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March 15/16, 2014
Jason Meyer | Matthew 19:13-15
Then children were brought to him that he might lay his hands on them and pray. The disciples rebuked the people, but Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven.” And he laid his hands on them and went away.—Matthew 19:13–15
Introduction
Last week we celebrated the calling of discipleship. It is a call to surrender to Christ. Part of that surrender means not being ashamed of his words. We do not shrink back from what he says. It is growing increasingly difficult to stand up for Christ’s words as our culture takes stands against them. One of the great flash points is biblical manhood and womanhood. That is why we listed it as one of our 14 priorities. We are not going to have a pastor for biblical manhood and womanhood, because all of our pastors are going to uphold it.
There are so many "lightning rod" issues here. We believe that God calls qualified men as pastors and elders, but we do not believe that he calls women to that role. This does not mean that women are not called into ministry! I used to talk to women who told me they were called to be a pastor. I would respond by saying, “I am not here to cast doubt on the fact that God has called you to serve him in ministry. I celebrate that calling. I have serious doubts about your interpretation of that calling. Why do you think that a calling to ministry must mean that a woman be a pastor and teach and have authority over men? Why assume that? I have two big reasons to not assume that. First, what is wrong with a calling to teach women? Do you view that as an inferior calling? I don’t. What is so great about teaching men anyway? Second, God is not going to say something different to you than he has already said to all of us in the Bible. God says in 1 Timothy 2:12 that women are not permitted to do the two things that elders are called to do (teach and have authority over men).” But I refuse to be slanted toward the negative, where we stress what women can’t do. I celebrate the positive—we want to stress what women can do in ministry—thousands of glorious, essential things in the body of Christ.
For example, Mary Delk is one of our ministers. She embraces the calling of ministry on her life to teach women. She and her team have developed one of the best women’s ministries on the planet. It is something to celebrate. Sometimes people use experience to call into question what the Bible says. I see something so different at work in women’s ministries. I see women who want to always interpret experience in the light of the Bible, not the other way around. Women’s ministries is a great example of our commitment to biblical manhood and womanhood. Women’s Bible studies are different than other Bible studies, because men and women are different. Women’s Bible studies have more of a relational element, because that is the way God wired women. It is a great thing. Sometimes I feel a little emotionally handicapped. Women talk about how they are feeling. Sometimes I don’t even have any thoughts about that. Men have something called a "nothing" box. I think my wife doubted this for a time. I especially like to go to my nothing box when I drive. "What are you thinking about honey?" "Nothing." It is true. We can’t talk about multiple things in the same conversation. I can only open one box at a time to talk about. I have to close that box before I can talk about something else. Women can do so much more than that. They are able to uphold a greater relational commitment without sacrificing for a second a commitment to the study of God’s word.
Today it is controversial in our culture to say that marriage is between one man and one woman. I did not think I would see a day come so quickly in which that message has fallen into such disfavor in our culture. But we will not shrink back from saying it, because Jesus has surpassing value. If he has the most precious value, then he will have the most persuasive voice.
So what does he say about something as controversial as the family and the next generation? We are about to find out. What will we do with this information? We know we are not supposed to shrink back. So what is the opposite of shrinking back? Shrinking back would mean somehow holding back the Bible’s teaching. We don’t want to hold it back and hide it from sight. We want to hold it up high for all to see.
In Matthew 19, Jesus gives us four pictures. I want to make the four pictures into four billboards that we hold up high: marriage, singleness, children, and youth.
He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? So they are no longer two but one flesh. wWhat therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.” They said to him, “Why then did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce and to send her away?” He said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. And I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery.”
I love the way Jesus responds to the Pharisees. This isn’t a real question. They are always trying to test him. They want him to answer a debate popular in the day between two rabbis about divorce. They want him to side with one over the other so that he looks either too conservative or too liberal. They begin by asking about the exceptions for ending a marriage. “And Pharisees came up to him and tested him by asking, “Is it lawful to divorce one’s wife for any cause?” (v. 3).
