Every thing seems to be, as it should…save one thing. Like an eerie Hitchcock tale….all of the children are silent, sullen and still. There are no sparklers waving around...no footballs flying through the air, laugher and giggling are gone.

It drives one to ask, “What is the matter with these children? What is wrong with this generation?”  That is the question of our text and the scene painted in Jesus’ parable…petulant children that are hard to please.

Its setting is the market place…a living presence in the ancient world…charged with activity: buyers and sellers, goat and fabrics and food.  But the children that you would expect to find darting in and out playing games and causing mischief…bringing revelry and life to the public square are silent and still.  What could be more awful that a picture of life where the children have forgotten how to play?

So, it is in this parable when the children are petitioned to play…

Let’s pretend we are at a wedding dancing to the flute.  You…you can be the bride dressed in bed sheets and your Mother’s pearls and you can be the groom wearing your father’s ill-fitting suit and top hat.  I can be the minister holding the big book and saying happy words over crying people.  There will be food and drink, music and dancing. We will sing and laugh and play. But the children would not play wedding games.

Let’s pretend we are at a funeral crying for the dead.  We will cover any color on our clothing and drape ourselves in black.  You…you are pretty quiet… you can be the body.  And you…you are pretty loud, you can be the mourners and I can be the minister holding the big book saying sad words over crying people.  There will be flowers and a chapel and we will wail and cry and mourn. But the children would not play funeral games.  They refused to play at all.

This was the way of Jesus’ generation. A few followed John and a bit more continued in movement fulfilled in Jesus and the rest refused to respond at all…either to the message of Jesus to  live or the call of John to die.

Like pouting children who could not get their way… they rejected them both.   “We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we wailed, and you did not mourn.”

Jesus explains the parable. “John came neither eating nor drinking and they say, “He has a demon””; John the Baptist was too much.  John walked out of the wilderness into the towns.  He was an outsider. He did not look like those to whom he preached. His wardrobe was different and wild: camel’s hair cloak and a leather belt.  He refused to eat like the others. His diet consisted of bugs and honey…strict and holy like that of the prophets.  His life was solitary and separate.  His company…no one.  His message…harsh. Wail, cry, and mourn for what you have done. Repent, be baptized and make your crooked paths straight for soon judgment is coming. 

Jesus was not enough. The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, “Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!” Jesus lived in the towns amidst the people.  He was one of them.   He looked just like those to whom he preached.  He dressed as they did.  His diet was not holy but common.  He ate and drank and lived as the people did.  His companions were collaborators who profited from the enemy and criminals with warrants out for their arrest, men who bought power with votes and women who sold love for a moment. His message was Repent, be baptized enter into the loving family of God.  We will sing, laugh, and love together.

Those too colicky of soul cannot see the grace that exists even in John’s judgment or the duty of law found in Jesus’ love. They do not respond to the gospel games of John and Jesus…they refuse to be players at all.

In this parable, Play should not be thought of as mere frivolity. There is after all, a drama to our lives...a certain sense of performance to our days.  As Shakespeare reminds us…"All the world 's a stage, and all the men and women merely players. They have their exits and their entrances; And one man in his time plays many parts."

Any child or anyone still a child at heart knows the games that children perform amongst themselves.  They begin with an invocation of sorts … a sort of call to action to enter into the game...Do you want to Play? Cops and Robbers, Cowboys and Indians, dress-up, Barbies or G.I. Joe each have their own set of rules of to follow and roles to play. 

Such times aren’t that different from other more mature moments in our lives when we with the help of a bit of creativity we imagine new roles of life into being…when you get that casting call at work and you are able to  imagine yourself thriving in that job. Or when you say I do and now play the part of husband or wife or even when with a bit of spirited improve you walk that aisle and say yes taking the leading role of your life in being a follower of Christ.  

