Well, good morning. Once again, I have the privilege of reading scripture. I'll be reading from Deuteronomy chapter six, verses one through 12, uh, out of the, uh, English standard version this morning. Now this is the commandment, the statues and the rules that the Lord, your God commanded me to teach you. that you may do them in the land to which you are going over to possess it, that you may fear the Lord your God, you and your sons and your sons' sons, by keeping the statutes and his commandments, which I command you, all the days of your life, and that your days may be long. Hear therefore, O Israel, and be careful to do them, that it may go well with you, and that you may multiply greatly as the Lord, the God of your fathers, has promised you in the land flowing from milk and honey. Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might. And these words I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children and shall talk of them when you sit in the house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates. And when the Lord your God brings you to the land that he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give you, with great good cities that you did not build, and houses full of all good things that you did not fill, and cisterns that you did not dig, and vineyards and olive trees that you did not plant, and when you eat and are full, Then take care lest you forget the Lord who brought you out of the land of Egypt and out of the house of slavery. This is the inerrant and inspired word of Almighty God. You may be seated. Well, good morning, church family. Let's turn now in our Bibles to the New Testament, to Matthew's Gospel, Matthew 19. As you're turning there, let me just acknowledge that you may well recognize that reading that we just enjoyed from Deuteronomy 6. You may recognize the opening words there as the Shema. an ancient prayer, an ancient creed, reminding God's people, Israel, of her allegiance to God and her dependence upon God. The Shema, the word simply means hear, it's a command, listen to this, hear, O Israel, Yahweh is our God, Yahweh is one, and it's followed by what? You shall. You shall. You shall love God and train your children and your grandchildren in the love of God. And let me just say by way of addressing those of you who always want to know what the point of this thing is. Here's the point that we're just going to squeeze as we turn to Matthew 19 and hear Jesus echo of this heart of God for children. God calls upon parents and listen he calls upon the entire covenant community in our new covenant vernacular we would say the church. He calls us to cherish children and nurture them to know and walk in God's ways. Every person who belongs to the covenant community, every believer here today who is indwelt by the Spirit of God, who has been brought into the body of Christ by God's grace has skin in the game. This heart of God for children is echoed in the words of our Savior and our King Jesus here in Matthew 19. So, let's just listen to the words of our Savior. Matthew tells us that some children were brought to Him so that He might lay His hands on them and pray, and the disciples rebuked them. Note that. But Jesus said, let the children alone, and do not hinder them from coming to me, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these. And after laying his hands on them, he departed from there. Let's just remember where we've been. Matthew has been telling us in his gospel that the arrival of Christ, God the eternal son, born into humanity in the person of Jesus Christ, the arrival of Yahweh's anointed king, marks the in-breaking of heaven to this earth. In the gospel of repentance and faith in Christ, repentance and allegiance to Christ, God is reclaiming his world and his people for his glory. And this reclamation that is the fruit of the gospel of the kingdom shows up in our relationships with other image bearers. Remember, the king's forgiven people are in turn forgiving people. This is the fragrance of the gospel. In a world full of begrudging scorekeepers, God's people, by grace, are increasingly not that way. Forgiven people forgive. Have you heard this? You did about three weeks ago. And when Christ is your king, marriages are radically transformed. so different from the revolving door of adultery and divorce that is so common in our culture, in our world today. And the fruit of such marriages, precious children, each one uniquely shaped as an image bearer of God, children provide yet another opportunity for the glory of the gospel to be put on display in our world. the way we think about and relate to children, not just those of us who are parents or grandparents, but as a church, says something to our community about the gospel. I wonder, do you ever think about the little ones in our fellowship and how we relate to them that way? The way we view little children is perhaps one of the greatest evidences that we either know the Savior or we do not. Christ's reign in the lives of his people is decidedly kid-friendly. And it's a powerful witness to our community. And this biblical view of children that Jesus so emphatically teaches his first followers here in just these three verses, shines brightly against a very dark backdrop in our culture. I'm not going to dwell on this, but I do want you to consider the backdrop. What's happening in the world around us? Well, our world is a very hostile place for children. In America, one of the most dangerous places for a child to be is in its own mother's womb. Nearly a million children will be murdered in utero in a given year in the United States. Almost two-thirds of Americans agree that this is something that should be legal at some level. And