Move Up Sunday 2025

Welcome to the Awakening Church podcast.

We pray this message encourages you and provides the hope and light of Jesus Christ.

Thanks for tuning in.

Imagine, imagine with me for a second.

This is where we're headed.

Imagine you are just sitting down to eat dinner in your house.

You have the table set, the meal is ready, and there's a knock on your door.

You open the door, and there's Jesus.

You have a chance to have a face-to-face conversation with the Savior and King of the world.

Where do you even start?

You have a bunch of questions running through your mind, trying to decide which one to ask him first.

Take a moment and think about what questions you would ask Jesus if you had a chance to have dinner with him.

I know I have a huge list.

Everything from big theological questions to why did certain terrible things happen, to what decisions should I make for my future, to what does he really think about me, and so many things in between.

The disciples got to be around Jesus every day for three years.

We see them ask lots of questions, but one stands out as one that we, in our culture of wanting to be great, might be apt to ask also.

We have our sights set on greatness, especially here in the Silicon Valley, with our startups and our dreams of going public, with big tech launching new innovation every single day, with valuing more and more education and higher levels of expertise.

One of the top 10 dream jobs right now is to be an influencer or a YouTuber.

And many of us are already pretending that we're doing that.

We want our hobbies to turn into side hustles, which can then turn into our full-time job.

And we strive to optimize life to find the very best way to live.

Now, apparently the disciples felt this way too, but they wanted greatness in the kingdom of God.

So we're talking about eternal greatness here.

So let's turn to the scripture to see what question the disciples had for Jesus and see how he answers in an unlikely way that will guide our time this morning.

Matthew 18, starting in verse 1.

Turn with me.

At that time, the disciples came to Jesus and asked, So who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?

There it is.

There's the question.

Jesus, Jesus, who's the greatest in your kingdom?

Me, right?

He called a small child and had him stand among them.

Truly I tell you, he said, unless you turn and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child, this one is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.

And whoever welcomes one child like this in my name welcomes me.

So they ask him, Who's the greatest?

And Jesus points to this little child and he says, You want to be great?

Be like him.

This is the most unlikely of answers.

Children were greatly looked down on at the time.

Many biblical scholars actually use the word scorned.

So for Jesus to take this little child and to point to him would have been so counter-cultural and surprising for the disciples to hear.

We have a higher value of kids in our culture, but also do we?

We don't want to be bothered by kids.

Many think that kids don't belong in certain spaces like restaurants or airplanes.

Many act like adult conversation is more important than the needs of a child.

And no way do we want to be called childish or immature.

What an insult.

But Jesus sees things differently.

He says, unless you become like little children, you will never even enter the kingdom of heaven.

Becoming like little children, that is the baseline to even get in.

Then he goes on to answer the question that they asked: Who is the greatest in your kingdom?

Whoever humbles himself like this child, they are the greatest.

Humility.

When we think of humility, we think of people who don't live with extravagance, right?

Our homes here, under a certain square footage, are called humble.

We think of people who refuse compliments.

Wow, they're so humble and won't even take credit for what they've done.

And then we have this weird thing in our culture where people use the word humbled when we really mean honored.

I feel so humbled to win this great achievement award.

All of these examples are different from what Jesus is getting at.

He says, turn and become like little children.

Humble yourself like this child.

Kids have a light-hearted nature to them.

They aren't weighed down by the things that adults are.

They aren't searching for greatness like adults are.

They aren't trying to be more than they are, but they also aren't trying to be less.

They aren't trying to manufacture humility because it's something that they think that they should be.

Pastor, author, and justice advocate Danielle Strickland says this about humility.

She defines it this way: humility is simply agreeing with who God says you are.

Nothing more, nothing less.

Humility is simply agreeing with who God says you are.

What Jesus knew is that kids, they live this out.

I wrote this quote down that Ella, my nine-year-old, said while we were talking about body image one day.

She said, you need to just be you.

Ella and Danielle agree.

Humility is agreeing with who God says you are and just being you.

So for the rest of our time together, we're going to see what it can look like to take our cue from the kids, to let go of this pursuit of greatness and to become like little children to experience the kingdom of heaven.