Jesus just refuses to start with the exception. You don’t define things based on exceptions. He doesn’t start with divorce; he starts with marriage. He doesn’t just go back to Moses and the Law, but back to the very beginning—to the very definition of marriage that comes from the design of the Creator. The Creator’s definition is better, because his design is better. He has the right to define marriage. Jesus’s point is that hardened humans should not have the right to define it! That is so true today. A culture in rebellion against God cannot come up with a better definition of marriage than God can. Jesus points to three things: 1) what God did, 2) what God said, and 3) what that means for today.
First, look at what God did: “He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female … ?” (v. 4).
Do you see what he has done? The Creator made them male and female. He did not make two men or two women or one man with multiple women. He made one man and one woman. What he did matters for the definition because it reflects design.
Second, we then hear what he said: “… ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’ ” (v. 5).
Third, now Jesus shows why all of that matters. He is going to directly answer the divorce question now: “So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate” (v. 6). Marriage is God joining together one man and one woman as one flesh. If God did the joining, then man should not do the separating. Marriage is one man and one woman as one flesh until death.
There is another reason to go back to the beginning. God’s original picture of an inseparable union has been distorted by hardened humanity. The Pharisees even distort God’s intention through Moses. The Pharisees claim that God commanded divorce through Moses. Jesus says that God allowed divorce through Moses, not because of God’s design, but because of human hardness. “They said to him, ‘Why then did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce and to send her away?’ He said to them, ‘Because of your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so’ ” (vv. 7–8).
There is more to the beginning that displays God’s intention. I will let Paul explain it:
"Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh." This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church.—Ephesians 5:31–32
Here is what God did not do. He did not start with marriage at the beginning of the world and then only later get a new idea about his Son and the Church. “I want my Son to have an inseparable union with the Church. I wish I had something that was like that so I could explain it better. Oh, yeah, back there at creation I made something called marriage. I could modify it and use it as an analogy.” He didn’t start with marriage. His plans centered on his Son and the Church. He started there! Jesus is the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world. The Father planned to give his Son a holy bride called the Church, so he designed the institution of marriage for the sake of seeing the gospel.
Marriage holds high the inseparable union between Christ and his bride. Christ never divorces his bride. Here is the good news. Marriage is a shadow that symbolizes something much greater. The substance is more glorious than the shadow. Human marriage says, “What God has joined together, let not man separate.” The gospel says, “What God has joined together, man cannot separate.” Let me apply this picture to our life together here at Bethlehem.
First, let me send a preemptive strike for the sake of present and future marriages. Please cut "divorce" out of your dictionary. One of the wedding gifts I always give when I preach at a wedding is a dictionary in which I have cut out the word “divorce.” I tell the couple they officially do not have the word “divorce” in their dictionary. I just did that today actually. I preached at Justin & Kate Woyak’s wedding. I got them a dictionary and cut the word out. There was some collateral damage as well. They won’t be able to look up “ditsy” or “dittany.” But that is no big loss. A dittany is a “creeping, wooly herb.” Who would want that anyway?
God does not give demands like “don’t divorce” just because he likes demands. They are loving! God’s demands are for our good. He loves us and wants us to move away from pain. One of the dominant metaphors for marriage is the husband as the head and the wife as the body. What does divorce do to this picture? It is like separating a head from a body. Divorce is like decapitation. I searched online just to see what divorce lawyers say about divorce. I read an article entitled, “Ten Proactive Steps to a Painless Divorce.” You might as well call it "Ten Easy Steps to Mordor." There is no such thing as a painless divorce. Like Mordor, painless divorce is imaginary—it does not exist. Children experience the pain too. They are too often collateral damage. The best thing you can give your kids is a daddy and mommy who love each other.
Second, what shall we say about the exception? Are there biblical grounds that allow for divorce and remarriage? There is a debate among Christians about the exception clause in verse 9. When you read the verse without the exception, Jesus says whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery. When you insert the exception clause, God sees remarriage as adultery unless adultery was already involved. Some of the pastors at Bethlehem read it as a genuine exception, other pastors read it differently. I am not going to pit one pastor against another at this point. I would like to lead toward more study and hopefully more unity on that question in the days ahead among our elders. But here is what I want to say today. I never start with the exception. I always start with the gospel. I try to counsel people toward gospel forgiveness. Not because spouses are worthy, but because Jesus is worthy. I believe a couple can put more of Christ and his forgiveness on display through marital forgiveness and restoration.
