Loved as a Child

PROPERS: 3 EASTER, YEAR B

TEXT:       1 JOHN 3:1-7

PREACHED AT RESURRECTION, STARKVILLE, ON SUNDAY, APRIL 14, 2024 

 

ONE SENTENCE:        The joy of being God’s child is not burdened with the aspects of our human relationships.

 

            Being a parent is not easy. Neither is being a child.

 

            I speak from experience, having been both a child and a parent.

 

            I know that the respective roles of parent and child are frequently idealized.  But let’s be honest – sometimes those roles are complicated by extraneous factors. Rabbi Edwin Friedman dealt with that tendency in his excellent book, Generation to Generation.

 

            Sometimes the relationship between parent and child is placid and ideal. There are no outside factors.  To be sure, we love our children… maybe even in spite of ourselves.

 

            But sometimes there are outside influences – influences handed down from our parents, grandparents, and generations before.  The brokenness that has infected earlier relations seem to magically show up in our relationships.  It’s not evil – it’s just normal to us.  It is what we experienced in our formative years.

 

            Sometimes those tendencies are benign or maybe even beneficial.  The tendency to be studious. A striving toward outstanding performance academically, athletically, or relationally. We treasure and value those tendencies.

 

            However, there are darker tendencies that we hand on from generation to generation. Genetic health issues. Problems with anger. Issues with intimacy. A tendency toward addiction.

 

            As a friend observed, “We come here prewired.” Maybe. Maybe not.

 

            So all of that burdens the imagery we see in the First Letter of John today – we are called children of God, for that is what we are.

 

            With the complexities many of us have known as children, we don’t know what that means.  We don’t know how to see ourselves as children. And the metaphor of God as Father or Mother is loaded, because of earlier relationships.

 

            I must admit that my relationship with my parents was not ideal.  I brought some baggage from that experience to the role of parent to my two children. I love them, but I am not ideal.  It was hard for me to see myself as a child of Godthrough the experiences of being a child or being a parent.

 

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            Then I had a bolt from the blue – 11 years ago, and nine years ago.  The birth of two grandsons – Wilt and Harris. (Wilt has asked if I ever mentioned him in a sermon, now I can tell him I have!)

 

            Those of you who have grandchildren and those of you who are grandchildren know what I am saying.  There is utter delight in those two boys. I am always glad to see them.  Our relationship is uncomplicated.  There is absolute joy in their existence.

 

            It struck me that that is how God views me as his child – a delight in his eyes.  A joy in my existence.

 

            That is how God views each of you, as well. Regardless of what you have done.  No matter your successes or failures. The roads you have traveled, the broken relationships – they do not matter.

 

            God loves you as a child. Never forget that.