A Song Still Rising

Exodus 15:20-21, Acts 16:25-24

Singing still opens prison doors.
In 1995 choral conductor Elvera Voth started the East Hills Singers in the Lansing Correctional Facility in Lansing, Kansas. Sponsored by the nonprofit organization Arts in Prison, the program brought together incarcerated men and professional singers to rehearse and perform together. Many of the inmates had never sung before, but in the group they found a new passion, a new belonging, and a new joy. Participants described the choir as a way to feel human in an environment with little humanity. Members noted the strong bond formed while singing and highlighted the love, compassion, and forgiveness they had received from audiences during performances.

The recidivism rate in Kansas is over 50 percent. For the East Hills Singers, it is less than 10 percent. The East Hills Singers became the first men’s prison choir in the country to perform outside of prison walls. They continue to perform regularly in churches across the Kansas City area. In fact, next month on May 2, they will be performing at Village Presbyterian Church in Prairie Village.
There is a power in singing. Something happens when people sing together. Breathing together. Feeling together. Becoming something more than we were alone. Science can measure some of the effects. Singing together reduces stress hormones, boosts mood, strengthens the immune system, improves lung capacity, and even synchronizes heartbeats. Anyone who has sung in a choir already knows this truth in their bones. Singing changes us.

And sometimes singing does not just change the singers. It changes the world around them, as exemplified by the Singing Revolution in Estonia.

Singing can be prophetic.

In scripture, prophecy is not mainly about predicting the future. Prophecy is telling the truth about God. It is proclaiming what God has done, what God is doing, and what God will continue to do. Prophecy names the world as it is, and the world as God intends it to be. Prophecy gives voice to hope when hope feels impossible. Prophecy announces what God’s kingdom looks like on earth as it is in heaven.

Prophecy is not something that ended long ago. It is something the church is invited to participate in today. Because as Easter people we live into the resurrection life of transformation, not only of our own lives but of the life of the world.
Throughout Israel’s story, God speaks through unexpected voices, calling people away from fear and toward justice, mercy, and new life. Over the next six weeks we will listen and learn from prophetic women in the Hebrew Scriptures, some familiar and some less well known.

The first prophet named in scripture is not a king, priest, or warrior. It is a woman holding a tambourine and leading the people in song. Miriam.

Miriam is the older sister of Moses. She is present at pivotal moments in the story of the liberation of God’s people. She is introduced simply as Moses’ sister, who stood at a distance to see what would happen as he was placed in a basket among the reeds of the Nile. She speaks boldly to Pharaoh’s daughter, offering to find a Hebrew nurse for the child, and then brings their mother to care for him. She helps save Moses from the waters of the Nile, and later she celebrates God’s salvation of her people as they pass through the waters of the Red Sea.

In Exodus chapter 15 she is named. Miriam the prophet, Aaron’s sister, takes a tambourine in her hand, and all the women go out after her with tambourines and dancing, singing, “Sing to the Lord, for he has triumphed gloriously; horse and rider he has thrown into the sea.”

The song they sing is one of the oldest texts in scripture, dating back more than ten centuries before Paul and Silas sang in their cells. While Miriam’s song appears as a brief response to Moses’ longer Song of the Sea, many biblical scholars believe this song may have originally belonged to Miriam before being attributed to Moses. The first lines of Moses’ song are the words of Miriam’s song.
Miriam gathers the women. She takes her tambourine and sings, not privately, but communally.

Before Israel has a king, before Israel has a temple, Israel has a song.
The people are not yet organized. They are not yet secure. They are not yet powerful. But they are free. And the first thing free people do is sing.

Songs form people. They provide a framework of shared memory and meaning, much like our national anthem, the Star Spangled Banner. Miriam’s song was passed down through generations, sharing the story of God’s liberating work in song long before it became scripture. The song celebrates God’s power and gives witness to that work continues, even now.

This is how singing becomes prophetic. Voices joined together in song show us what God’s kingdom looks like. When we sing together, we experience, even if only for a moment, God’s kingdom in our midst.