we have two presidential candidates right now, neither who can decide where they want to line up on this. About 19 million American kids grow up without a father in the home. Fatherlessness in households is an epidemic in our land. And you know, America's children suffer in more insidious ways than that, less visible ways, less openly horrific ways. At the other end of the spectrum are boys and girls raised by parents who idolize their offspring. And so they cater to every earthly want that little boy or that little girl has while ignoring their eternal souls. And the child-centered home, I'll say more about this later, is so commonplace in our culture that we confuse that with loving children. Statistics are not kept on such things, obviously, but you can be sure that when colleges and universities in the U.S. now have so-called safe spaces for young adults so they don't have to hear anything that hurts their feelings, you can be sure we have gone way off course with respect to raising children. That's the culture. That's the backdrop. The encouragement is what? The gospel at work in a family shines brightly against that kind of backdrop. The gospel of the kingdom radically changes, radically transforms both attitude and practice when it comes to valuing children. And that means just as was true of marriages among God's people, is also true of parenting among God's people. It's one of the brightest witnesses that we have for our community. It really is. Right here in Idaho, there is a bright witness among God's people in terms of how we think and act toward children, at least there is meant to be. Well, we should probably get to the passage, don't you think? I kind of went on a little rant there. But I think it's important that we understand the backdrop that we're living in because we can be in Christian community to such an extent that we kind of lose track of that darkness that the light of the gospel is shining into. So we'll take this passage this morning in three parts, three verses, three parts, very simple. Matthew tells us of a commotion, and then he tells us of a correction, and then he'll tell us of a conclusion. And isn't it great that all of those words start with C? What's the commotion? Look at verse 13. Then some children were brought to Jesus so that he might lay his hands on them and pray, and the disciples, rebuked them, rebuked the parents, the people who were bringing their children. Remember, Jesus and his closest followers, the 12, are journeying from Galilee to Jerusalem. They're in the area of Perea, or east of the Jordan River, making their way to Jerusalem for the Passover. And it will be this Passover in Jerusalem during which Jesus, the Lamb of God who has come to take away the sins of his people, will die a bloody death on a cross at Calvary. The cross looms large now for Jesus as he's with his men and what is on our Savior's mind but seizing this opportunity to recalibrate his disciples with respect to their attitudes about children. This was important to Jesus. Mark tells us that on the way to Jerusalem, Jesus and his men are in a house, and as was always the case, crowds flocked to Jesus with many demands. But in the midst of all of these demands, says Matthew, parents and others are bringing their little ones. The Greek word for children here is padeion. It refers to newborns, toddlers, all the way up to maybe, you know, six, seven years old, about that. So think little kids, young kids. Luke's account, if you read that as was suggested, refers to babies. So in your mind's eye, just picture this scene. Parents and relatives bringing newborns perhaps, little toddlers, and a little bit older children. And it was a very common thing for Jewish parents to bring children to a rabbi or a respected elder in the community and seek a blessing, to ask for that individual to pray. over their children. And this was one of the things that caused Israel to stand out among the pagan nations that they lived around. And we know, don't we, that little children can create quite a commotion. I mean, that's their job. And every once in a while, that will happen in our Lord's Day gatherings here. There will be some kind of a commotion. With very little effort, they can pull this off. I mean, they don't even break a sweat. And they're not overly concerned about the commotion they're creating. And I just want to ask you, church, how do you feel? What is your first thought when something like that happens? How does it match? what you see in your king in the text we look at this morning. Never mind sitting in a building with a cross on it. What is our attitude when this kind of stuff happens, say, at a restaurant or, heaven forbid, at an airplane? I don't mean a flight to Boise. I mean Charlotte, that kind of flight, a long one. And before you answer, I want you to notice with me in the text that from Jesus' perspective, the commotion is not the kids, it's the disciples. It's the disciples' reaction to the kids. Mark's gospel tells us that Jesus heard this commotion and when Jesus saw this, he was indignant. How many of you know when Jesus sees you doing something and He's indignant, that ain't a good thing? Jesus is repulsed by His disciples' dismissive attitude toward children. I'm not making this up. It's in the text. Just look at your Bible. The verb tense in verse 13 suggests that these parents and others just kept on bringing children more and more, and the disciples just kept on rebuking. What's a rebuke? It's kind of like, you guys should be ashamed of yourself. Get out of here. The master has far more important things to do than fiddle around with your kids. To be rebuked is to be severely censured. There's nothing polite about it. Not