An Invitation to Play

2026-39
sermon preached at Church of the Good Shepherd, Federal Way, WA
www.goodshepherdfw.org
by the Rev. Josh Hosler, Rector

The Sixth Sunday after Pentecost (Proper 9A-tr 2), July 5, 2026

Zechariah 9:9-12; Psalm 145:8-15; Romans 7:15-25a; Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30

I am just a bit too young to remember the 200^th birthday of the United States. I’m told that my dad participated in a Civil War reenactment that day while my mom and I watched. When he played his part faithfully by getting shot and dying, I burst into tears! (I was three.)

So for many years I’ve looked forward to that next round number, 250. But I can’t say I felt especially joyful about this one. Know what I mean? Ordinary folks are being arrested for touching peeling paint, and several members of the Supreme Court has established that we no longer have three co-equal branches of governement—so, no more checks and balances. Are we still a democracy? Maybe just barely. And it can’t be resolved quickly—indeed, I expect that if America does survive this episode, we’ll be repairing the damage for the rest of our lives.

In the middle of trying so hard to rise above the despair of our national moment, then, we get an odd variety of readings today: an apocalyptic prophecy, a psalm of reassuring love, a letter whose author is tortured by his consistent inability to do the right thing, and … Jesus speaking angrily about children’s play! Hmmm. I don’t think I’ll be able to tie all these together today. But let’s start with that tortured letter writer, Paul.

During my high school years, I frequented Episcopal summer camp in the Diocese of Northern Michigan. One night the camp director, Father Phil, asked each of us to bring our favorite Bible passage to the campfire to share with everyone else. I don’t remember what others shared, but I do remember mine, because we just heard it read. Always ready to be a performer and a cut-up, I listened through several spiritually inspiring passages and then stood up to share what I had brought:

I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree that the law is good. But in fact it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh. I can will what is right, but I cannot do it. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me.

I was only partway into it before I heard gratifying giggles from around the campfire. It seems I wasn’t the only one who found hilarity in the convoluted sentences of St. Paul. But I’ll never forget Father Phil’s gentle smile when I was finished. He said, “Once you’ve lived a few more years, you may find that passage a little less funny!” He was right, of course. So often, indeed, I do not do what I want to do, but I do the very thing I hate.

But no, I don’t really want to talk about Paul’s letter to the Romans today. I’ve preached so much lately about the ills of the world. I don’t want to talk about sin. Instead, let’s talk about the giggles of my young friends and Father Phil’s gentle smile. See, Father Phil gave me a real gift that night: he gave me permission to allow the Bible to be a little less thick and a lot less stuffy. He saw my delight in something funny I’d found in the Bible, and he honored it.

I’ve been an Episcopalian all my life, and here’s one of many things I appreciate about our church. When we’re at our best, we can laugh together at the elements of our faith that we hold most dear. We treat coffee as the eighth sacrament. Somebody’s grandmother probably donated that lightbulb, so how dare we change it? We love to play dress-up with cassocks and surplices and albs and stoles and chasubles. We love to use funny words like cassock and surplice and alb and stole and chasuble. And all of this, of course, is in keeping with the charter of the Anne Boleyn chapter of Anglicans Against Domestic Violence! Whatever it is that makes us Episcopalians, we can usually laugh together about it. We can be playful.

We could do a lot worse than to gain a reputation as “those Christians who laugh.” After all, Jesus supports us in our laughter.

Jesus came by his own laughter honestly. Way back in the beginning, there was delight and laughter as God, through Holy Wisdom, created the world. God smiled on the first humans and called them “very good.” When Sarah laughed, God must have laughed too, for her baby Isaac’s name meant “laughter.” And can you imagine God’s wry smile when he saw the prophet Jonah all vomited up on the seashore and said, “OK, kid, let’s try this again”?

So many of Jesus’ parables, too, when you strip away the royal gloss of King James English and just listen to them, are just plain funny. A camel through the eye of a needle? A friend who comes knocking at midnight? A father giving his child a snake instead of an egg? Why is it so hard for some Christians to enjoy what a funny person Jesus is?

Yet when Jesus brings laughter, the people don’t want it. When Jesus is playful, he becomes an object of widespread scorn. So in today’s gospel he gets fed up and calls them out on their distinct lack of humor: “People, what’s your deal? You’re like a bunch of kids who start out playing but end up in a fight. One group wants to play wedding, and the other wants to play funeral. Both groups are too obstinate to compromise, and as a result, they miss out on the one thing they set out to do in the first place: to play! Look at this schoolyard scuffle! Look at these bloody noses and broken friendships!”

In case they don’t get his metaphor, he explains it to them outright: “Hey, John the Baptist came before me. Like so many of our prophets, he’s homeless and wears a hairshirt and yells at sinners to repent, so you’ve decided he’s possessed by a demon. Now I come along—the guy called the Son of Man in the Book of Daniel—and I enjoy partying with literally anyone who’ll have me, but you call me a shameless libertine.”

I don’t think Jesus is smiling by this point. He’s mad at specific people in specific places who have written him off without a hearing. Jesus goes on: “Oh, you all think you’re so wise. You think you’re the generation that’s got it all figured out, like all of human history was just building up to your starring role. Well, I’m here to blow up all your notions of wisdom. Toddlers can understand what I’m about, so why can’t you? You want to be emperors, but you’re all naked, and I’m here to demonstrate that. And thank God! Now maybe you sticks-in-the-mud will have no choice but to recognize what’s going on. Why am I here? For a play date. I want a play date with you!”

Now, suddenly, Jesus has finished his raging. Like a fed-up parent, he takes a deep breath, sets aside his own feelings, and gets down on the child’s level. Jesus is escaping this loop of negativity so he can return to the joy of play as soon as possible. And none of those he’s yelling at will be uninvited from it. Jesus gets to the core of his invitation:

“Look, I see how tired you all are of carrying the weight of your worries. Just hang out with me. That’s all I want. Set down whatever you’re lugging along through life and … just be with me for a while. I’m here because I love you, and I can see how much you need a hug. Come accept that hug. And then let me teach you how to live with a lot less anxiety. You all knew how to play when you were kids. Well, it’s time to relearn that skill—with the benefit of adult knowledge! Come rest for a while, and then let’s get back to seeing the world as our playground. Stop being bullies and start being playmates.”

The God who created us for delight and joy has come to play with us. Even when it comes to such weighty matters as fulfilling prophecy, Jesus will ride into town on a donkey. He doesn’t worry about how silly he looks. We don’t have to, either. Jesus’ invitation to his own generation is for our generation, too. Here we all are with our fears of the future of America and the world, so deadly serious … because these are truly serious matters. But you know what? Joy is resistance, and maybe it’s the most effective kind. Because those we resist against have no understanding of joy, of humor, or delight in any way, and that’s just sad.

It’s a good thing that we have a new playground at Good Shepherd. And though we have just converted the old nursery into an office for Father George from Emmanuel All Nations, we have made up for that by establishing a new play room in a different location. You’re all invited to come check it out next door. There’s also our Godly Play room, which has lain fallow for two years but which we’re preparing to use again to invite children to play dates with Jesus. If you would like to learn how to share sacred stories with children, talk to me about Godly Play training!

Don’t turn down Jesus’ invitation to play. Be the child who sees the possibilities in play, the child who is not afraid to announce that the vain, self-conscious emperor has no clothes. Keep developing practices of delight, joy, and whimsy, and use those to expose the desperate, fearful actions of the heartless. Set down the burden of soul-crushing weariness and pick up the burden of love. And the one who loves us most will shoulder it up along with us. For that matter, he will carry most of the weight himself. Amen.