Miriam knew what the East Hills Singers discovered centuries later. When people who have known confinement begin to sing together, something inside them opens. A different future becomes imaginable. A new identity begins to take shape. Not prisoners.

Not slaves. Not enemies. But a people.

One member of the East Hills Singers described the unity found in singing this way, “We all play different parts and we all sound different individually, but together we become this great melody. In many communities we are taught to see difference as threat, but when we learn to listen to one another, we begin to discover how much more becomes possible when we work together.”
The song of Miriam did not end at the Red Sea. It echoes wherever people gather to sing hope into difficult places. And this afternoon we have an opportunity to do just that.

This week I received an email from Pastor Catherine extending an invitation to our congregation to participate in some prophetic singing. This afternoon at 5:45, College Hill United Methodist Church will host a gathering of Singing Resistance. Singing Resistance is a grassroots movement that began amidst violence and injustice in Minneapolis and has spread across the country. People gather to sing songs of hope and solidarity, expressing collective grief and anger while fostering courage and community strength through nonviolent, joyful resistance.

Christian theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a member of the resistance against the Third Reich, once wrote, “It is the voice of the Church that is heard in singing together. It is not you that sings, it is the Church that is singing, and you, as a member of the Church, may share in its song.”

This is the invitation of prophetic song.

To sing when hope feels fragile. To sing when justice feels distant. To sing when fear tells us to be quiet. To sing when the world tells us nothing can change. To sing when love feels risky. To sing when courage feels costly.

Because when we sing together, we begin to hear the world differently. We begin to hear the possibility that God is still at work. We begin to hear the possibility that love is stronger than fear. We begin to hear the possibility that resurrection is not only something that happened once, but something that continues to happen.

The song of Miriam is not finished. The song of liberation is not finished. The song of justice is not finished. The song of hope is not finished. It is still rising.

It rises whenever people refuse to accept injustice as inevitable. It rises whenever voices join together in courage and compassion. It rises whenever the church remembers who we are and whose we are. It rises when we sing in worship. It rises when we sing in protest. It rises when we sing in grief. It rises when we sing in hope.

Because the good news of Easter is not only that Christ is risen. It is that the risen Christ is still at work. Still rising in communities of compassion. Still rising in acts of justice. Still rising wherever love refuses to be silenced.

And maybe that is why the first prophet named in scripture is not holding a scroll, but a tambourine. Because sometimes the most faithful thing we can do is join our voices together and sing.

So may we have the courage to become people whose song still rises. A song that remembers God’s faithfulness. A song that proclaims God’s justice. A song that trusts God’s future. A song that helps the world hear the good news that resurrection is still unfolding even now.

May it be so in your life, in the life of your family, in the life of our congregation, and in the life of Christ’s church.

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Gardener of Grace

John 20:1-18

While it is still dark Mary goes to the tomb. She sees that the stone has been removed, and she runs to tell Peter and the other disciple. They run to the tomb. They look in. And in one of the most understated lines in all of scripture, we are told that “they see… and believe.” My mother often reminded me that, “even Jesus folded his clothes.” And there they were, the grave clothes, neatly lying there. The guys go in, and as guys do, they assess the situation. They draw a conclusion. And then they go home. John tells us plainly: They believed… but they did not yet understand.

Which raises one possibility for us this Easter morning. It is possible to observe something about resurrection, to affirm something about resurrection, even to believe something about resurrection, and still not yet be changed by resurrection. Sometimes we want resurrection to be something we can examine, understand, affirm, and then move on from. But if resurrection does not transform us, then we are not yet resurrection people. We are not yet Easter people. Because seeing the risen Lord changes you.

But Mary stays. While the disciples return to their homes, Mary remains outside the tomb, weeping. She does not rush past her grief. She does not pretend everything is fine. She does not move quickly to hope. She stays. She stays with the confusion. She stays with the sorrow. She stays with the uncertainty. And then she does something courageous. She bends down and looks into the darkness of the tomb. She dares to peer into the place where hope has been buried, into the place shaped by loss, into the place defined by fear. And when she looks into that darkness, she does not find what she expected. She sees two angels sitting where the body had been.