Third, let me say a word to those who have been through the horror of divorce. How does this land on you? I know some of your stories. Some were betrayed and rejected. Some were even abused. The gospel is good news for you too. Christ suffered all of those things for you. The one who was betrayed and rejected and abused will never betray you, reject you, or abuse you. Never. He will always love and always cherish you. Forever. He will receive you and not cast you out. Christ will never divorce his bride.
I have spoken to some of you who have committed adultery. The struggle here is the struggle to believe. Christ is never unfaithful, but he does pay the price for our unfaithfulness. Divorce is not the unforgivable sin. Adultery is not the unforgiveable sin. Unbelief is unforgiveable. All other sin can be cleansed. People refuse to come to Christ because they refuse to believe that he is able to forgive their sin. Refuse to believe that the blood of Christ is insufficient for your forgiveness. It is grace greater than all our sin.
I want the sufferers and strugglers and sinners here to taste hope. Divorce does not have to be an identity. You don’t have to walk around feeling like you have a big “D” on your forehead. Don’t let that define you. Let Christ define you. Let forgiveness define you. Listen to the difference of identity between the two. I am a divorced person (as if that were the most important thing about you). No, I am a forgiven child of God in Christ who struggles with the fact that I am divorced. Let’s look at our next billboard.
The disciples said to him, “If such is the case of a man with his wife, it is better not to marry." But he said to them, “Not everyone can receive this saying, but only those to whom it is given. For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let the one who is able to receive this receive it.”
As the disciples look at the rigors of marriage, they begin to think that maybe it would be better not to marry than to be saddled with a difficult marriage. “The disciples said to him, ‘If such is the case of a man with his wife, it is better not to marry’” (v. 10). Fulfilling the obligations of marriage when things are difficult may be harder than staying single. Jesus shows them that singleness cannot be defined as avoidance of marriage. “But he said to them, ‘Not everyone can receive this saying, but only those to whom it is given’” (v. 11). I think “this saying” goes back to the disciples response that it is better not to marry. Not marrying is given to some. He explains the “some” in the next verse. “ ‘For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let the one who is able to receive this receive it’ ” (v. 12).
It is hard to explain eunuchs to an audience full of children, so let’s say that eunuchs are those that are not able to marry for physical reasons. For some, these physical reasons were not voluntary (they happened at birth or later by unwanted surgery at the hands of men). But there is a third group that willingly chooses singleness for the sake of something greater. That is where Jesus takes the discussion. Singleness is not defined as for those who are deterred from marriage because it would be difficult. Some of you guys out there should not shy away from marriage because it takes commitment. Stop spending time conquering imaginary worlds in video games! Be a real man and go get a date. Give yourself to something greater than video games.
For others, singleness is defined by something greater. Singleness says, “As great as marriage is, there is something even greater: exclusive, single-minded devotion to the kingdom of Christ.” Those that can receive it, should receive it. I do think he is talking about some receiving the ability from God to remain single—to have a single-minded focus on the kingdom. I think that is exactly what Paul is talking about:
Now as a concession, not a command, I say this. I wish that all were as I myself am. But each has his own gift from God, one of one kind and one of another. To the unmarried and the widows I say that it is good for them to remain single as I am. But if they cannot exercise self-control, they should marry. For it is better to marry than to burn with passion.—1 Corinthians 7:6–9
Why would God call some to be single? Singleness shows the world that there is something greater than earthly marriage: The marriage between Christ and the Church. Some get to skip the symbol and go right to the reality. Others get the symbol first and then the reality. The kingdom of Christ has such surpassing worth that it would be worth giving up marriage so that it could be one’s exclusive focus. Singleness looks to the future and says, “One day there will be no marrying or giving in marriage in heaven. I can be a sign pointing to that day.” Singleness is a blazing billboard for the supremacy and sufficiency of Christ. Christ is enough. Singleness refuses to find an identity in a deficiency (what I don’t have), but in a sufficiency (what I do have). That is, someone who is single should not be pitied for what they do not have (marriage and family). What would be better if you had to choose? A perfect earthly marriage for 80 years and then hell because you don’t have Christ? Or no earthly marriage—just Christ right now and for all eternity? Singles can say, “If all I had for this life and the next were Christ, it would be enough!”