when it's done this way. And you just have to ask yourself, why would they have this kind of attitude toward children? These are Jesus' closest followers. These men have watched Jesus interact with people in communities all over Israel going on three years now. Why would they still react this harshly to these parents? Well, I want to allow for the fact that they probably are sincere in this. There's not malice in it so much as they are trying to guard Jesus' time. It's very possible that they're wanting to guard their own time with Jesus. which was precious to them in light of the press of public ministry. My point is simply that these disciples may be sincere, it's just that they're sincerely wrong. How many of you know sincerity is not always the best gauge of the rightness of something? What might be a takeaway from us? Well, as a church family, we might be very sincere in planning ministry priorities here at Hayden Bible Church, but if we were to not be deliberate about seeing our children as an essential part of the ministry of this church, we will have gone way off course in terms of reflecting the heart of our King. Now, I'm not suggesting we've done so, but I am suggesting we don't want to do so. We don't want to go in that direction. All disciples are privileged and called to love children toward Jesus. And if you're sitting here today and you're thinking, well, Pastor, that's all well and good, but I'm kind of an old duffer now, and my kids are long gone, or I didn't have any kids, and I'm not like you. I don't have to talk about my grandkids all the time. I'm gonna talk about my grandkids. What was I saying? And you're thinking to yourself, well, that's not to do with me. If you're a part of this fellowship where there are children, this is to do with you. And it's to do with me. And if that's anyone's attitude, that's the very problem Jesus is correcting here in His disciples. And that brings us to the correction. So we've had a commotion. Who made the commotion? The disciples, not the kids. What's the correction? Look at verse 14. Jesus said, let the children alone and do not hinder them from coming to me." You see, even, don't miss this, even well-meaning disciples, these are the good guys. These are the future apostles whose teaching the church itself will be foundational. Even well-meaning disciples must be recalibrated to love children the way Jesus loves children, eagerly. deliberately pointing them to our Savior. I ask you, friend, today, if any of our little ones followed you, I don't mean out the door, I mean in the press of life, and just followed your example, would they end up closer to Jesus? That's meant to happen among God's covenant people. So it's possible I don't know your heart, but it is possible that some of us here today might need this kind of recalibrating. We want to ask ourselves as individuals, and we want to ask ourselves as a congregation, am I helping or hindering children from coming to Christ? This passage suggests, and I'm going to show you a couple others here in a few minutes, suggesting that there's no neutral in this. It's one or the other, because it involves a mindset, not just a pattern of behavior. Let the children alone, says Jesus. Let the little children come to me, some of your translations say. And I got stuck on that, so join me, right, in being stuck on that. What an interesting way to put that. I thought the parents, I thought the big people were taking the little people to Jesus. But Jesus says, no, let them come to me. What's he talking about here? The disposition of these very young children is to come to Jesus. Now, don't misunderstand this. This is not a statement about the innocence of children, that they are sinless. Anybody here with little kids knows they are not sinless, any more than you or I are sinless. But we also know, do we not, that with very little kids, they are not yet jaded about the world they've been born into. This is not rocket science. So these little children are not fearful as they approach Jesus. Their parents are leading them in that direction toward Jesus. These children are attracted to the love of God exuding from God the Son. Can you imagine such a thing? The expression on our king's face as he welcomed these little children to himself. And this is a very natural and normal season of life for little children to come to Jesus. I want to just share with you, I thought about putting this on the screen, but I worried you'd hurt yourselves trying to write it down. It's kind of long, but this is a statement from a fellow named R.C.H. Lenski in his commentary on Matthew's gospel. I want to just read to you what he says. He says, have you ever noticed this mysterious thing That when you tell the smallest child about God, the child never asks with strangeness and wonder, who is God? I've never seen him. But listens with a shining face to the words as though they were soft, loving sounds from the land of home. This was written a while ago. Or when you teach a child to fold its little hands in prayer, He or she does this as though it were just a matter of course, as though there were an opening for that child of that world of which the child has been dreaming and longing with anticipation. Or tell them, these little ones, the stories of the Savior, how their pure eyes shine and how their little hearts beat. This fellow is not making a doctrinal statement about the innocence of children. He's simply pointing out the obvious thing that all of us should see when we see little ones, very little ones, is that they're impressionable. Ecclesiastes 12.1 says this, Remember also your creator in the days of your youth before the evil days happen and the years draw near in which you