknown number are enslaved, trafficked, and sold for less money than your new phone. And during this pandemic, countless children are being abused behind closed doors where no teacher, friend, or neighbor can help.
Perhaps the most telltale sign of the world’s attitude towards children are the millions of babies that are aborted worldwide. And I am not naive enough to think that this doesn’t happen in our churches but we are here for you, no matter what has happened. If you are ever on the verge of ending a pregnancy, talk to a good Christian friend, and know that there are viable ways for you to choose life. I know that in this day and age, it is not the popular position to ask women to choose life but I’ve seen the beautiful children of women who decided to give their babies as a priceless gift to a trusted couple.
As a church, we are called to follow the example of Christ and to honor our children and the children in this city. Again it may not be the most glamorous or worthy of attention on social media but it is important work because the kingdom of God belongs to these children.
“Children are not a distraction from more important work. They are the most important work.”
“Children are not a distraction from more important work. They are the most important work.”