This morning we want to celebrate children. What would life be without them?
The parents of one rowdy little fellow were trying to decide what to give him for his birthday. Dad suggested a bike.
"Do you think that perhaps that will improve his behavior?" Mom asked hopefully.
"I doubt it," Dad said realistically. "But at least it will spread it over a wider area." Children can be a pain, but they are also a pleasure. They look at life in such a different way.
Expecting her third child, one mother tells how her two children were suggesting names for the baby.
"Well, if it's a boy," said the oldest child, "can we name him John?"
"Maybe," said the mother.
"Well, if it's a girl," she went on, "can we name her Mary?"
"Maybe."
Finally, the youngest child, anxious to prove her intelligence, piped up, "Well, if it is a dog, Mom, can we name it Lassie?" (1)
A grandmother took her grandson to St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York City. She showed him various parts of that magnificent structure. Finally, they arrived at the altar. "Under here," she said, "is where all the cardinals are buried."
He looked in amazement and asked, "You mean the whole team?"
Thirty-five years ago a movie was made, "The Night of the Hunter." It's about two children fleeing their murderous stepfather, a selfordained preacher who has "Love" tattooed on one of his fingers and "Hate" tattooed on another. The children unwittingly have with them $10,000 hidden in the little girl's doll.
Down a river the brother and sister float in a skiff. They are safer under the sky than under the roof that was supposed to shelter them. Eventually they arrive at the home of an old woman who has taken in other orphans of the storm. She describes herself as a tree with many branches. In the end, she defeats the preacher. Her gun is the immediate reason; her goodness is the ultimate one.
"My soul is humble when I see the way little ones accept their lot," the old woman says as all the orphans of the storm gather round her Christmas tree. "Lord save little children," she says. "The winds blow and the rains are cold, yet they abide." (2)
Lord, save the children. That's a prayer we could pray today. IT'S A DANGEROUS WORLD OUT THERE FOR CHILDREN.
It is estimated that 2.4 million children are physically abused every year. They are kicked, punched, beaten, stabbed, and at times, even shot. One estimate suggests that in Boston alone there are 40,000 kids who have been sexually assaulted before they reach their sixteenth birthdays. Lord, save the children. (3)
UNESCO estimates that there are about 40 million street kids around the world. Forty million. That's about the combined population of California and New York. These kids are working at such jobs as selling papers or shining shoes to escape the poverty and hunger. They live in doorways and under bridges and even in junk cars.
Then there are those displaced by war and famine. How our hearts ache for the children of Bangladesh, and Ethiopia and the Kurdish children in Iraq. It's a dangerous world out there for children.
Of course, not all hurts are physical. Every year, 2 million kids in this country discover that their parents are getting divorced. And that hurts as well. It's a dangerous world out there for children. That's a hard truth that we must confront.
FOR, AFTER OUR COMMITMENT TO CHRIST, OUR NUMBER ONE RESPONSIBILITY IS TO OUR CHILDREN. This is a spiritual principle we need to understand. Jesus raised children to an exalted level of importance when he said, "Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me; and whoever receives me, receives not me but him who sent me." Our number one responsibility is to our children! That responsibility even supersedes our responsibility to our parents.
In the movie "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?" there is a great exchange between Dr. John Wade Prentice (played by Sidney Poitier) and Dr. Prentice's father. The father is trying to convince his son to see things his way and resorts to reminding his son what the son owes him. Mr. Prentice points out that he carried a mailbag 75,000 miles and mowed yards in the dark to earn the money to support him. He reminds his son that his wife did without many necessities too so that the money could go to get her son an education.
Dr. Prentice replies, "You tell me...what I owe to you for what you've done for me. Let me tell you something. I owe you nothing; if you carried that bag a million miles, you did what you were supposed to dobecause you brought me into this world and from that day, you owed me everything you could ever do for melike I will owe my son if I ever have another."
We may not like his tone of voice, but essentially Dr. Prentice is correct. The apostle Paul put it like this, "For children are not responsible to save up for their parents, but parents for their children."
Robert Raines tells a beautiful story about a young man named David who left home for the first time. From the age of seven he had lived with his uncle and aunt, who sold fruit at a peddler's stand. They had loved and cared for him. He stood on the train platform getting ready to leave. He grabbed the rough hands of his peddleruncle and said, "How can I ever begin to repay you for what you've done for me!"
His uncle spoke: "David, there's a saying, `The love of parents goes to their children, but the love of these children goes to their children.'"
