The text for this morning’s message comes from the first Epistle of John, focusing in on the second chapter:
My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.Thus far the text.
Dear Friends in Christ, He is Risen!
You know the truth of what I’m about to tell you. If you tell a child not to do something, like, let’s say, don’t hit your sister, what’s the first thing that child is going to want to do? Hit their sister. If you tell a child, don’t take a third cookie, what are they going to want to do? Take a third cookie. If you tell a child, don’t run at the pool, inevitably, what is that child going to want to do? Run at the pool!
Doesn’t it just seem to you that there is something inherently wired within us that just seems to ALWAYS want to do exactly the opposite of what we’re told. Let’s, for the sake of argument, call this “childishness.” For this reason, I know that I would not have made a very good military man. I know this. I can just see the drill instructor yelling in my face, telling me, “Drop and give me 20!” And I’d be all, “Your mom will drop and give you twenty.” Or, “I want that floor so clean I can eat off of it!” And I’d be like, “Plates really are more sanitary and you can take them really anywhere you go.” Just for the record, I want to say I absolutely respect those men and women who serve in the military; it’s just that I’ve known since I was a child that I was a stubborn-hearted little boy and I kind of seem that I will always be that.
I mean, my wife tells me to do something at home, and almost inevitably, I will want to do the opposite. Now, at the outset, I should say Elizabeth is not very demanding of me. She’s a great wife. And when she tells me to do something, there’s usually a good reason behind it. But sometimes, when she tells me she needs me to do the dishes, I’m going to do everything in my power to stall and whine and complain and put it off and do it just on my own darn time. Childishness. Now, if she hadn’t told me to do the dishes, surprisingly, I’d be much more apt to do them on my power. But as soon as she says the words, “Do the dishes,” my stubborn, childish heart wants to do the exact opposite.
I know, I know that I’m not alone in this. I know this. I know that you are stubborn, you’re childish, too, aren’t you? I mean, come on, admit it with me. We hate when people tell us to do something. Why is it? Ultimately, we just don’t like it when people tell us what to do. We all of the sudden realize that they know something we don’t, or they see that we’re doing something wrongly, and we get embarrassed. We don’t like it when people call us out. They’ve caught us in our sin. After all, what do we confess? We have sinned in thought, word, and deed, by what we have done and by what we have left undone. That pretty much covers the gamut of sins.
Beyond that, just think about it. We sin when people catch us in sin and so we sin against them for calling us on our sin. Oh, it’s a vicious cycle.
And, honestly, we really don’t even like it that the Apostle John is calling us out in our reading for today. “My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin.” Oh, really, John. You’re writing me to tell me not to sin? Just who do you think you are anyway? So you’re an apostle, who cares? What do you know of my life, my career, my standards, my ethics, my work, my family. Just what do you know anyway, you 2000-year-old relic?
And that’s why John calls us little children. He knows us well, doesn’t he? He knows that we behave like children. I kinda think John knew us exactly. I think he knew us and hit right at home calling us his children because he had been through this as well.
“Lord, we want you to do for us whatever we ask. I want you to seat me on right and my brother on the left when you come into your kingdom.” Poor John. How childish. Jesus, give me what I want. Give it to me now. “Daddy, I want an Oompa Loompa. I want you to get me an Oompa Loompa right away! I want it now, Daddy, now!” Oy vey.
And this isn’t the only place the Scriptures point to us being like children. Remember Paul in 1 Corinthians? “When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child.”
When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. Is there anything wrong with being a child? No, of course not. In a way, you are always children. I will always be my mother’s son, my father’s son. You will always be their daughter or son. Your children will always be your children. And certainly, you may, if you are a Christian, call yourself, for you are, God’s child. But to be childish, to have childishness, it’s a phase that all of us go through and a phase we must leave behind. If you’re sitting here as an adult, you were once a child. And if you’re not an adult, you’re a child. It’s okay to be a child. It’s NOT okay to not grow out of being childish. “But when I became a man, I put away childish ways.”
Your childishness, your propensity to be an immature little being who doesn’t know right from wrong, who doesn’t know what you do hurts others, who doesn’t know that what you do hurts God, that what you do hurts yourself, this childishness causes you to sin and that’s not good. Sin is not good. Lust, adultery, anger, malice, blasphemy, harlotry, theft, brazenness, hatred, lewdness: these are childish things, these are very sinful things. Our world then is not in a good way.
But what John is writing to us here, it removes us from the world, it removes us from the effects of the world, for John doesn’t just leave us as children. Instead, he expects his children to hear these words, these words that propel us forward into maturity and adulthood. He expects us to put aside our childish ways. These words changes lives. And they change lives immediately.