Then children were brought to him that he might lay his hands on them and pray. The disciples rebuked the people, but Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven.” And he laid his hands on them and went away.
Many use this as a proof text for infant baptism. Spurgeon’s debate with a paedo-baptist is probably the best response that I have heard. Spurgeon said, "Why don’t we both go to our best text to defend our position?" The minister went to this text in verse 14: “Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven.” Spurgeon responded by saying, “That’s it? That is the best you have? Um, okay, here is mine then, “There was a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job, and that man was blameless and upright, one who feared God and turned away from evil” (Job 1:1). Minister: “But your text has nothing to do with baptism.” Spurgeon: “Exactly. Neither does your text!”
If this text is not a proof text for baptizing babies, what does it teach? I think two clues really stand out. First, notice that the children did not come on their own. See the key phrase in verse 13: “Children were brought.” Passive voice. The children couldn’t come on their own. Who brought them? It was certainly not the disciples! It was their parents. The children were dependent. They had to be brought to Jesus.
The disciples looked down on children. They viewed them as not being worth Jesus’s time. They were like assistants that were managing Jesus’s schedule. "You are not important enough to get a meeting with Jesus." Who would schedule a bunch of children? The disciples did not rebuke the children; they rebuked the parents. “The disciples rebuked the people” (v. 13).
Jesus does not share the disciples’ attitude toward children: “But Jesus said, ‘Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven’ ” (v. 14). That last phrase is the second clue and it makes all the difference. Why does Jesus value children? Children have value in all kinds of ways, not least the fact that they are made in the image of God. But Jesus focuses on something else that children image: Children are an image of childlikeness, which is true of everyone who enters the kingdom. What do people look like who enter the kingdom? They are as helpless as children. They need to be brought into the kingdom: “For to such [childlike people] belongs the kingdom” (v. 14).
Childlikeness is the opposite of self-sufficiency and independence. Childlikeness is awareness of insufficiency and dependence. The younger the child, the more dependent they are on their parents or other caregivers. Children help us see who we are. Every diaper change, every time a child has to be carried somewhere. We are more dependent than the youngest child among us. Control is an illusion. We need Christ every moment. We are completely dependent upon him to save us. We are completely dependent upon him to sustain us: “In him all things hold together” (Colossians 1:17).
The disciples needed children. They needed needy children because they needed to see their own neediness. The very presence of children would preach to them. Jesus loves to refer to Christians as “little ones” in Matthew. We need to see children so we can see what we are like. In fact, we need all kinds of children. We need children with a disability. God delights in being desperately needed, because he delights in meeting the needs of desperately needy people (see Psalm 50:15). Children who have a disability also help us do what I said last week: Embrace sovereignty. Our disability ministry is a trumpet blast that testifies to our trust in the sovereignty of God in that even the most profound disability is part of God’s good design. "Survival of the fittest" has no place in the church of Jesus Christ.
The problem with adults is that we sometimes get mixed messages about maturity. It is true in the physical realm that growing up means taking on more and more responsibility so that we become less and less dependent upon our parents. Spiritual growth is actually the reverse. We grow as we become more and more dependent upon our heavenly Father.
The next story is a rich, young man. He is a youth who is the opposite of childlike. He trusts in his riches. His riches have made him independent. He treasures his riches, not the kingdom.
And behold, a man came up to him, saying, “Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life?” And he said to him, “Why do you ask me about what is good? There is only one who is good. If you would enter life, keep the commandments.” He said to him, “Which ones?” And Jesus said, “You shall not murder, You shall not commit adultery, You shall not steal, You shall not bear false witness, Honor your father and mother, and, You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” The young man said to him, “All these I have kept. What do I still lack?” Jesus said to him, “If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” When the young man heard this he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.
And Jesus said to his disciples, “Truly, I say to you, only with difficulty will a rich person enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.” When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astonished, saying, “Who then can be saved?” But Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.
