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    Apr 06, 2025

    I Won't Grow Up

    I Won't Grow Up

    Passage: Luke 18:15-17

    Speaker: Patrick Lafferty

    Series: Worthy: His Worth, and a Life Worthy of Him

    Spend enough time with small children and you might suddenly appreciate more the company of adults. But among those who may have left childhood behind, something of value might’ve been lost, too. Of late we’ve heard from the author of Hebrews his warning about a life of childish stuntedness. This week we hear Jesus offer another warning–this time of forsaking childlikeness for so-called adulthood. As Dan Fogelberg once sang, “part of the heart gets lost in the journey, somewhere along the road.” Only one kind of heart fits in the Kingdom of whom Jesus is the head–the heart of a child. Let’s see what that might mean.

    CENTRAL TEXT:  Luke 18:15-17

    15 Now they were bringing even infants to him that he might touch them. And when the disciples saw it, they rebuked them. 16 But Jesus called them to him, saying, “Let the children come to me, and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God. 17 Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it.”

     

    PRAYER/SCRIPTURE READING/CONFESSION OF FAITH:     Hebrews 5:7-6:3

    LEADER:   In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverence. 8 Although he was a son, he learned obedience through what he suffered. 9 And being made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him, 10 being designated by God a high priest after the order of Melchizedek.

    About this we have much to say, and it is hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing. 12 For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food, 13 for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child. 14 But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.

    Therefore let us leave the elementary doctrine of Christ and go on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God, 2 and of instruction about washings, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment. 3 And this we will do if God permits. 

    The Word of the Lord

    ALL:   Thanks be to God

     

    BENEDICTION:    1 John 3:1

    LEADER:     See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are.

     

    RELATED SCRIPTURES:

    • Isaiah 65:1
    • Matthew 7:7-11
    • James 4:2

     

    DISCUSSION QUESTIONS: 

    1. From what you’ve been told or could remember, were you a more or less behaved child? Memory of some moment representative of that characterization? Why might you have leaned in that direction rather than the other?
    2. Try to steel-man the response of the disciples to the gaggle of children who sought to surround Jesus. What might they have thought that would lead to that protective measure?
    3. In the sermon we said children are models and masters of two inclinations essential to a mature faith: approach and appeal. What did we mean by each? Why are they fundamental to almost everything else that follows from following Jesus? Why do find ourselves having “unlearned” what children didn’t need to be taught?
    4. How does the news of Jesus–who He is and what He has done–mean to preserve and nurture those inclinations in us?

     

    ILLUSTRATIONS:  

    Apr 6, 2025

     

    QUOTES:  

    • Joy at the start 
      Fear in the journey 
      Joy in the coming home 
      A part of the heart 
      Gets lost in the learning 
      Somewhere along the road.
      - “Along the Road,” Dan Fogelberg

     

    • "all whose taste is schooled to the things above, who ponder the realities of heaven, who live with circumspection in this world, taking care not to offend God, who are wary of committing sin, but if they do sin are not ashamed to confess it, …all who are humble, gentle, holy, just, devout and good—all these belong to the one city whose king is Christ."
      - St Augustine

     

    • Those that would be rich in grace must betake themselves to the poor trade of begging, and they shall find it a thriving trade.
      - Matthew Henry

    • Expect great things from God, attempt great things for God.
      - William Carey

    • Parents should consider that they owe obedience to God, and that, above all, they should earnestly and faithfully discharge the duties of their office, not only to provide for the material support of their children, servants, subjects, etc., but especially to bring them up to the praise and honor of God. Therefore do not imagine that the parental office is a matter of your pleasure and whim. It is a strict commandment and injunction of God, who holds you accountable for it. The trouble is that no one perceives or heeds this. Everybody acts as if God gave us children for our pleasure and amusement, gave us servants merely to put them to work like cows or asses, and gave us subjects to treat them as we please, as if it were no concern of ours what they learn or how they live.  No one is willing to see that this is the command of the divine Majesty, who will solemnly call us to account and punish us for its neglect, nor is it recognized how very necessary it is to devote serious attention to the young. If we want qualified and capable men for both civil and spiritual leadership, we must spare no effort, time, and expense in teaching and educating our children to serve God and mankind. We must not think only of amassing money and property for them. God can provide for them and make them rich without our help, as indeed he does daily. But he has given and entrusted children to us with the command that we train and govern them according to his will; otherwise God would have no need of father and mother. Therefore let everybody know that it is his chief duty, on pain of losing divine grace, to bring up his children in the fear and knowledge of (tr-631) God, and if they are gifted to give them opportunity to learn and study so that they may be of service wherever they are needed.
      - Martin Luther,       Large Catechism

    • [G.K. Chesterton writes,] “For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony … for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we.” Adulthood often strips us of something that we were meant to be—creative beings who see a world of sameness through imaginative eyes. In losing the joy of routine, we diminish our capacity for knowing and reflecting our God, who reveals himself in the small rhythms of daily life.
      - Anne Kerhoulas

     

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