And they ask her a question. Not theology. Not doctrine. A question: Why are you weeping?

Resurrection begins with God acknowledging human pain. Mary answers honestly, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” She releases her fear, her sorrow, her uncertainty. God does not dismiss her emotion as a lack of faith. God meets her inside it.

Then John tells us something subtle, but important. She turns. She turns away from the tomb. She turns toward the garden. She turns toward the world beyond the place of burial. And she sees Jesus standing there. Except she does not yet recognize him. She assumes he is the gardener. Which John wants us to notice. Because John’s gospel does not begin with the birth of Christ, it begins with Christ in the midst of creation itself: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God.” And now, in the resurrection story, we find ourselves in a garden again. And the risen Christ appears as a gardener. The one who cultivates life. The one who nurtures growth. The one who tends what is wounded. The one who brings beauty out of soil that looks barren.

Mary assumes he is the gardener. And maybe she is not entirely wrong. Because Christ’s work did not end with resurrection. Christ’s gardening continues. Christ is still at work bringing life out of places that look empty, still at work cultivating hope in places that feel barren, still at work nurturing new creation in the middle of what looks like endings.

Jesus asks her the same question the angels asked: “Why are you weeping?” And then he asks another question: “Who are you looking for?” Mary still clings to the only explanation she can imagine. She says, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him.” She is still trying to make sense of the empty tomb, still trying to solve the mystery, still trying to hold onto the reality she understands.

And then Jesus speaks one word. “Mary.” Just her name. And somehow that is enough. This is how recognition happens in John’s gospel. Jesus says, “My sheep hear my voice. I know them. And I call them by name.” Recognition happens through relationship. Resurrection becomes real when it becomes personal, when love speaks your name, when you realize you are known, seen, held, called.

Mary does not respond, “Jesus.” She responds, “Rabbouni.” Teacher. Which suggests that even in this moment of recognition, she is still learning, still growing, still discovering what resurrection means.

Now, do not get me wrong, John’s gospel leaves no doubt that the resurrection is real, tangible, embodied, transformative. Jesus will invite Thomas to touch his wounds. Later, he cooks breakfast for the disciples by the sea. John makes it clear that resurrection is not just metaphor. It is real and embodied. But this first appearance reminds us that resurrection is not only something that happened then. It is something that continues to happen now. Because the risen Christ still meets people in gardens, still calls people by name, still transforms grief into hope, still cultivates life in unexpected places.

Mary sees the risen Christ because she stays. She stays with her grief. She stays with her questions. She stays with the pain. She stays with the uncertainty. She looks into the darkness of the tomb and discovers that the darkness is not as empty as she feared that God is there. And when she turns toward the world again, she is able to see differently. Nothing about the environment changes. What changes is what she can see.

There is plenty of darkness in our world right now. Darkness of war. Darkness of fear. Darkness of separation from loved ones. Darkness of anxiety about what tomorrow may bring. Darkness of grief that still feels fresh. Darkness of addiction. Darkness of depression. Darkness of anger. Darkness of broken relationships. Darkness of uncertainty. And the resurrection story does not call us to pretend that darkness does not exist. The resurrection story does not call us to rush past pain. The resurrection story does not call us to go home unchanged. The resurrection story invites us to remain present long enough to discover that Christ is still at work there, still gardening, still cultivating, still bringing life out of places that look empty.

Mary is the first apostle, the first witness, the first preacher of the resurrection. She goes and tells the others, “I have seen the Lord.” She does not yet have all the answers. But she has experienced enough to speak. And that is what resurrection does. Resurrection changes you. Resurrection sends you. Resurrection calls you to share good news.

And that is the calling to the church this Easter morning: to be people who do not turn away from the places where hope feels buried, to be people willing to stay present to the pain in our world, to be people who trust that Christ is still at work cultivating life, to be people who learn to recognize the voice that calls us by name, to be people who participate in Christ’s ongoing gardening, tending what is fragile, nurturing what is growing, caring for what has been wounded, trusting that new life is still possible.