The first thing to notice is that this young man was focused on doing enough to earn eternal life. “And behold, a man came up to him, saying, ‘Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life?’ ” (v. 16). Jesus asks the young man if he really knows what "good" means (v. 17). Then he probes further by focusing on the commandments. How far has the young man been able to get with his doing and earning? Is he close?
“If you would enter life, keep the commandments.” He said to him, “Which ones?” And Jesus said, “You shall not murder, You shall not commit adultery, You shall not steal, You shall not bear false witness, Honor your father and mother, and, You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” The young man said to him, “All these I have kept. What do I still lack?”—Matthew 19:17–20
The young man takes spiritual inventory and his assessment is that he has arrived. He is looking for what one thing he is possibly missing. Jesus answers this question in verse 21, “Jesus said to him, ‘If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.’ ” Jesus is not endorsing this man’s conclusion—he is testing it. I think what Jesus has done is expose this young man’s sinful self-righteousness. He believes that he has kept all the commandments all the time (since his youth). I read this as Jesus saying, “Well, let’s test your keeping of the commandments. Let’s start with the first one. Do you have any other gods than God? If riches are not your god, you should be able to let go." He refused to let go because riches were an idol. He was an idolater. He had not even reached first base. “When the young man heard this he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions” (v. 22).
Jesus takes the opportunity to explain how one gets into the kingdom. You don’t earn your way in. He says that it is very difficult—even or especially for a rich man. “And Jesus said to his disciples, ‘Truly, I say to you, only with difficulty will a rich person enter the kingdom of heaven’ ” (v. 23). Why is it difficult? Humanly speaking it is harder for a rich person to become childlike again and become spiritually dependent when they have attained financial independence. Rich people have more earthly things in which to trust and therefore more to let go of. I think that is what Jesus meant when he shockingly said to them, “Truly, I say to you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes go into the kingdom of God before you” (Matthew 21:31). Prostitutes knew that they were not righteous. Humanly speaking, it was harder for them to trust in their own righteousness. They knew they didn’t have any. It was easier for the Pharisees to trust in their own works. They were deceived into thinking they had enough righteousness to enter heaven.
But Jesus raises the bar of salvation beyond what is difficult for humans. He portrayed it as not just difficult, but impossible for humanity. He gave them a picture of something that was physically impossible. The eye of the needle is not a place in Jerusalem somewhere. It is a tiny needle with a small opening we call the “eye of the needle.” You can get a thread through it, not a camel. I don’t care how many camels you have and how many needles you have, or how many times you try, you will never get a camel through the eye of a needle. That is the point. Salvation is not just difficult for humanity, it is impossible. “But Jesus looked at them and said, ‘With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible’ ” (v. 26). Only God can save.
The source of salvation is God’s work, not human work. Humans can’t do it, but they can see it after God does it. Jesus taught us in John 3 that God saves by the power of the Spirit. It is like the wind. You can’t see it, but you can see the effects of it. When the wind of the Spirit blows in conversion, the evidence is very visible. You can look outside and say, “Wow, it is windy outside.” Why? Do you see the wind? No, you see the trees. You see the trees bending over. The tree bends as the wind blows. When the hurricane of God’s grace blows, you are bent in worship and love and childlike dependence.
Salvation is a spiritual miracle that has physical effects that are very visible. What does this have to do with youth? I love it when young people are converted. You can see it. It’s loud. Whatever young people like, they like loud—music, colors, hairstyles—whatever it is. They often wear their hearts or their loves on their sleeves (or on their t-shirts). What they treasure is expressed loud and clear. They don’t have as many reservations. They are going to let it all hang out a little more. I loved teaching youth and college age, because you can almost see the change on the spot. When something grips them, it changes everything. The trajectory changes right before your very eyes.
