This past year I have been extremely blessed by my church.
After I got back from a mission trip with my church last summer, I was asked to help out with our children’s ministry.
I was a little hesitant to make the commitment but I finally decided to be a leader with Judy, one of my friends from the trip.
We got the chance to hang out with 3-10 kindergarteners each week starting last August and ending a couple weeks ago.
So I was extremely blessed to work with these kindergarteners.
I think I learned more from them than they learned from me.
Let me share with you a couple comments that I remember my kids saying this past year.
Me:
If you notice someone in your class being left out during playtime what can you do?
One of my kids:
Go play with them and share my toys.
Me: What would you do if you knew that someone was hungry and didn’t have food?
One of my kids: I would share my food with them.
I am guessing that I didn’t knock anyone’s socks off with those comments.
When I look back and read them I am realizing that they are actually pretty simple answers.
There is nothing flashy, no bells and whistles, no fireworks to the answers, just a child’s simple solution to the problem.
It makes so much sense to a child that if someone needs something and you have it, share with them.
This is just one example of the simple yet amazing answers to some of the difficult problems in the world today.
Every week I got the chance to hear these comments and these kids just rocked me with their simplicity and honesty.
I want to share with you something that our kids have been doing at our “church”.
Let me give you a quick summary.
For about two months or so we have been planning this event at “church” called Hope Walks.
To sum it up, the children of our “church” are leading the “church” in a walk to raise money.
The money that is raised is going to help a community that we have a relationship with in the Congo.
The money will be given to HEAL Africa which is a program that provides medical care, food, agricultural programs, job and skills training, and counseling for men, women, and children.
So today the children of my community lead about 2000-3000 people in a walk to raise money.
I missed it because I had to meet with another “church” for work, but I made it back to where the walk was taking place.
The walk took place around one of Minnesota’s amazing 10,000 lakes.
There was a huge BBQ for more fundraising, along with a dunk tank, face painting, and a slip n slide among many other things.
After the BBQ we had our service outside on a hill by the lake.
Tonight we talked about kids and Jesus’ view on children.
In Matthew 18:3, Jesus says,
“I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”
In Luke 18:17 Jesus says,
“I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.”
After reading this, I believe that there is definitely something about children that Jesus thinks is so important for us to be or do.
I don’t know what it is.
Is it there honesty? Simplicity? Curiosity? Openness? Ability to trust?
It could be a million things, I am not really sure what it is and it is probably different for all of us.
This all kinda leads me into why I rushed home to type up a blog.
Something happened tonight that rocked me.
I don’t really understand because it is so simple.
I have had tears in my eyes since “church” and it is driving me nuts.
During our service, our worship leader had a bunch of kids come up on stage and he interviewed them.
One of them was Adam, one of my kindergarteners.
I have gotten to know his family pretty well this past year.
His mom, dad, and sisters (Kate and Anna) are just amazing people.
Honestly, Adam’s parents, Peter and Heather, might be the most amazing parents I have seen.
They do such an awesome job with their kids.
I love when I get the chance to get together with Adam and his sisters because I have so much fun laughing, smiling, and playing with them.
Anywho…so Adam was up on stage and he was amazing.
He was asked, What would you do if you could do anything with Jesus for an hour?
He responded by saying that he would “play basketball and then snuggle.”
He also made the comment that he would give all his money away to help someone and one of the other kids asked, “Then what would you do?” He responded by saying, “Pick up sticks for my mom and dad to make more money.”
Isn’t he amazing?
After the interview, his little sister Kate whose birthday happened to be today, so she is 5, prayed for the whole community up on stage.
She too did an amazing job.
When she was done, they ran back to sit by their parents which happened to be right behind me.
We started our end of worship songs and soon I got a tug on my leg.
Adam came over to talk to me.
I told him he did an awesome job and that I was proud of him and then I told him to run and get his sister and tell her to come over.
He did and I told her that she did a great job too.
Then they went back and sat with there parents.
As I sang, I was looking up the group of kids that had gathered up in front of everyone.
They were dancing around right in front of the band.
They were just doing what kids do, if they get the urge to dance, they dance.
It is that simple. They were up there spinning, twirling, and jumping for God and everyone to see and they didn’t care one bit that 3000 people were watching them.
A couple times in the past I have wondered what it would be like to just run up there and start dancing and worshiping Jesus with everything I got.
But then I quickly remember that there are a lot of people that would think I am crazy so it doesn’t get much more than a thought.
I started to think about that again when I got a tug on my leg again.
Kate and Adam wanted to go up and dance with me.
I was shocked for a couple reasons, the first being I don’t dance.
The second was that as I looked around, I saw a hillside full of people.
I started to go, but then I looked back at the friends I was sitting with and I tried to get someone to go with me as the kids were tugging on my hands to go.
Kate let go and ran up with her sister to start dancing.
Adam kinda gave up and followed them.
My head shot straight down.
The whole service we talked about being like a child, and I couldn’t even go dance with them for a couple minutes, because people were watching.
All they wanted to do was dance.
I looked back at them dancing in front and noticed Kate looking around.
She was looking all over the place and then she looked straight at me back in the crowd and smiled and came running over to me.
Again she asked me to go dance.
Again I looked around for someone to go with me.
She pulled on my hand for a little bit and then gave up and went and sat down with her parents.
Minutes after hearing about how I need to become more like a child, I turned down dancing with 3 children not once, but twice, all because I didn’t want to look stupid in front of people.
I wanted someone to dance with, and there were 3 kids that wanted nothing more than to go dance with me.
Why cant I do the simplest things sometimes?
I stood there during the final songs with tears in my eyes because I couldn’t do something as simple as dance like a child.
That bothers me a lot.
I want to dance for Jesus!
I realized tonight that I need to learn to not care about looking silly in front of people like children do.
It is something that holds me back from enjoying moments that God is giving me.
Adam, Anna, Me, Kate
God, thank you for bringing Adam, Kate, and Anna into my life.
Thank you for using your children to show me more of your heart.
Please take away my worries, give me the ability to just lay it all out there for you so that I can dance for you with all my heart. I love you!