will say, I have no delight in them. What in the world is that talking about? At some point, it's normal for a person to get pretty jaded about life in a fallen world. And we have the privilege as the company of God's people, his covenant people, to build now in our youngsters what they will be remembering about their creator from the days of their youth. Is this making any sense at all? The Old Testament scripture that our elder brother Coldy read to us, Deuteronomy 6, reminds us of that. God's people, Israel, would stand out from among the nations by the way they welcomed and trained, specifically how they trained their children toward love of God. And here's the thing, those, you're still listening, those disadvantages that I rattled off earlier about what's happening in our culture. As horrific as some of those things are, as many of you know, they're not new or unique in our day. They really are not. Matthew has already told us in his gospel that there was this wicked king Herod who slaughtered the little boys around Bethlehem, trying in vain to kill God the Son, Jesus. Israel historically lived around pagan nations who routinely sacrificed their children to false gods, burning them at altars. And so, And Israel, at different times in her history, embraced these horrific practices. They lived around other cultures who sold children into slavery and worse things. As Jesus is speaking his words to his men, they lived under the thumb of the Roman Empire, whose abuse and exploitation of children was widespread and accepted. This has always been the context for the bright witness of God's people or the opportunity for bright witness among God's people in how differently we care for and love children. The gospel then is restoring what sin has so horribly distorted in family and in community relationships. Notice again with me Jesus' correction of his own disciples here. Still in verse 14, let the little children alone, do not hinder them from coming to me. The verb tense here, present tense, negative, in other words, you guys need to stop what you've been doing. This isn't a one-off thing. I've noticed this about you and you guys need to stop doing what you've been doing. It pains our King. It grieves Jesus. He's filled with righteous indignation. when any of his followers hinder, discourage a little child from coming to him. And he'd say, well, my goodness, I'm really surprised you're preaching this because we're not the kind of people who would hinder a child from coming to Jesus, are we? I mean, we're church people. We're early service church people, the elect of God. How do you suppose, again, Jesus is addressing disciples, not his culture. How do you suppose disciples, then, might hinder children from coming to Jesus? Well, certainly an attitude that somehow conveys that children do not matter, that they just don't have enough to contribute yet, they're dismissed as a hindrance, you know, that sort of thing. How many of you know our children know when they are loved and wanted, and they know when they are not? Certainly a failure to teach them deliberately about Jesus would hinder them from coming to Jesus. Proverbs 22.6 says this, train up a child in the way he should go. Even when he is old, he will not depart from it. Parents and grandparents, now is the time When children are young and impressionable, that deliberate instruction in the things of God is so imperative. Because you're cutting a trail, you see. Do you have a plan? Not just a thought, but a plan that's being carried out to deliberately make much of Jesus, to deliberately make much of God in his ways to our youngest children. From the moment they are born, we can sing of Jesus as we hold them in our arms. That's happening right now in our nursery. And we don't even check to see if you've got a singing voice to do that. It's precious to those children. And as they get older. We can share the Bible with them in age-appropriate ways. We can raise them in the company of God's people. I am so delighted that even at this early service, we have a whole bunch of kids in our children's church. We've got some kids here in the auditorium with us. And what are the parents doing? They're training their children that on the Lord's Day, we gather with God's people. This is a covenant community, and we worship God. because we love Him and we belong to Him and we are His people in this world. Amen? So if you ever want to see one of your elders twitch, and you don't, I've seen it, just whine about kids making a noise in here. We don't want to hear it. It's a reminder to all of us of the noise we make every time we cry out to God. And how many of you know he's always got time for us? He's always very concerned about what we bring to him. That was also a rant. It doesn't count against my time. Don't hinder children by leaving them starved for the gospel and the Word of God and the worship of God. And you might think I'm speaking in terms of what happens on a Lord's Day morning. I'm actually not. This is imperative in terms of what happens in our homes. Let me just ask you this. Parents, grandparents in particular, are we persuaded that our children need Jesus to save them from their sins? Are you persuaded of that? Because that will energize what's going on in the home in terms of how much you speak of Christ and make it clear to those little ones your love for Christ. It's not a contrived thing when your heart is burning with an awareness that life is short. And there is eternity ahead. And our children need Jesus to save their eternal souls. So we want to look for those opportunities in everyday life. Our elder, Gary Munson, did us a great favor. He was singing that song, what's that song called again? All