I've spent the last 10 years working in kids' ministry, and before I was in ministry long ago, I worked as a nanny and at a child care center and as a kids' birthday party leader and as kids' summer camps and babysitting.

I've worked with hundreds of children, and over all these years and experiences, I have learned a few things about how kids have been created and how they operate.

This morning we're going to look at three key characteristics of kids and see how tapping into those which are still deep within us, how that will lead us to connection with God.

And these things will lead us to the kingdom of heaven.

When I think of kids, the first thing that comes to mind is that they are playful.

Kids love to play and they can make a game out of anything.

They learn through play, they accomplish things like chores best through play, and play is actually how they connect with others.

Now, before you check out and think that this message isn't for you because playfulness is below your pay grade, I'm not suggesting that we forsake all of our responsibilities and trade them in for fun all the time.

We still have to work and grocery shop and clean our homes and pay bills, but what I am suggesting is that we learn from kids, we become like little children and infuse playfulness into our spiritual life.

Our spiritual lives have gotten so serious, probably because we emphasize spiritual disciplines and quiet time.

Now, these aren't bad things, these are actually great things in your life with the Lord.

But do either of those phrases sound fun to you?

Not to kids, that's for sure.

When we talk to kids about spending time with God, we emphasize the importance of that, the spending time with God, but it doesn't look so serious.

What could it mean for us to infuse playfulness into our spiritual life?

Play is the avenue to connection.

One of the number one questions that my kids ask me every single day is, will you play with me?

What this question actually means is will you spend time with me?

Play is the primary connection point that kids have with others.

It's how they get their quality time bucket filled.

To infuse our spiritual life with playfulness is to spend time with God.

But here's the catch.

Play is intentionally unproductive.

That's like I said a bad word here.

It's intentionally unproductive.

So when I say to playfully spend time with God, I'm not talking about a Bible reading plan that has a goal attached to it.

I'm not talking about a list of prayer requests of all the people of all the suffering in the whole world.

These are both great things.

They're important for us to do.

But what we're talking about here is different.

Brian Edgar, who's a professor of theological studies, wrote, a playful spiritual life is one that emphasizes joy, delight, freedom, grace, and love.

Just like the ways that we connect with God through our spiritual disciplines look different for each of us, our playful connection with God will also look different.

For some, it will be walking or hiking through nature to experience God through his creation, not with mileage in mind, but with joy and freedom of moving your body and breathing in that fresh air.

For some, it could be playing music on either an actual instrument or from a playlist that you can dance along to to worship God with joy and freedom.

For some, it could be studying scripture with curiosity.

Sometimes I'll search a word in the Bible app and read all the different verses that come up containing that word and then find common themes of showing what God is like.

It's a fun game for me as I study scripture that doesn't have a particular hoped outcome other than connection with God.

Author and podcaster Annie F.

Downs, at the end of every podcast episode, she asks her guest, What sounds fun to you?

This is where you can start.

What sounds fun to you?

And then do that thing.

And then as you do that thing, see how you connect with your creator through delight and freedom and grace and love.

Here's what we need to remember: the kingdom of God won't fall apart if you take time to play.

It doesn't hinge on you.

To be able to play, we have to let go of this self-importance that we have.

And this is what leads us to humility.

Play is meant to be enjoyment with no accomplishment, which allows us to rest from this hamster wheel of our lives.

We can take a big exhale from holding everything together and working and working and working and simply enjoy God and our lives.

If our default posture is more work, more productivity, more improvement, what would it look like for you to interrupt your momentum with playfulness?

What sounds fun to you?

Let that connect you to God and ask him, Will you play with me?

Making space for this playfulness will unlock the next thing that we can learn from the faith of kids.

And that is that kids are filled with wonder.

Wonder is defined as a feeling of surprise mingled with admiration, caused by something beautiful, unexpected, unfamiliar, or inexplicable.

Wonder is a feeling that many of us have buried deep down.

When we show a sense of wonder, it reveals that we don't know everything, which can be a hard pill for us to swallow and an even harder thing to show to others.

We may still feel wonder internally, but we don't want other people to know for fear of embarrassment or judgment or general unkindness directed toward us.

So we tuck it away.

Kids, though, they are filled with wonder.

They want to tell you every single thing that is beautiful and unexpected and surprising.