On this Easter morning we are once again invited to join Mary in bearing witness: We have seen the Lord. May we be transformed by this good news to live into the resurrection as Easter people. Christ is risen. Christ is risen indeed. Alleluia. Amen.

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Two Parades

Psalm 118:1-2, 19-29, Mark 11:1-11

In January of 2023, I had the opportunity to travel to Israel and Palestine with a group from Austin Seminary and members of Agudas Achim, a Jewish synagogue in Austin. I remember walking that steep path down from the Mount of Olives. It is not wide. It is not straight. It winds back and forth. It drops. It turns back on itself. You descend farther than you expect, down into the Kidron Valley, and just when you think you have arrived, you realize you still have to climb up a steep incline to enter the city. That was the road Jesus took into Jerusalem for the Passover festival.

But it was not the only road leading into the city. There were two processions entering Jerusalem at Passover, one from the east and one from the west, both heading toward the same city and both proclaiming very different visions of power.

From the west came the empire. Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor, traveled from Caesarea on the coast, sixty miles from the northwest, three or four days on the road. He did not travel alone. With him came soldiers, hundreds of them, infantry in formation, cavalry mounted on war horses, armor catching the sunlight, banners lifted high, the eagle of Rome overhead. They traveled along Roman roads that were wide, straight, engineered for strength, direct, elevated, unyielding. This was not just a journey. It was a message. Rome is here. Rome is watching. Rome is in control.

And from the east comes Jesus. Not from a capital or a palace, but from a hillside, down that winding road, into the valley and back up again. Not on a war horse, but on a borrowed colt, surrounded not by soldiers but by ordinary people laying their cloaks on the ground and waving branches cut from the fields.

From the west came the sound of marching feet, the beating of drums, the creak of leather, the clink of metal, the snort of horses, a visible display of power and a reminder, especially during Passover, a festival celebrating liberation from empire, that resistance would not be tolerated. This is what Rome called peace, the Pax Romana, peace through strength, peace through control, peace enforced by the sword.

From the east the sound is different. No marching cadence, no armor, just voices, people pressing in, people hoping, people singing out together, “Hosanna! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord!”

From the west, people step aside. Some show support. Some bow their heads. Some watch in silence.

From the east, people come together, drawn closer. They do not have power or status, but they show up. They follow. They celebrate. They hope.

Both processions are entering the same city at the same time for the same festival, a city filled with people remembering a God who delivers them from empire, now occupied by one.

One procession proclaims the power of empire. The other proclaims the kingdom of God. One rides in on strength. The other comes through the valley. One depends on fear. The other stirs hope.

Rome believed it was bringing peace through control. Jesus embodies peace through justice, mercy, and humility.

Those two parades are not confined to the pages of scripture. They still move through the world. They still pass by us every day, and they still ask for our allegiance.

Sometimes the lines between them can feel blurred because we hear voices, Christian voices, invoking scripture to bless violence, to justify war, to call it necessary, even righteous. And yet, the witness of the church has long been different. Bombs do not create peace. Violence does not lead us to the kingdom of God. When war comes, it is always the most vulnerable who bear the weight through loss, displacement, and fear. Again and again, the call has been to seek another way, a way shaped not by domination but by diplomacy, not by escalation but by restraint, not by destruction but by the hard, holy work of peace.

Which brings us back to the road. Which parade will we join? The one that trusts in force, or the one that walks in mercy. The one that answers harm with retribution, or the one that seeks reconciliation. The one that divides the world into enemies and allies, or the one that longs for unity, not uniformity.

This is not just a question for nations. It is a question for us. It is a question we answer in our homes, in our workplaces, in our conversations, in the ways we speak about those with whom we disagree, in how we respond when we are hurt, and in how we use whatever power we have.

Every day, we step into one procession or the other, because the parade of empire is always recruiting. It promises security. It promises certainty. It promises victory. It tells us that strength comes through control, that peace comes through dominance, that safety comes through exclusion.

