Feeling Joy When You Don't Want To Series

People love a baby. You only have to watch when a new baby enters our auditorium how people flock around that baby. People love little children as well. We consider them so cute. And when they come up with the most interesting comments we just laugh at them. Kids have few if any inhibitions. For example.

My father would tell this story on himself. When he was a kid his parents invited a particular lady around to their house for dinner. During the meal my dad climbed up the back of the woman’s chair. She asked him what he was doing. He said, “I am looking to see if you have a mouth in the back of your neck.”

“Why would you want to do that?” the woman asked.

“Well,” said my dad, “my father says that you always talk out of the back of your neck.”

A kindergarten pupil told his teacher he’d found a cat, but it was dead. “How do you know that the cat was dead?” she asked her pupil. “Because I pissed in its ear and it didn’t move,” answered the child innocently.

“You did WHAT???” the teacher exclaimed in surprise. “You know,” explained the boy, “I leaned over and went ’Pssst!’ and it didn’t move.”

A mother tells a story about when she was six months pregnant with her third child. Her three-year-old came into the room when she was just getting ready to get into the shower.

She said, “Mommy, you are getting fat!” She replied, “Yes, honey, remember Mommy has a baby growing in her tummy.”

“I know,” she replied, but what’s growing in your butt?”

A certain little girl, when asked her name, would reply, “I’m Mr. Sugarbrown’s daughter.” Her mother told her this was wrong, she must say, “I’m Jane Sugarbrown.” The pastor spoke to her after the worship service and said, “Aren’t you Mr. Sugarbrown’s daughter?”

She replied, “I thought I was, but mother says I’m not.”

On the first day of school, the kindergarten teacher said, "If anyone has to go to the bathroom, hold up your hand." A little voice from the room asked, "How will that help?"

A three-year-old went with his dad to see a litter of kittens. Upon returning home, he breathlessly informed his mother that there were two boy kittens and two girl kittens. "How did you know?" his mother asked. "Daddy picked them up and looked underneath," he replied. "I think it’s printed on the bottom."

You may remember when you said things like that, when you embarrassed your parents to death. But most people take these things without being offended because they recognize that they come from children. We don’t expect them to be mature like adults.

Everyone in this room began life as a baby. It is a hard life being a baby and then a child. We are told what to do and when to do it. We seem to have very few rights. Most of us are quite happy when we leave childhood, adolescence, and reach adulthood, marked by leaving home and making our own decisions without someone leaning over us making decisions for us.

The problem is that some of us never really grow up. Some of us become adults and still act like children. And this has been true throughout all the ages. Paul wrote the following to the church in Corinth.

“Dear brothers and sisters, when I was with you I couldn’t talk to you as I would to spiritual people. I had to talk as though you belonged to this world or as though you were infants in the Christian life. I had to feed you with milk, not with solid food, because you weren’t ready for anything stronger. And you still aren’t ready, for you are still controlled by your sinful nature. You are jealous of one another and quarrel with each other. Doesn’t that prove you are controlled by your sinful nature? Aren’t you living like people of the world? When one of you says, “I am a follower of Paul,” and another says, “I follow Apollos,” aren’t you acting just like people of the world?

“After all, who is Apollos? Who is Paul? We are only God’s servants through whom you believed the Good News. Each of us did the work the Lord gave us. I planted the seed in your hearts, and Apollos watered it, but it was God who made it grow. It’s not important who does the planting, or who does the watering. What’s important is that God makes the seed grow. The one who plants and the one who waters work together with the same purpose. And both will be rewarded for their own hard work. For we are both God’s workers. And you are God’s field. You are God’s building. (1 Corinthians 3:1-9, New Living Translation).