In my house, this always starts with mama, mama, mama, guess what?

This year on Easter, early in the morning while it was still dark, I was getting ready for church, and my five-year-old son, Luke, he came in to be with me.

We started talking about Easter and why, yes, Easter is a church day.

We talked about Good Friday and how Jesus died in order to rescue us.

And he said, What?

He died.

And I said, Yeah, bud.

But do you know what happened on Easter?

Why today is a great day?

He said, What?

I said, on Easter, three days later, Jesus came back to life.

He was dead, and then he was alive.

And his eyes got really big.

And he said, What?

This was his way of saying, that's amazing, because it is.

Kids are amazed by Jesus.

As we teach kids about God on Sunday mornings in kids' ministry, what's happening right now, this mission is what drives how we do that by tapping into this innate sense of wonder that kids have.

We say awakening kids exists to awaken the kids of this generation to the wonder of Jesus and the truth of God's word.

Kids are amazed by Jesus, and this is what draws them to Him.

The God of the universe came to earth as a man in order to be with us and to rescue us so that we could live with Him forever.

Really think about that.

Let that wonder bubble up in you once again.

It's a humble posture for us to come before God in this wonder of what He has done.

When was the last time that you read a passage of Scripture and you were amazed by God?

We're gonna practice it together because I'm gonna guess that it's been a while.

I'm gonna read a story about Jesus from the Gospels.

It's not the one we're preaching, it's a whole separate story.

Allow yourself to tap into this wonder that is somewhere innately in you.

This is how we were created.

It's there.

Let go for just a moment of what does this story mean?

Or what should I learn from this?

Or the most dangerous one, I already know this story.

And just notice what is surprising and beautiful and unexpected.

This story is found in John 21.

It takes place after the resurrection.

Jesus has already appeared to his disciples, and they already know that he's alive.

Afterward, Jesus appeared again to his disciples by the Sea of Galilee.

It happened this way: Simon Peter, Thomas, Nathanael from Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two other disciples were together.

I'm going out to fish, Simon Peter told them, and they said, We'll go with you.

So they went out and got into the boat.

But that night they caught nothing.

Early in the morning, Jesus stood on the shore, but the disciples did not realize it was Jesus.

He called out to them, Friends, haven't you any fish?

No, they answered.

He said, Throw your net on the right side of the boat, and you'll find some.

When they did, they were unable to haul the net in because of the large number of fish.

Then the disciple, whom Jesus loved, said to Peter, It's the Lord.

As soon as Simon Peter heard him say, It is the Lord, he wrapped his outer garment around him, for he had taken it off and jumped into the water.

Take in this absurd, surprising, beautiful, unexpected story.

These men who were fishermen by trade, they've been fishing all night and they haven't caught anything.

Then Jesus stands on the shore and he has the audacity to tell them to move their net from one side of the boat to the other side.

Same water, same fishing spot.

And when they try to pull in that net, it is so full of fish that they can't even pull it in.

And John's response is, oh, it's Jesus! And Peter, in his wonder, jumps into the water to get to him.

When we approach God with wonder, we come alive because we see the miraculous.

We experience how big and amazing God is, and we can believe that for our own lives.

We start to see the things that God is doing, and we recognize it as God doing something beautiful and unexpected and surprising and amazing.

And we can say, oh, it's Jesus.

It's the Lord.

The Lord did this.

As we are filled with wonder, our spiritual life becomes filled with delight.

This is the last thing I'm gonna highlight about kids is that they experience life with delight.

Delight is a feeling of great pleasure or joy.

Kids delight in so many things.

If you've ever spent time around children or even just walk by them, you can hear the squeals of laughter over the tiny things that cause great delight.

In our preschool classroom here, we have a treasure box that's filled with these tiny treasures for kids to pick one as they leave.

Usually they're like these tiny squishy animals or a fan favorite.

Oh, it got real sticky.

A sticky hand.

Anyone know what this is?

As each kid comes out of the classroom, they run to their grown-up and they say, Look what I got.

It doesn't matter that they chose a sticky hand every single Sunday for the last 10 weeks.

What matters is that it's bringing them delight right now.

To delight in life, we have to set down our too-cool adult mode and allow ourselves to experience joy from the things that make us light up.