And the parade of Christ is always inviting. It invites us to trust that mercy is not weakness, that humility is not defeat, that justice is not naive, that love is not powerless. It invites us to believe that the way of Jesus, the way that passes through the valley, is still the way that leads to life.

The crowds cried out, “Hosanna, save us.” Salvation does not come from powers that demand allegiance through fear. Salvation comes from the one who enters without violence, who refuses domination, who embodies a kingdom where peace is not enforced but cultivated.

So today, the question is not simply what we believe. The question is where we will stand. Which parade will shape our lives? Which vision of power will guide our choices? Which kingdom will form our hearts?

We do not choose once. We choose again and again. We choose when we practice compassion instead of contempt. We choose when we listen instead of dismiss. We choose when we work for justice instead of subtle complicity in complacency. We choose when we refuse to let fear have the final word. Every time we choose mercy, every time we choose humility, every time we choose hope, we step more deeply into the procession of Christ.

I keep thinking about that road, the one that winds down into the valley and only then rises into the city. Before Jesus enters Jerusalem, he descends, and maybe that is where discipleship begins. Not with triumph, but with trust. Not with domination, but with love. Not with certainty, but with faith.

The good news on this fifth Sunday of Lent is that the kingdom of God does not arrive through the power of empire. It grows wherever people choose the way of Christ. So the question remains, which parade will you join?

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Mercy in the Dust

Isaiah 1:10-17, John 8:2-11

I came to Jerusalem for the festival, like everyone else. Every year when the harvest comes in, we travel up the hill to the city. The roads fill with pilgrims and wagons, children running ahead of their parents. You can smell dates and figs drying in baskets, hear lambs bleating and traders calling. By the time we reached the city gates, the place was packed with pilgrims.
We built our sukkot just outside the temple courts, little shelters of branches and woven palm leaves, roofs thin enough that if you leaned back, you could see the stars. That is what Scripture commands: to dwell in booths and remember how our ancestors wandered in the wilderness and how God sheltered them there.

If you have never seen Jerusalem during the festival, it is hard to explain. The rabbis say, “Whoever has not seen the rejoicing at the place of the water drawing has never seen rejoicing in their life.” I believe it now. Each evening the priests went down to the Pool of Siloam and drew water in a golden pitcher. We followed them back up the hill singing the psalms, thousands of voices echoing through the streets. When the water was poured out at the altar, the crowd roared like a storm breaking over the sea.

And the light. You cannot imagine the light. Four great lampstands rose above the temple courts, taller than a house. When they were lit, the whole city glowed. The elders said there was not a courtyard in Jerusalem that did not shine with their light. It was beautiful, glorious even.

But I will admit something. It was hard to sleep. The singing went late into the night. Drums and flutes, dancing and laughter, voices rising and falling like waves. People moved between the sukkot, visiting neighbors, sharing wine, celebrating the harvest. At one point I woke to someone singing nearby, loudly, praising God with such enthusiasm that half the camp must have heard her.

I noticed her then. She was dancing with a group of others, her voice rising above the music. Joyful, certainly, but a bit unrestrained, reminiscent of the prophet Hannah. I remember wondering whether she was filled with the Spirit or filled with spirits. Still, who am I to judge someone’s joy at Sukkot?

The next morning, I went early to the temple courts. Word had spread about a Galilean rabbi who had come up for the festival. He had already stirred quite a conversation in the city. Some said he healed a man who had been unable to walk for nearly forty years. Others said he fed a crowd with almost nothing, just a few loaves and fish, and there were baskets left over. Some even whispered that he had walked across the sea.

Just the day before, during the water ceremony, he had cried out to the crowd, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink.” That got people talking. So, I went early, hoping to hear him teach.

He was already there in the temple court, seated among the people. And I must say, he spoke differently than the others, not like someone reciting traditions, but like someone who knew the heart of the matter.

