Sunday Meditation: Receiving One Child

The journey for Jesus and his apostles continues through Galilee.  Here the apostles do something very disagreeable to Christian sensibility.  They try to become superior over each other.  Jesus slaps this down right away, and he admonishes them by telling them that service and sacrifice is what makes one great in God’s eyes.  He tells them again He will be put to death, and juxtaposed to this prophesy He shows them the true meaning of service.  He takes a child and says those who receive such a child is that who is great.

 

Jesus and his disciples left from there and began a journey through Galilee, but he did not wish anyone to know about it. 
He was teaching his disciples and telling them,
“The Son of Man is to be handed over to men
and they will kill him, and three days after his death the Son of Man will rise.”  But they did not understand the saying,
and they were afraid to question him.

They came to Capernaum and, once inside the house,
he began to ask them, “What were you arguing about on the way?”  But they remained silent.
They had been discussing among themselves on the way
who was the greatest.  Then he sat down, called the Twelve, and said to them, “If anyone wishes to be first,
he shall be the last of all and the servant of all.” 
Taking a child, he placed it in their midst,
and putting his arms around it, he said to them,
“Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives me; and whoever receives me, receives not me but the One who sent me.”

~Mk 9:30-37

I think this was the passage that inspired me to adopt, or at least it confirmed my decision to adopt.  Children are extremely important to Jesus.  Elsewhere Jesus will tell the apostles that unless they need to become like children in order to enter the Kingdom of God. 

To get the full understanding of this passage, I like Fr. Geoffrey’s explanation again.

 

So the Messiah must not be understood in terms of a conquering king, but as a suffering servant and an innocent child.

 

Sunday Meditation: “Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives me”

 

I am going to go with this beautiful Communion song, “I Come With Joy (A Child Of God).” 

 

The first stanza captures today’s themes perfectly:

 

I come with joy, a child of God,

forgiven, loved and free,

the life of Jesus to recall,

in love laid down for me.