This is a posture of humility, of being who God has created you to be.

Now, these things will look different for everyone.

Things that bring me great delight are so different from what bring my husband great delight.

He finds delight in the way that milk swirls through his coffee, and I know some of that's true about you too, based on Instagram.

In the sound, he finds delight in the sound of meat searing in a hot pan and the very first cast while he's fishing.

While I find delight in blooming flowers in my garden and in sitting in the sun with feeling the warmth on my skin and in farm animals.

I love them.

When we delight in life, it brings connection.

When I sent this photo to my best friends, even the one who hates chickens, they felt delighted with me.

This is the same with God.

When I walk through my garden each morning and notice the flowers that have changed since the night before, I delight in them.

Nick, take it down.

And delight and playfulness can be seen as lowly or childish traits.

But Jesus says that whoever takes the humble position of a child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.

It takes humility to delight in the simple things.

It takes humility to show wonder in this world and be amazed by the things around us.

And it takes humility to set down our productivity to play.

Each of these will draw you into connection with God.

Scripture has a great emphasis on joy.

Joy comes from the Spirit working in us.

Psalm 16, 11 says, You make known to me the path of life.

In your presence there is fullness of joy.

At your right hand are pleasures forevermore.

Romans 14, 17, for the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.

Let us rejoice and be glad in it.

Now, I don't say all this to diminish or to discount suffering and pain and trauma.

Those things are real and they matter to God.

You matter to God.

Many of us in this room, me included, are going through really difficult things in our lives.

God sees you, God is with you, God is for you, and God won't abandon you in your grief.

And there's hope.

Church, the morning will come.

If you are in that place, the morning will come.

And this message still applies.

Kids are act are able to actually hold grief and joy at the same time.

And being playful through things like play therapy and art therapy, it actually helps them work through whatever pain they're experiencing.

But what I want you to hear this morning is that God is with you and that the morning will come.

It will.

However, we're experiencing life right now, author Steve Cust posed this question: How do we enjoy the God we believe in?

By learning from the kids in our midst of how to have a playful approach to our spiritual life and how to experience wonder and delight.

We will enjoy our life and our relationship with God.

If you want to actually experience this with kids, you can put this into practice every Sunday.

Come on, you knew it was coming.

You can learn about faith from children by serving in our kids' ministry.

You have an opportunity right here in this community to join in on that playfulness and wonder and delight that kids bring to every Sunday morning.

Just by being around them, you will grow in this also.

Or if you want an even more immersive experience, come serve at Camp Wonder.

Come be with us.

The name is purposeful.

Wonder guides our time, and everything that we do is infused with play and delight.

This is my personal invitation to you to explore joining one of these teams this summer.

To join, you're gonna pull out that connection card, you're gonna scan that QR code, kids ministry is under serve, Camp Wonder is under events.

You will find it.

I hope my inbox is full this week, and I hope I talk to every single one of you.

As we close, I want to come back to the question I posed at the beginning.

If Jesus showed up at your house, what questions would you have for him?

Last week I asked Ella this.

She didn't take long to think, and the first thing she said was, Can you stay for dinner?

Her first question to Jesus was, Will you be with me?

Will you spend time with me?

Who's the greatest in the kingdom?

It's the one who wants to spend time with Jesus.

Playfulness and wonder and delight, they're not the end goal.

These aren't new things to add on your to-do list or a benchmark to meet or a goal to accomplish.

Playfulness and wonder and delight are avenues for connection with God to set down our agenda, to set down what we think we already know, to set down our expectations of God, to set down the version of ourselves that we want to portray to the world, and to just be with Him.

Who's the greatest in the kingdom?

It's the one who wants to spend time with Jesus.

Let's pray.

Jesus, thank you that you invite us to spend time with you.

Thank you that you delight in us, that you are the one that provides this wonder and this delight and this playfulness.

God, I pray over our church.

I pray for every person in here that we would get a new version of connection with you, a deeper version of connection with you.

God, thank you that you invite us into that.

Lord, would you be glorified in this place?

Would you be glorified by our worship and by the way that we leave this place and celebrate?

God, thanks.

Amen.

We hope you are blessed by this message.

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