It's All About God

          It’s all about God, isn’t it? Every piece of scripture we have heard read this morning is about God.

          And doesn’t that same statement hold true for our lives? Aren’t our lives all about God, or at least they ought to be.

          Terrible things happened to Job. He lost his livestock; he lost his crops; he lost his sons and daughters. And then…in his suffering he learned about God.

          The psalmist thought he knew about God and he wanted God to prove it to him. Not so much different from us actually. Don’t we all want God to prove that he really exists…to us?

          The author of Hebrews is talking about the Christ, Jesus but in the end we see that it’s all about God, every bit of it. God created it all and it’s all about Him.

          And then we get to Mark who has the Pharisees trying to distract us, and everyone else, from thinking about God. Remember, friends, it’s all about God, every bit of it.

          They, the Pharisees, try to get Jesus off track by talking about divorce and marriage but Jesus won’t have any of that. He knows the word of God because he is God. The words were inspired by Him. But they didn’t believe that. He explains to them what God intended when two people come together as one. And that was that.

          All of what Jesus said confuses people. It troubled the disciples so that Jesus often times had to repeat what he’d told them earlier. And still they didn’t always understand it all. Really smart theologians and ministers and lay people are still trying to get to the bottom of what Jesus meant. None of them will truly get it until Jesus explains it all to us when we get to glory.

          The gist of it all is, it’s all about God…and his kingdom. Doesn’t that make sense? Why do we think we have to have it all figured out?

          That brings us to the end of what we heard this morning from Mark.  People, all sorts of people, were following Jesus as he traveled through the country. Of course they had to bring their children with them. Just like Linda and I have to take our two boys, the dogs, with us when we go anywhere for an extended period of time.

          So, there were children all over the place and they were noisy and probably a little obnoxious.  Therefore, the disciples were trying to keep them away from Jesus when he was teaching. 

          They didn’t realize that Jesus actually knew everything that was going on all around him. Just as God knows what we’re doing every minute of every day of our lives. 

          Again Jesus used this as an opportunity to teach the disciples about hospitality and what the kingdom of God was really like.

          Do we really think that heaven is an exclusive club where only the extremely good people will be allowed to reside? Come on!

          Unless we all accept the kingdom of God with the simplicity of a child we’re going to miss it.  Just like we all know that the church will not survive without children Jesus said that children are the very center of life in the kingdom.

          Now, I don’t know if that means that we’re all going back to our youth in the kingdom or if we’ll be taught by the children who’ve gone on ahead of us. They’ll teach us how to live in and enjoy and participate in the life of the kingdom of God.

          Whatever we find there and whatever we read in God’s word remember one thing, “It’s all about God.”

          We, you and I, are here because God wanted us here. He created this place and us because everything’s about God. We are here for God.

          And…God is here for us. He made us and he loves us. That’s evident when we read his word. But again, it’s all about God.

          So, good friends, as you go journey on this week remember that. “It’s all about God.”  Thanks be to God for his loving grace. Amen.