It was of course the cause of much laughter. However, in that moment, and in her simple way, she had challenged me to think afresh about how a small child sees me, and how I should act in ways that help make proper connections between a large adult and a small child. It was also something of a rebuke.
Unbeknown to her, I had challenged an equally tall man called John, back when I was a curate, about how he approached small children arriving into church. Unlike me and my love for children, John openly admitted to not liking them. He was a bachelor from a military background. He agreed with me to experiment with bending down to greet children as they arrived, smiling at them (not so easy with his glass eye) and offering them the same books as the adults. John, bless him, took heed and did so. After a few weeks he told me that - much to his surprise - he was actually beginning to like some of the children, and I could tell him that some children had told me that ‘the horrible man’ had stopped being ‘horrible’. The warmth between him and the children continued to grow in the months and years that followed.
The reception child made me think again about how she perceived me. She reminded me to consider when I would stand, bend down, kneel or sit on the floor to engage with the children with whom I was talking. Every time I lead a collective worship act in a school I consciously try to think about the physical, and therefore emotional and spiritual, dynamics of what is taking place. It is not a trivial point. These things matter. It is an example of how a child’s comment and perspective has affected and shaped how I conduct my ministry. In an ongoing way, I try to put myself in the place of the child and grasp what they might be seeing and hearing from me in the way I act.
If I dismiss the thoughts of a child I am in danger of missing God’s voice to me
THE ADULT TRAP
Despite all of my years of ministry with children, I still fall into the deadly adult trap of thinking I know better than them. I still catch myself talking in ways which sound as though children are empty vessels into which I, and the Church, needs to pour the knowledge of God. Yes, life has taught me a great deal; my studying, experience and learning do mean, I think, that I have some wisdom to share with people of all ages. I am grateful that children do ask me for advice and insights into life, and especially into how to live as a follower of Jesus. But Jesus keeps reminding me that, ‘Unless you become like a child you cannot enter the kingdom of God’ (Matthew 18.1-4). He keeps pointing out that the father reveals things to little children, for it is his gracious will to do so (Matthew 11.25-26). I continually need reminding that children will offer me spiritual insights and wisdom that I will miss if I do not listen to them carefully and take them seriously. Their insights can and should be shaping my ministry.
I remember sitting on the bench outside the hut in Longbarn Meadow, the sun shining. The Scripture Union Longbarn East End week was in full flow. Caroline, our eldest, then aged three, came running across the field. She leapt onto my lap, put her arms around me, looked me in the eye and said, ‘Daddy, Jesus is my friend, and you’re my friend too.’ She hugged me, and before I had time to say any more than, ‘Thank you’, she was off my lap, running off and playing by the stream. It is one of the deepest and most heartwarming memories I have as a father. Here she was expressing her love of Jesus as a three year-old, her relationship with him and her relationship with me. She made me think again about how we express faith and about what faith looks like for a child at each age and stage of life. She made me reflect on our equality in God’s wonderful all-age family. Naturally, she did not do this to make me think, nor did she have any idea what impact her action and words would have on me; she was simply behaving as a three year-old lover of Jesus and lover of her dad. But she shaped my thinking afresh about my own relationship with God, and about my ministry with children of all ages. It was certainly part of the inspiration behind a booklet I later wrote for Scripture Union called God’s friends. It still gets me thinking what the picture and image of ‘friendship’ with Jesus is all about.
Children and young people continue to shape and form the ministry to which God has called me
SMALL SEEDS
At my inauguration service as Bishop of Durham in February 2014, I preached on the parable of the mustard seed. I had three key points I wanted to get across at the outset of this new ministry: expect growth, don’t underestimate the small, and offer welcome. Within the sermon I told the story of my planting a runner bean in a jar with blotting paper in Mrs Stone’s class at St Paul’s Church of England primary school. I told it as an example of my own ability to be stubborn, insisting a particular bean was mine when Mrs Stone assured me it was someone else’s. At the end of the service everyone was given a runner bean seed to take away and grow as a reminder of the parable (not my stubbornness). In the following weeks, everywhere I visited I was shown beans growing. It was encouraging to see the way a simple illustration had been taken up. In March this year a letter arrived from a ten yearold girl, Olivia, with 33 bean seeds. She wrote: ‘In February, last year, my granddad attended your inauguration in Durham Cathedral. As he left he was given two beans, one for me and one for my brother. Unfortunately only one survived the jam jars. In April we planted it in the garden where it grew to a height of over 8ft tall. By the time we picked the last pod we collected over 90 beans. I’ve enclosed 33 beans which I hope some children will enjoy as much as I did.’
I admit to having a tear or two in my eye when I read this letter. Here was a ten year-old showing she had grasped something of the point and wanting to share it with others. Why had I not thought of doing the same (my bean produced some pods too)? What thoughtfulness about sharing enjoyment and pleasure with others. Olivia encouraged me in my ministry. Olivia challenged me in my ministry. Olivia made me think afresh about my ministry and how we use tangible symbols and signs to help each other grow in faith.
GOD’S VESSELS
One of my favourite pieces of work is engaging in questions and answers with children and young people in visits to schools and midweek clubs. Very often the leaders of the clubs and the teachers have worked really hard with the children in getting them to think what questions they want to ask. One of the most thorough happened very recently in a village school in County Durham. The combined year five and six class really wanted to get to know me. So we had questions about my own childhood and schooling, and questions about my hopes and ambitions as a child and young person. They wanted to hear the story of how I had come to faith. They wanted to know about why I had become a vicar and then a bishop. Yes, they wanted to know some of the stuff about supporting a football team, my favourite colour and what pets we have, but their real interest lay in the deeper questions about Jesus, God, caring for the planet, family life, and suffering. On this occasion the local vicar was with me and he was asked to respond to the same questions. His faith story is quite different from mine, so was his experience of school and his career path. This gave some wonderfully helpful contrasts for the children to consider. Some of the time they took the answers and noted them down. At other points they wanted more explanation or debate. I love the way children are prepared to push back and probe more deeply. As they do so I regularly find that they make me think afresh about Christian teaching. I am made to consider what is the best pastoral response to situations of sadness and tragedy in family life (often, in front of their peers, children will share about difficult family situations). They do not necessarily grasp the depth of some of their own questions but they certainly push me to think afresh; they deepen my own understanding and I hope therefore make me a better minister of the gospel and a better bishop. I could dismiss much of what is said as, ‘Well that’s just children for you.’ If I do so I am in danger of missing God’s voice to me. I run the risk of adult arrogance rather than responding to the fresh offer to become like a child.
I have deliberately chosen in this article to tell stories of actual occasions where children have helped to shape the ministry that I have exercised over the years. I hope it is clear that I believe children, and indeed young people of whom I could have told many similar stories, continue to shape and form the ministry to which God has called me. As team rector of Walthamstow, every time a new baby was born to a member of the congregation and they were brought to church for the first time, I tried not only to welcome the family afresh but to make it clear that this new child changed all of us as they would draw love and care out of us all. Their presence would remind us of God becoming a baby; their parents’ care would speak to us of God’s mothering and fathering of us all. Children, even the very youngest, speak to us of God. We ignore their presence and insights to our peril for through them God speaks and helps shape the people and ministers that we are as adults, who continually need to become like a child.