"But," David protested: "That's not so. I'll always be trying to...."
And then the aunt interrupted, "David, what your Uncle Asher means is that a parent's love isn't to be paid back; it can only be passed on." (4) Our first responsibility is to our children. This does not mean that we do not have responsibility for our parents. We do. But our children come first.
A mother comes to her pastor with a familiar problem. "Dad needs someone to look after him," she says. "He has become very difficult to deal with. If I bring him into our home, the effect on my children and upon my marriage could be devastating. What should I do?" The pastor's answer was this: Your first responsibility is to your children, then your spouse, then to your parents. Whenever we forget that rule, there are problems. Our first responsibility is for our children!
Well, WHAT ARE OUR RESPONSIBILITIES TO OUR CHILDREN? They are twofold. First of all, it is to provide them with a safe world. That's basic, isn't it? They deserve a safe, secure world. Unfortunately, we are not doing so well with this responsibility.
Suppose, for example, the so-called Green House Effect is real? We know the rain forests are disappearing at an annual rate equal to the size of Pennsylvania. The loss of the rain forests results in an increase of carbon dioxide. This supposedly is causing average temperatures to rise. The four hottest years in recorded history have occurred since 1979. Will the polar ice caps begin melting before long and the oceans begin rising? Will there be extensive droughts as the experts are saying? Each year the world's deserts grow by as much as 16,000 square miles. We don't know what the future holds, but we are talking about things that could occur in the lifetimes of our children. We better be serious about finding answers.
Richard Johnson tells of an event that occurred in his wife's home village in the South of France. She remembers when several motorists were killed after a bridge collapsed near her village. A man had been dredging and selling sand from the riverbed. He had removed too much sand near the pillars holding up the bridge. This was thought to be a contributing factor in the bridge's collapse. Among those killed was a motorcyclist. He was the sand dredger's own son! (5)
Is this a parable of the fate of our children? Will we so despoil the planet with our greed that they will be unintended victims? I don't have the answers, but it is an issue we must address. There is a Kenyan proverb that goes like this: "Treat the Earth well. It was not given to you by your parents. It was loaned to you by your children." Lord, save the children.
A safe and secure world. Do we think that our children will be spared the problems of the growing crime rate or the despair of the inner cities? Do we think that the continuing threat of political unrest throughout the world will not affect them? Think how many Americans were affected by the Gulf War. Do we really believe that every trouble spot will be as easily dealt with as Iraq? What about our deteriorating schools? There is a shortsightedness on the part of many people today, a stinginess, even a mean-spiritedness that says, as long as I get mine, who cares about the future? But what about the children? We owe to them a safe and secure world.
We also owe to them a safe and secure home. They need to know that Mom and Dad are committed to one another and to them. They need to know that someone will always be there for them. They need to know that they are recognized and special. If that means that we delay or even discard some of our own dreams, if that means we make some extra sacrifices, if that means we sometimes grin and bear a difficult situation, so be it! Their welfare comes first!
We can't keep them from making tragic mistakes, and we can't keep them from making wrong decisions. All we can do is give them the proper environment. The rest is up to them.
Someone once compared it to what often happens at a small town airport as small planes set out on their journey at night. As the plane heads its nose down the runway, an attendant turns the switch and a pencil of light is thrown along the path of the plane. The plane makes its way along that thread of light until it rises gracefully from the ground. The attendant then switches off this beam of light. He has done all he can dohe has helped the pilot off to a good start. And this is about all that parents can do for their youthget them off to a good start, and trust to a kindly Providence to give them a safe landing at the end. (6)
Lord, save the children. It's a dangerous world out there. But we can make it safer. That is our first responsibility in lifeto provide every child with a safe world and a secure home. "Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me; and whoever receives me, receives not me but him who sent me." Thank God for children. May we always do right by them.
1. A CELEBRATION OF AMERICAN FOLKLORE, (New York: Panteon Books, 1982).
2. NEW YORK TIMES, 122288, p. C2, "Close to Home" by Mary Cantwell.
3. Fred Hartley, DARE TO BE DIFFERENT, (Old Tappan, New Jersey: Fleming H. Revell Company, 1980).
4. Robert Raines, CREATIVE BROODING, (New York: MacMillan, 1966), pp. 102-103.
5. LIFE AS IT AIN'T YET: MEDITATIONS FOR LIVING NOW, (St Louis, Missouri: CBP Press, 1988).
6. Cited by Dr. Eugene Brice.