Then suddenly there was shouting. A group of teachers of the law pushed through the crowd, dragging a woman with them. I recognized her immediately, the same one I had seen singing the night before. They threw her down in the middle of the courtyard.

“Teacher,” they said, loud enough for everyone to hear, “this woman was caught in the act of adultery. Moses commanded us to stone such women. What do you say?”
You could feel the tension in the air. It was a clever trap. Everyone knew it. The kind of question that ruins a rabbi. If he rejected the law of Moses, they could accuse him of blasphemy. But if he supported the execution, the Romans would not look kindly on it, and neither would many of the people. Either way, he would lose.

But something else struck me as strange. Where was the man? The law says both should be brought forward. Yet there she was alone, surrounded by accusers. And surely this kind of case belonged before the courts. Who conducts a trial, and an execution, in the middle of the temple courtyard?

The rabbi said nothing at first. Instead, he bent down and began writing in the dust with his finger. I remembered the words of the prophet Jeremiah: “Those who turn away from the Lord shall be written in the earth.” Perhaps he was only biding his time.

Finally, he stood and spoke. “Let the one among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone.” Then he bent down again and continued writing.
For a long moment, no one moved. Then the older men, the ones who had pushed forward so confidently, began slipping away one by one. The younger ones followed soon after. I watched them go and suddenly realized that if the wisest among them were leaving, perhaps it was time for me to go as well.

So, I slipped out of the crowd and made my way back toward the sukkot. But I could not stop thinking about what had happened in the courtyard, about the way that woman had been thrown into the dust, about the silence that followed the rabbi’s words, and about the mercy shown to her when everyone else had gone.

It made me wonder. If that is how he treats someone the world is ready to condemn, maybe that is what God’s love looks like for all of us.

That question is worth holding onto for a moment. If that is how Jesus treats someone the world is ready to condemn, perhaps we are seeing something essential about the way God works in the world.

When we look closely at this story, we discover Jesus speaking to two groups of people: the leaders of the church and the woman they dragged into the courtyard.
To the accusers he says, “Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone.” Those words point backward. They reach into the past; into the lives these men have already lived. Before you pick up a stone, look at your own life. Before you condemn another person, remember your own humanity. Remember your own failures. Remember your own need for mercy.

One by one, beginning with the elders, they walk away. Perhaps the older ones understood something the younger ones had not yet learned. Perhaps the longer you live, the harder it is to pretend you have lived without sin.

Then Jesus turns to the woman. “Neither do I condemn you. Go your way, and from now on do not sin again.” These words point forward. They open a future that had seemed impossible only moments before. Jesus does not deny that something has gone wrong in her life, but neither does he define her by her worst moment. Instead, he offers her something new, a future that is not bound by the past.

Do you see what Jesus has done? He treats the woman as the social and human equal of the scribes and the Pharisees. He speaks to them all about the same thing, sin. But he speaks about it in two directions. To the crowd he says, look honestly at the past you have lived. To the woman he says, look toward the future that is still possible. And to both he offers the same invitation: begin again, right here, right now.

The remarkable thing about this story is that mercy is extended to everyone. The woman receives mercy, of course, but so do the accusers. They are given the chance to put their stones down. They are given the chance to walk away. They are given the chance to live differently.

Which means this story is not only about the woman in the dust. It is also about the people in the crowd. It is about us.

Because we have stood in both places. There are moments when we are the ones who have made mistakes, moments when we carry shame and hope someone will show us mercy. And there are moments when we stand with the crowd, when it feels easier to judge than to understand, when it feels satisfying to believe that someone else deserves the stones.
And this is where Jesus introduces something that feels almost unreasonable: mercy.

The Rev. Lizzie McManus-Dail writes that “the inconvenience of mercy is that it is hardly ever merited.” Mercy does not operate according to the logic of fairness. It is not earned. It is not transactional. And yet mercy is one of the clearest signs that we belong to God.

Because the truth is this. Every one of us lives by mercy. Every one of us has moments we would rather leave in the past. And yet the good news of the gospel is that our lives are not defined by our worst moment. In Christ, the past does not get the final word. In Christ, the future remains open.

