Dr. Rodney Plunket

Harold Shank is a good friend of mine.  He is the minister of the Highland Street church of Christ in Memphis, Tennessee.  He also serves as National Spokesperson for Christian Child Care with the Christian Child and Family Services Association.  This year he released a book entitled, Children Mean the World to God, published by 21^st Century Christian of Nashville, TN.  In that book he tells the following story.

At the National Prayer Breakfast in Washington, D.C., the speaker told about an American reporter covering the conflict in Sarajevo who saw a little girl hit by a sniper bullet.  The newsman threw down his pad and pencil, stopped being a reporter, and rushed toward the girl.  A local man arrived first and cradled her in his arms.  The American helped them both into his car and sped to the hospital.  Not far down the road the man holding the bleeding child said, “Hurry, my friend, my child is still alive.”

A moment later he cried again, “Hurry, my friend, my child is still breathing.”

Another block or two passed when the man pleaded a third time, “Hurry, my friend, my child is still warm.”  As they approached the hospital he called again, “Hurry, my child is getting cold.”

They were too late.

Later the two men were in the bathroom washing the blood off their hands and clothes.  The local man turned to the reporter.  “This is a terrible task for me.  I must tell her father that his child is dead.  He will be heart­broken.”

The reporter was amazed.  He looked at the grieving man.

“I thought she was your child.”

The man looked back.  “No.”

Then he added a line that I can’t forget.  The man who had cradled the hurting child, not his own, verbalized what motivated his action.  The one who ventured onto the street where the sniper had just hit a small child gave insight into his courageous heart.  “No, she is not my child.”  Then the line:

“Aren’t they all our children?”

I think it can and should be argued that from the biblical perspective all the children of the world are our children.  Every Christian should feel deeply for the hurts and needs of all children.

Today is an extremely special day here at Broadway.  This is the day we focus on supporting the childcare provided by the Children’s Home of Lubbock.  The Children’s Home was established by the Broadway Church of Christ in 1954, and since that time nearly 4,400 children have been provided services through the ministries of the Home.

This is my ninth Children’s Home Special Sunday here at Broadway.  I recently looked back over many of the sermons that I have preached for this special event.  I could not miss the two points that I have highlighted over and over again.  Number one, children in America are hurting.  They are more likely to be poor than any other group in America.  The occurrences of child abuse and child neglect in our nation are truly horrific.  Many times I have given relevant statistics to make the point that children in America are hurting indeed.

The second point that I have highlighted over and over is that God has a special concern for children.  In past Children’s Home Special sermons I have drawn attention to the many passages which declare God’s special concern for children.  And Matthew 5:13-15 has been used in the past, as it has been today, to reveal that Jesus also felt God’s special concern for children.

Yes, children in America are hurting and God’s heart is broken as a result.  And whatever breaks the heart of God should break ours too.  Yes, they are all our children.

But this morning I want to highlight two Children’s Home experiences that I have had quite recently.  These two experiences have strengthened my support for the Children’s Home, and have made me even more excited about this day and the contribution we collect.

The first experience took place just a bit over two months ago on the last Sunday in September.  On September the 30^th there was a special “Journey Launch” at the Home.  A committee, on which I served with Broadway members Debra Rogers and Eric Dickey as well as several other persons, had developed a means of enhancing the spiritual focus of the Home.  We wanted every child, every staff member, every administrator to embrace God’s vision for their lives–
–a vision that can be understood as a journey, a journey toward two goals.  Those two goals are to love God with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength; and that we love one another as we love ourselves.  The very fact of being able to launch such a journey at the Home was exciting, but let me tell you the experience that had a special impact upon me.  It was during the very first prayer that was prayed.  When it was announced that we were going to pray, the whole row of teenage girls joined hands and bowed their heads.  No one told them to join hands.  They did it spontaneously.  And it was clear there was a spiritual connection between themselves and between themselves and God.

I have thought many times since about what I saw those teenage girls do on that Sunday.  I wondered what the likelihood was that any of them would have ever joined hands with anyone for prayer were it not for the Children’s Home.  I wondered if they would have ever even been introduced to prayer and to God had they not come to live at the Children’s Home of Lubbock.

The second experience that I want to share happened just last Sunday.  It happened just prior to the 11:00 service in the lower level.  An African-American boy whom I had gotten to know just a little bit came to me and asked if he could arrange a time to be baptized.  He is a student from the Home.  I quickly found Eric Dickey who is the Spiritual Director at the Home and the Boy’s Ranch.  I told him what the boy wanted.  Eric promised that he would make sure that the boy received the appropriate attention and guidance.  I believe the boy will be baptized soon.

Of the almost 4,400 children that the Home has served and brought to church and introduced to Jesus, I wonder how many would have ever known God at all had it not been for the Home.

Kids are hurting.  God’s heart is breaking.  We can help.  We must help.  And we must give the most important help of all.  We must connect these kids to the power and the wonder of Jesus Christ our Savior and Lord.  Your support of the Children’s Home helps do just that.

Would the servers please go to the back and prepare to take up the Children’s Home Special offering?

Before our prayer for that offering, I want to read a prayer that I shared with you several years ago during a Children’s Home Special Sunday.

We pray for children
who put chocolate fingers everywhere,
who like to be tickled,
who stomp in puddles and ruin their pants,
who sneak popsicles before supper,
who erase holes in math workbooks,
who can never find their shoes.

And we pray for those children
who stare at photographers from behind barbed wire,
who can’t bound down the street in a new pair of sneakers,
who [don’t even know the simplest of games],
who are born in places we wouldn’t be caught dead,
who never go to the circus,
who live in an X-rated world.

We pray for children
who bring us sticky kisses and fistfuls of dandelions,
who sleep with the dog and bury the goldfish,
who hug in a hurry and forget their lunch money,
who cover themselves with Band-aids and sing off-key,
who squeeze toothpaste all over the sink,
who slurp their soup.

And we pray for children
who never get dessert,
who have no safe blanket to drag behind them,
who watch their parents watch them die,
who can’t find any bread to steal,
who don’t have any rooms to clean up,
whose pictures aren’t on anybody’s dresser,
whose monsters are real.

We pray for children
who spend all their allowance before Tuesday,
who throw tantrums in the grocery store and pick at their food,
who like ghost stories,
who shove dirty clothes under their beds, and never rinse out the tub,
who get visits from the tooth fairy,
who don’t like to be kissed in front of the carpool,
who squirm in church and scream on the phone,
whose tears we sometimes laugh at and whose smiles can make us cry.

And we pray for children
whose nightmares come in the daytime,
who will eat anything,
who have never seen a dentist,
who aren’t spoiled by anybody,
who go to bed hungry and cry themselves to sleep,
who live and move, but have no being.

We pray for children who want to be carried and for those who must,

For those we never give up on and for those who don’t get a second chance,

For those we smother––and for those who grab at the hand of anybody kind enough to offer it.

--Ina Hughes

Would the servers please come forward?

Children in America are hurting.  God’s heart breaks for all those hurting kids.  Through our support of the Children’s Home of Lubbock we show to some of those hurting kids the loving heart of God.  Let’s be used by God to bless the children, because “aren’t they all our children?”  Let’s pray.

Top | Sermons | Home