“But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.” There’s a way to get through sin. There’s a way out of childishness. There’s a way out of immaturity. And that’s in Christ, not by your own works. See, John knows that we will continue to sin. He knows that we will continue to hurt God and hurt others and hurt ourselves. He knows that we will be stubborn, lying, blaspheming, adulterers. It doesn’t make it right. But John knows that these things will happen. And he tells us of the way through: Jesus Christ advocates for us. He is our friend; He’s been in our place. He’s our lawyer; He knows our sins, after all He died for them. He is our brother; He is THE Son, but we are sons and daughters of the King of Heaven.
And that is why this is an appropriate second week of Easter sermon. This was only done in the life, death, and resurrection of our Lord. Only through His life did Christ live perfectly for us on our behalf, the benefit of that perfection did He graciously grant to us. Only through Christ’s death are all our sins crucified and killed. And only through His resurrection are we given the seal of our forgiveness in the promise of eternally living with Christ in our glorified bodies.
Knowing this, believing this, it is the only thing that matters. In fact, if you don’t believe this, then there’s really not much of a point to coming to church, is there? If you don’t believe in the Resurrection of Christ, then you might as well be just as served by going out an enjoying the nice weather we’ve been having this last month. You don’t get to heaven just by coming to church. Thinking this way is childish. You get to heaven by believing on the name of Jesus, the one who lived, died, and was resurrected for you. You don’t get yourself into heaven. Thinking this way is childish. You don’t obey certain laws, you don’t earn your way, you’re not a good enough person, you don’t do it on your own! Thinking this way is childish!
What is mature, what is adult, what is right is believing that Jesus Christ, as John says, “is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.” This means that Jesus turned away the wrath of God from us and put it on Himself. That means that Jesus took away a legalism that wants to reassert itself at every possibility and puts us on a path of righteousness that HE earned. This means that Jesus Christ died for the whole world, every single person, every single sinner, because He desires that all men would be saved. But this also means, that while we are yet sinners and God died for us, we may reject Him. We may be childish and petulant.
God in Christ Jesus died for you; believe in the Gospel. No! I don’t want to! I want to do it my way! I want to do things the way that I want to do them!
Dear friends, this type of childish faith does not get you to heaven. Your stubborn hearts want to get in the way of your salvation. And yet, Jesus says, “Let the little children come to Me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven.” So, what children is Jesus talking about? What kind of children does Christ desire to come to Him?
Jesus desires little children, like little Shaylynn, this morning. It’s not that Jesus only wants INFANTS to come to Him through the waters of baptism, though He certainly does. Jesus welcomes all children to come to Him, whether they are an hour old or 110 years old. No, age doesn’t matter to Christ. He has saved all people. So, it is not age, but rather, Jesus desires that all men, all humanity, come to Him through these same waters of baptism. Why? Because a child, someone completely passive, someone who gives everything up to the one who is baptizing them, is so easy to drown, so easy to kill.
And make no mistake, my friends, Jesus is out to kill you. He is out to drown that Old Adam, that old sinner, that lives in us, because in His life, death, and resurrection, Jesus made it clear that He is the New Adam, the true Adam, the better Adam, and there is no room in our hearts for both the Old and the New Adams. Jesus must kill that Old Adam, Jesus must kill you, in order to save you and raise you up to new life. Jesus must kill you to give you new life. He did this in your baptism and He continues to do this daily for you in your repentant faith. And He does this because only those that are dead can be raised as children of the heavenly Father. Only those who are killed can be made re-alive.
And this morning, Jesus drowned little Shaylynn, Jesus drowned this little sinner, Jesus drowned this little child. For make no mistake, Shaylynn is a sinner just as each and every one of us are. But Jesus doesn’t leave it there. Jesus doesn’t leave us in our little childhoods. No, instead, Jesus raises Shaylynn and us up out of death and into life. He gives Shaylynn and us true faith. He gives Shaylynn and us true life. He makes us all His children, who then grow up into being His adults, His mature Christians. Jesus gives us all that we need in this life for He gives us Himself, in the waters of baptism, through His preached and proclaimed Word through His servants, and in the very body and blood He grants us through His supper.
So, while we are yet sinners, we are also saints. While we sin, we are also forgiven. While we are children, we are also growing in Christ. While we were yet sinners, God in Christ Jesus died for us that we may be made His own.
Dear friends, your childishness did not stop Jesus from going to the cross to die for you. He went regardless. But childishness is still childishness. It is still sinful. Repent and believe the Gospel. Do not throw it back in Jesus' face like people who desire to win heaven for themselves. Rather, by faith, by that faith granted to you in your baptisms and that faith that is strengthened in the Lord’s Supper, grasp onto Jesus’ death and resurrection, that gift that comes through the cross by the waters of baptism and the body and blood of Christ in the Supper. Make it yours, for it is indeed a gift of grace through faith, granted to you by the Holy Spirit, through the very power of the death and resurrection of Christ. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
Now may the peace that passes all understanding, guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord. Amen.
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