But that does not mean mercy is easy. Mercy means refusing to reduce a person to the worst thing they have done. It means recognizing the humanity of people we disagree with. It means believing that restoration is possible, even when the world would rather punish.

Mercy does not ignore injustice. But it does insist that justice is more than retribution. True justice is rooted in restoration, in reconciliation, in the possibility that relationships and communities can be made whole again. Justice, in the kingdom of God, is faithfulness to mercy.

So, the question this story leaves with us is a simple one. Where are the stones in our own hands? Where are the places where it is easier to condemn than to extend mercy? Where are the places where we have forgotten that the people standing before us are just as human as we are?

Jesus does not pretend that sin does not exist. But he refuses to let condemnation have the final word. Instead, he opens the possibility of a new beginning for the woman in the dust, for the crowd with stones in their hands, and for us.

The good news on this fifth Sunday of Lent is that the kingdom of God is not built with stones of accusation. It is built with mercy that lifts people from the dust. It is built with justice that restores. It is built with faithfulness that refuses to give up on people.

And thanks be to God, that kind of mercy has room for all of us.

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Who’s Missing?

Matthew 19:13-15 and Deuteronomy 24:17-22

I remember the day we brought the children to Jesus. Word had spread that he was coming through our village, and people were already gathering along the road, some hoping to hear him teach, some hoping for healing, and some just curious. We had heard the stories. They said he could drive out demons, heal the sick, and even calm a storm with a word. So I thought, well, if he can handle a storm, maybe he can handle my children.

You should have seen them that morning. Running everywhere, wrestling in the dust. One of them had already knocked over a water jar before breakfast. Still, I wanted them to be blessed. In our family that mattered. My father used to place his hands on our heads before the Sabbath and speak a blessing. His father did the same before him. Sometimes he would say the words of the priests: “May the Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make his face shine upon you.” Other times he would remember the story of our ancestor Jacob crossing his hands over his grandsons and saying, “May God make you like Ephraim and Manasseh.” I can still see the smile of my younger brother.
So when we heard Jesus was nearby, I thought, why not? If a blessing from a grandfather mattered, surely a blessing from a teacher like this might matter too. So we gathered the children and made our way through the crowd.

That is when the disciples saw us coming. They stepped forward quickly, arms out like a gate across the road. “No,” they said. “Not now. The teacher is busy.” Busy. I suppose I understand. Important people always seem busy. But the children were already pushing past me, trying to see him. And suddenly I felt embarrassed, like we had made a mistake coming at all. You know that feeling? When you realize you might not belong where you thought you did. Like maybe this place was not meant for people like us.

Then Jesus looked up. He saw the children. He saw the disciples trying to hold us back. And he said, “Let the little children come to me. Do not stop them.”
The disciples stepped aside. The children ran straight to him, climbing into his lap, tugging on his sleeves, talking all at once the way children do. And Jesus laughed. Then he placed his hands on their heads and blessed them. And he said something that puzzled me at first. “For it is to such as these that the kingdom of heaven belongs.”

I remember thinking, if heaven belongs to children like these, then heaven must be a lively place. Full of running feet, dusty knees, and questions that never stop. Maybe the kingdom of heaven looks less like a room full of important people sitting quietly and more like a place where everyone, even the smallest, loudest, most unlikely among us, is welcomed right into the arms of God.

In Matthew’s Gospel, children are a living parable of the kingdom of God. In chapter 18 Jesus tells the disciples, “Unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” After Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem, it is the children who cry out in the temple, “Hosanna to the Son of David.” Children demonstrate how to enter the kingdom. Children exemplify who receives the kingdom. Children recognize the king.

In our gospel lesson, Jesus tells us that it is “to such as these that the kingdom of heaven belongs.” So to what qualities is Jesus pointing?

In the ancient world, children were considered blessings. They were also considered possessions. They were completely dependent. They lacked any social standing or status. They had nothing to bargain with but were open to receiving. They simply come. And Jesus beckons us to come with the same posture.