Conclusion
We are not just looking for a few good volunteers. We believe that serving the next generation is a calling for some. We do not need you to just fill some slots. We want to help you fill in the following blank. We can help you find your ministry calling—a place where you say, “I found my niche here in ______.” Please do not think that you have to be a gifted teacher with a thorough knowledge of curriculum or Bible trivia. Change does not happen merely through curriculum. The goal is more than information. The goal is transformation. We don’t trust in a well-timed lecture. If we say, “Just listen while I tell you what you need,” we are trusting in information. Author James Smith says we are treating kids like bobbleheads or brains on a stick. “Why are you still struggling with that? We taught you not to think that way last week?” He gave an example that really stuck with me from the author George Orwell.
When I was fourteen or fifteen I was an odious little snob, but no worse than other boys of my own age and class. I suppose there is no place in the world where snobbery is quite so ever-present or where it is cultivated in such refined and subtle forms as in an English public school. Here at least one cannot say that English ‘education’ fails to do its job. You forget your Latin and Greek within a few months of leaving school—I studied Greek for eight or ten years, and now, at thirty-three, I cannot even repeat the Greek alphabet—but your snobbishness, unless you persistently root it out like the bindweed it is, sticks by you till your grave. —George Orwell, Road to Wigan Pier; quoted in James K. A. Smith, Desiring the Kingdom.
The curriculum did not take root as much as the ethos or atmosphere. An approach to life was caught: snobbishness. Sometimes our priorities are better caught than taught. You know what was convicting? When I read him say “I studied Greek for 8 or 10 years and now at 33 I can’t repeat the Greek alphabet.” I thought, "Man, I am glad I didn’t forget my Greek. I am further along than him." That was my first thought! My second thought was repentance. It is like bindwind! Root it out!
We are what we love. We are defined by our desires. We don’t want “church culture” kids. We want Christian hedonists. Kids who can say “Christ gave me life.” Kids who increasingly say, “To live is Christ. Christ is my life. He has first place, he is of first importance. He has surpassing worth. His surpassing value brings me surpassing joy.”
Therefore, we want Christ-centered Christian hedonists in the classroom. If someone can believe in God’s holiness and Christ’s redemption without manifestly loving those things, then children will see what James called a dead faith (James 2:26) or what Paul calls a form of godliness that denies its power (2 Timothy 3:5).
Dear friends, if the things you are teaching do not excite you, there is almost no way that they are going to excite children. Children are uniquely gifted in being able to sniff out phoniness. They have finely tuned bologna detectors. They instinctively say to themselves, “If what you are sharing does not excite you, then why would I want it?” We are modeling for children how they ought to respond to the things of God. When our hearts are unengaged, we end up lying about the very things we are teaching. We are saying, “Hey, look everybody, this is the bland way you should engage with these stupendously glorious things.”
When you divorce the laws from the love story of the gospel, you get legalism. The Pharisees, the rich young ruler—they all looked at the laws and missed the love story—the awesome rescue mission of Jesus. Are we witnesses of this love?
I told a love story at the wedding I did this weekend. There was a man travelling in the Middle East that ended up trespassing on private property and was taken into the prince’s palace. The prince said, “You were caught trespassing and the laws of our country say that you should be killed. What do you have to say for yourself?” The man pleaded for mercy because he was newly married. “I can’t bear the thought of breaking the heart of my beloved one back home.” The prince did not believe in love so he arranged for a test. “We will write back to her and see how commited to you she is. If she really loves you like you say, then she won’t mind cutting off her ring finger and sending it to me.” They waited and waited. Finally a package came. There was a note inside. The wife said, “I thought it over and decided that this love was not worth one finger, but far more.” In the box, she had sent her whole hand.
But Jesus did more. The King left his heavenly throne. He came. He gave all of himself. Every drop of blood—in whipping, lashing, and nailing to the cross! You don’t have to pay your way in. Jesus paid it all. He gave all. We are witnesses. We are part of the greatest love story. We can’t stand beside the cross and remain snobs.
Do you see the King of glory in a first hand way? Do you see his love and mercy washing over all your sin? Then you will sing: Hosanna. It means “O save!” Save now. Save us, we pray! We rejoice in the salvation Christ has purchased. We are the redeemed singing of our Great Redeemer. We celebrate “in the highest.” He deserves the highest praise.
Children were crying out to the King too. And the Pharisees hated children praising Jesus, but we love to hear it here at Bethlehem.
Closing Song: "Hosanna"