Creatures of Our God and King. What was my point? Oh, and you said something about the change of seasons. God did that. I read somewhere in Scripture that the Lord gives us life in seasons. Ecclesiastes 3, right? That was God's before it was a rock and roll song, right? For everything there is a purpose under heaven. How difficult is it to stop in this change of season and remark to our children the wonders of our God in creation? God did that. Well. We want to have an attitude, church, of helping, enabling this kind of training and influencing that our families have. So you don't want to be one of those people who says, well, I don't have kids. This isn't really for me. No, this is to do with all of us. We've all got skin in the game. These kids are watching us. And they're sniffing out genuineness or lack thereof. By the way, this is one of the reasons, you still with me? This is one of the reasons why we now send home with parents every Sunday family devotional materials from our children's church teachings, just as a way of encouraging moms and dads, hey, let's make this part of what we're doing in the home. Let's follow up with what is learned on Sunday in the home. This is why some of our kids have this little listening guide on a clipboard as they're in here. And how many of you know our heart as a church is not that this is just busy work, hush-up work, that kind of thing. This is to recognize that our children have the ability, because God gives it, to hear the Word of God and actually understand the Word of God. How else might we as a church inadvertently hinder children from coming to Jesus? You know, our elders were discussing this this past week at our meeting and looking at this passage and we thought of what happens when we as adults, and I can just speak from personal experience, when as an adult I have shown my children duplicity, hypocrisy, that's a great spiritual hindrance to children. They know that when they see it. What are we teaching our children about faith in God when we sing of it on Sunday? But for most of the week, we live in dread of what's happening in the world. We live in fear about who's going to get elected in November. Does this making sense? What else is a hindrance to children? Ephesians 6.4 says this, Now here's another text in scripture that suggests there's no neutral. There's provoking children and the opposite of that is bringing them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. So dad, as head of household, moms too, are not to exasperate their children. Not because an exasperated child is unpleasant, I mean there is that, but because exasperation You know, provoking children in this way hinders their own relationship with the Lord. It may hinder them from coming to the Lord. So how might we exasperate our children, provoke our children? When your marriage is a shipwreck, I mean, you know, that doesn't just affect the husband and wife. That affects the kids and it provokes them to think deep thoughts about this profession of faith in God with whom all things are possible. I was talking to our biblical counseling director, Bill Sanchez, about this, and he said, you know, I've been reading this book called The Heart of Anger that has a chapter on provoking children. What does that look like in real time? And I'm not going to read from the book. I'm going to just paraphrase a couple, three things here. But the author says when your home is child-centered, rather than Christ-centered. Remember, the world tells you that's love, that's what you do. You train those kids that the whole universe revolves around them. Disregard their eternal soul. When your home is child-centered rather than Christ-centered, children are hindered from giving Christ priority in their own lives. They're not being taught that foundational thing, that he's at the center of all things. Because they don't see it in mom and dad. Parents, when we live in sin, when we live in license, when we're too quick to pull that wrong understanding of grace card that says, well, I'm a grace person. God doesn't care about holiness. We provoke our children to think wrong thoughts about God. The other extreme is also true when we live legalistically. I've got some personal experience with this. What matters is what other people see. So shut up and settle down. We're going to church. I'm sorry this isn't practical to you, but maybe you can learn from some of my mistakes here. I'm so glad to be a grandfather because it's like a mulligan on all of this stuff. You get another swing at it. Listen, one way, one way, stay with me here, we're almost done. One way children are sometimes exasperated occurs simply when we don't accept their faith in Christ as valid. Because they don't understand the doctrine of the Trinity yet. Never mind that neither do you. It's a mystery. Doesn't mean we can't know things about it, but it is a mystery. And we forget that simple faith in the sufficiency of Jesus is saving faith. Amen? Charles Spurgeon, let me tell you a quick story first since I'm already blowing up the time here. Two of our grandchildren went to our vacation Bible school just this past summer, and I'm so grateful to the many of you who were part of making that happen. Not my kids going, but the VBS happened. And our grandson, six years old, is not very expressive. He's very withdrawn, and I couldn't tell if he was engaging or not the whole week. And I kind of leaned toward, I don't think this engaged him. And so at home, a week or so after VBS, we're reading a nativity account from a book at our house, and he just looks at me and he says, I know my Bible verse. I said, well, what are you talking about? He says, Romans 12.2. Don't be conformed to the image