Skip to main content

The Prints Of An Alive Church




         If you come to the building early enough on Monday (you have to be early, things get cleaned up around here pretty fast.) you will notice that there are most always little handprints on the front door.  The young ones are not tall enough to reach the push bar, and leave behind the marks.  You may think that they are a stain but I come to understand that those smudges are prints of a living church. 
         Children at times may seem like a hindrance to worship. They fidget, they fuss, they might make a mess.  You may think that baby’s cry is an annoyance but it really is the heartbeat of the church.  Without those cries, a church is beginning to die.  Show me a church with no sounds of children, no marks of little hands and I will show you a church that will soon be fighting for it’s very life. In those children are the faith of the future, the love of the present and the hope of the past. They show us the church isn’t just about us, the desires of the here and now. It is the legacy before us and the impression we make for the future.
         We need to remember how valuable our young ones are to church.  Like the disciples in Matthew 19:13-14, we may be tempted to push them away  It says, “Then some children were brought to Him so that He might lay His hands on them and pray; and the disciples rebuked them”.  But Jesus said, "Let the children alone, and do not hinder them from coming to Me; for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these." Jesus recognized that children are a living example of what the church needs to be. Without them, we lose a perceptive on the kingdom of God that the body desperately needs.
We need to do everything we can to encourage and support those with young children, so they will know how important they and their children are to the worship.  There are already so many difficulties for parents trying to worship with children.  We want to be of assistance to them and never do anything that might make them think it would be best for them to be away. 

Labels

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Until Midnight

    In Acts 20, there is the tragicomic event surrounding a young man by the name of Eutychus. He did what a lot of folks before and after him did, he fell asleep during a sermon. Unfortunately, he was setting in in the third story window at the time. So instead of nodding off and hitting the pew in front of him, he fell to his death. The good news was the apostle Paul was delivering the sermon and had the ability to bring him back.       I don’t know, however, if we can judge Eutychus too harshly. The sermon had gone on till midnight. Paul wouldn’t finish it up till daybreak. That’s a long lesson. I know some folks that might want to jump out of a window if I had a lesson that long, yet these Christians wanted to be there to hear Paul.   Don’t get me wrong, I’m not pushing for all night sermons but I think we might need to adopt these folks' dedication. They knew that Paul was only in town for a limited time only and they were determined to ...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Mighty Gulf

  It is hard to get people on two sides of an issue to come together. Each has their own viewpoint, their perceptive, their own foibles, their own understanding.  To gain any common ground there must be something in common. Something or someone that can bridge the gulf between the two.   Could there be a greater gulf than there was between God and man? How could a holy perfect God find a way to connect to the fallen, imperfect mankind? How can one without temptation connect to those who are beset by it? How could limited mortal beings understand an omnipotent eternal God?   In 1 Timothy 2:5, we read, “ For there is one God, and one mediator also between God and men, the man Christ Jesus .” The phrase mediator here describes a person that bridges the gap, a go-between. Jesus was one who could stand in both worlds. A perfect holy one who can understand our temptations, a man who would die yet live eternally, One who was God yet became flesh and dwelt among us. ...
Post a Comment
Read more

You Are Not Getting Away With It

  It is hard to find a place in New York City to park unless you are a United Nations diplomat. They park wherever they want.   It’s not that they are allowed to but their diplomatic immunity keeps them from paying the cost. In one year alone the diplomats racked up 143,508 parking summonses, which would have cost them $15.8 million. Yet, because of the immunity, the punishments they incur are not enforced. So, they tend to park very badly   Solomon recognized this tendency. In Ecclesiastes 8:11he writes; “ Because the sentence against an evil deed is not executed quickly, therefore the hearts of the sons of men among them are given fully to do evil .” If we do not pay for our wrongs quickly, we tend to think they are OK.  This however is a terrible practice to have in our lives. In Romans 2:4-6, Paul warns us about the danger when we look at God’s tolerance and patience of our sin as acceptance. He warns it will make things worse for us in judgment since God wi...
Post a Comment
Read more