Imagination, as I have learned from your pastor, is organ of faith.  It allows us to perceive of something larger than ourselves…to look up to the stars and imagine the divine.  If Jesus says that the only way to enter the kingdom of heaven is to come as a little child then maybe just maybe our imaginations are the beginning.

Did any of you have an imaginary friend when you were a child?  My wife Erin, when she was a kid, had one of her very own.  Her mother couldn’t help but to smile that “sheepish” parental grin as every day when she would politely open the car door for her harmless little companion…buckle him in and then scoot over in the backseat so that they could have more room.  She would set aside part of her meal and screech out loud if she thought her father was about to sit on him. He would walk with her and talk with her. And one day, her mother just had to ask, “Honey, who are you talking to?  What is your friend’s name? “Why, mother, it is just Jesus, she replied.

JESUS! Obviously… she was aback.  I mean its not every day that your little girl talks to Jesus…or is it. She was only rehearsing what it would be like if everything that her parents had told about God were actually true:  that Jesus was her Lord and her very best friend….that he would always be with her…always care for her and protect her…and provide for her and the one day he would live in her heart…but apparently until then, in her mind, he slept under the bed. 

Families do this all the time.  From bedtimes stories to vacations…they tell and retell the stories that make them who they are.  

Diana Garland is the chair of the School of Social Work at Baylor University.  In her book, The Sacred Stories of Ordinary Families, she highlights the importance of families rehearsing their lives through rituals.  It is how tales and traits fair from generation to generation. Every family has rituals or ways [they] go about both the everyday and the special tasks of life. Rituals are the dance steps that the family knows.  [They are] the rhythms we can count on to mark our days with pattern.  Doing things the same way communicates to family members that they belong… Children in particular love rituals because they provide the security of knowing what is going to happen next. They can be simple and by themselves, they don’t mean much. But they are important because they organize life in ways…that the meaning of shared experience comes through.

It is the same way with your family of faith, you know…every time simple sea salt and votives are transformed into the “salt of the earth” and the “light of the world.” We rehearse the gospel story and mark the time week in and week out so that that over time it may begin to sink deeply in to the marrow of who we are. 

Tomorrow, we celebrate freedom in this country…  No other monument speaks so clearly, than that of the statue of liberty, to the role that Americans have played at their best in the open acceptance of the people.  Its base bears this inspired inscription:  “Give me your tired, your poor, Your Huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of you teeming shore.  Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me.

Today, however, today is the Lord’s Day.  On it, we celebrate the source of all liberty and the pathway to true freedom for all people in the world.  It is best exemplified in stone not by Lady Liberty, but Christ the Redeemer, overlooking the beautiful city of Rio de Janero.  There Christ is depicted standing tall with outstretched arms 28 meters from tip to tip.  Arms wide enough to catch you when you stumble and gentle enough to guide you on your way.  Can you even imagine?

For some of us, it is difficult to imagine such a thing.  Life has not been fair and time not always on our side.  Before you know it life can pass away so quickly that you feel far removed from any sense of child like imagination… your creativity dulled your imagination stifled you cannot even see in your mind's eye the other worldliness of faith and following Jesus. You are Peter Pan all grown up…stuck in the real world…unable to find a happy thought about faith, family or God on which to fly. Everything seems rote, tired, and empty and no amount of magic dust will every change that. To whom will you turn?

For others there is no chance of remembering the innocence of a child’s imagination in your biological family or your family of faith.  Your past has been marred by disappointment or neglect or by others whose actions were out of your control.  The burden that you carry in life weighs deeply upon your soul.  Whom will you ever trust?           

“Come to me,” Jesus says… “all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens and I will give you rest.”

Jesus’ invitation is to Take his yoke upon you, and learn from him... for he is a gentle teacher and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.

If you are weary today, you might find Jesus standing at your door and knocking…waiting for you with outstretched arms.  He has already called your name… Are you ready to come out and enter into life in a new role?  Are you ready to come out and play?

If you are, it is time to open the door.  Amen.