The real surprise in this story is not that Jesus blesses the children. The surprise is that Jesus says the kingdom belongs to people like this. The disciples saw an interruption. Jesus sees a revelation. Those assumed to be the least important become the clearest picture of God’s reign.

Which raises a question for us. If children help us see the kingdom more clearly, who else might we be missing?

That question runs all through scripture. Long before Jesus welcomed the children, the law of Israel was already teaching the people of God to look for those who were easiest to overlook.
In Deuteronomy, Moses gives the people instructions about how to live together once they settle in the promised land. He says, “You shall not deprive a resident alien or an orphan of justice; you shall not take a widow’s garment in pledge. Remember that you were a slave in Egypt and the Lord your God redeemed you from there.”

Then he gives a surprisingly practical example. Leave a little extra in the field. Leave a few olives on the tree and a few grapes on the vine. Leave some for others.

In other words, build space into the life of the community for those who might otherwise be left out. Space in the fields. Space in the harvest. Space in the economy of the community.
The people of God are told not to gather everything for themselves. Leave room for the stranger. Leave room for the vulnerable. Leave room for those who rely on the kindness of the community.

And the reason given is striking. “Remember that you were slaves in Egypt.” Remember what it felt like to be powerless. Remember what it felt like to depend on the mercy of others. Remember what it felt like to be a child. Remember that your life was changed because God lifted you up when you were vulnerable.

If that is how God has treated you, then that is how you are called to treat others.

So when Jesus says, “Let the little children come to me,” he is not inventing something new. He is revealing something that has always been at the heart of God’s kingdom, that the wideness of

God’s love covers us all, especially the least, the last, and the lost.

And that brings us back to the question. Who is missing?

Who are the people who sometimes stand at the edge of the field, wondering if there will be anything left for them?
Sometimes they are people who assume church simply is not for them. People who carry identities that churches have not always welcomed. People who wonder whether they will be seen as a problem to fix rather than a person to love.

Sometimes they are people who come from different cultures or traditions and worry they will not quite fit in here. Sometimes they are people who drive past a building like this and think that looks like a church for someone else, a church for people with more money, more history, more belonging than I have.
And sometimes the people standing at the edge are simply those who feel unseen. People carrying grief. People carrying doubt. People who have been hurt before and are not sure they want to risk being hurt again.

The disciples were not trying to be cruel. They were trying to protect Jesus. But in doing so, they almost kept people away from the very grace Jesus came to offer.
Which means the question for the church is not just who belongs here. The question is who might still be standing at the edge of the crowd, wondering if they are welcome to come closer.
The good news on this fourth Sunday of Lent is that Jesus keeps saying the same thing he said that day. Let them come to me. Do not stop them.

I imagine the parents going home that day with the children still running ahead on the road, dust on their feet, questions tumbling out of their mouths, and energy that never seems to run out. Maybe they were still turning Jesus’ words over in their minds. “For to such as these belongs the kingdom of heaven.”
What must heaven be like if that is true?

Perhaps the kingdom of heaven looks like a place where everyone is welcomed with open arms. A place where people are not measured by status or achievement. A place where those who have nothing to bargain with are still received with joy. A place where we are embraced and blessed just as we are.

And if that is what the kingdom of heaven looks like, then the church is called to look a little like that too. A place where the door is open wider than people expect. A place where those who have wondered if they belong discover that they do. A place where the words of Jesus are lived out again and again: “Let them come to me. Do not stop them.”

Because the kingdom of heaven does not belong to the powerful, the accomplished, or the impressive. The good news on this fourth Sunday of Lent is this: the kingdom of heaven belongs to the vulnerable, to the marginalized, to the least, the last, and the lost.

And when the church becomes the kind of community where all are welcomed, we begin to look a little more like the kingdom Jesus was talking about.
Which means the question for us is still the same one we asked earlier. If Jesus were standing here today saying, “Let them come to me. Do not stop them,” who might we suddenly notice standing just outside the circle? Who might still be wondering whether there is room for them here?

In other words, who is missing?

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