of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind." And as I'm picking my jaw off of my lap, listening to that, that was the memory verse from Vacation Bible School. And he just nailed it. I'm not bragging on him. I'm bragging on the power of the Spirit of God and a reminder to grandpas that kids can understand things about God. That's why there's this Shema in our Old Testament to God's covenant people, Israel. Hear this. Train them this way. Charles Spurgeon, in a sermon on Mark's account of this, he said this. He says, I will say broadly, So he's just broad brushing this. I will say broadly that I have more confidence in the spiritual life of the children that I have received into this church than I have in the spiritual condition of some adults thus received. A clearer understanding of the gospel and a warmer heart toward Christ than in some adults. I'll just leave that hanging there. If Jesus was this indignant toward disciples hindering children from coming to him physically, how indignant must our King be toward any behavior that hinders our little ones spiritually? So we need to ask ourselves as a church, said the pastor in closing, does the Christianity our children see in us influence them toward Jesus? You could personalize it, I suppose, because I have been this past week. Am I helping or hindering children coming to Christ? Well, we've seen the commotion. caused by disciples who think wrongly about little ones. And we've heard the correction. Let's just really quickly see the conclusion here. Still in verse 14, let the children alone, says Jesus, do not hinder them from coming to me for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these. And that phrase, to such as these, you might want to circle that one so you don't forget this. Jesus is not saying that children are morally innocent and all little children will be saved. We know that's not true. Jesus is not saying that little children are more important than us old people, by comparison, age-wise. He's not even referring to literal children now. We saw this back in Matthew 18. He's using them as an object lesson for everybody. Kingdom people are characterized by such as these little children. Meaning what? Children are needy. Children are dependent. Children are, in their neediness and their full dependence, they unashamedly seek what is needed. Children gladly receive what's given. Children are not overly concerned about what they're contributing, they're just receiving. It's not a quid pro quo kind of thing, not with real little kids. And children have this receptiveness to what is being taught them, which is why we need to take such care in what is taught. But really what Jesus is getting at here is not all that complicated. He's just speaking of childlike faith, simple trust in Christ. Like a baby resting in dad's arms. In Mark's account of this whole kid thing, Jesus said this, "'Truly I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it.'" So there's an implied conclusion here, and then there's, I think, a more direct conclusion. What's the implied conclusion? Have you entered the kingdom of heaven? As a little child. Needy. Dependent. With nothing in your hands to offer. Nothing in my hand I bring simply to his cross I cling. With simple faith. I don't know everything. But I know I'm a great sinner and God has given me a great Savior in Jesus." Is that you? There is a demonstrated conclusion here as well. Look at verse 15 in Matthew. After laying his hands on them, the children, he departed from there. Here is Jesus imparting blessing imparting his love for and acceptance of these kids. And I can't help but picture this in my mind's eye and not see for us that he is demonstrating a stewardship for us to embrace. That's what that whole hero Israel thing is all about. God saying to his people, these kids are mine before they're yours. And I'm giving you a stewardship of influence of these children. And though we cannot save our children, salvation is of the Lord, that ultimately is between each little girl and boy, each teenager, each, you know, you get the idea. But church, how many of you know God uses means And one of his chosen means of pointing our little ones to Jesus is how we function as a church. The attitude and the actions that are seen in our lives. So let me just end where we began. God calls upon parents. and the church to cherish children and nurture children to know and walk in his ways. All right, that's it. Let's pray. Lord, we thank you so much for the truth of what we sang. Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so. And Lord, here is a familiar passage to us, and yet we're challenged with this reminder that you were speaking to disciples, you were speaking to men who knew all about the practice of seeking a blessing from God, and yet somehow in the busyness and press, even of ministry, they had lost sight of your heart for little ones. Lord, I pray that you would protect us as a church that we would not follow in those footsteps. And so if there, Lord, is a need for correction here among us as individuals in our private lives, in our homes, I pray, Lord, that you would graciously take us by the hand and lead us through that recalibration that we just read about this morning. And Lord, I pray that it would be the testimony of Hayden Bible Church and other fellowships who love you and worship you and cling to your word, Lord, as you allow. I pray that it would be our testimony as your covenant people, your new covenant people, That there is a big, big difference between our community and the way God's people think of children and minister to children. We ask that you would cause this to be so. In Jesus, it's in your name that we pray. Amen.