Celebrating the childJune 5, 2015

The dawning of June is the time our city really celebrates being young. May bid farewell with Baby Exit – a kids version of the city’s major festival. The fortress boasts mini stages where judo meets ballet and various other costumed groups perform for parents and passers-by alike. Fire trucks open their door and hand over helmets for pictures while policemen turn performers. Amidst tables of kids drawing, sweetie stalls and fair rides the usually subdued fortress buzzes.

Skip forward a few days and into June proper and the action moves down into the city centre. Substantial set-up’s dominate the city square where street art, men in costumes and fine dance vie for attention. The main street is a slalom of helium balloons, street entertainment and outdoor speakers. Candy-floss and the more permanent popcorn stands fragrance the air as proud parents tweak costumes or coax their young ones to interact with the free events.

The young are valued, their innocence precious, their enthusiasm infectious, and their energy seemingly boundless. It is no surprise to me that Jesus chose these as examples of how our faith should be. Their power is just as much potential as realised, their imagination not shackled by preconceived realities and their footing confident yet so fragile. Oh that our faith could be so, to daily see heaven on earth and yet the greater heaven to come, to throw out the limitations we have placed and instead believe that our faith can really move mountains, to walk confidently into each challenge we meet, knowing their will be a cost but not counting it. All our doctrine, all our legality, our arguments and schism pale in the face of a child – and at our core we really are just children of a heavenly father who loves us, brothers and sisters squabbling but bound by blood, insecure infants loved beyond any understanding.

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