 In the Name of Jesus 
It’s on posters and T-shirts. I think it’s
even a book. “All I really need to know I
learned in kindergarten.” Share, get in
line, take your turn, play nice—such
important skills and attitudes. As we
“grow up,” if we forget those simple
rules, trouble finds us fast.
Do you remember heading into
kindergarten? They had sent your
parents the school supply list in the mail.
Maybe your parents took you along to
the store. This was really cool. You got
new stuff, your school stuff—stuff you
didn’t have to share with your brothers
and sisters. Remember the box of eight
jumbo crayons? This was awesome.
Your new crayons were still sharp. They
still had the wrappers on them. They had
their own box. They weren’t those
pieces of broken crayons in the ice-cream
pail at home. You were so proud of these
jumbo crayons. Your mom even wrote
your name on the box.
You walked like a peacock as you carried
those crayons into school. Your proud
ownership went on for a while, until
February, when you heard the rumor: the
first and second graders didn’t have eight
jumbo crayons. They said “Fat crayons
are for babies.” The first and second
graders had 16 crayons—skinny crayons,
just like the ones big people use. Oh, this
was devastating! Your eight crayons no
longer were worth bragging about. You
couldn’t wait for next year.
22 January 2012
Epiphany 3 – B
Jeremiah 1:4-10
Finally August came. A new supply list
arrived in the mail. You brought the
calendar to your parents to set a time
when you could go to the store and buy
your first set of skinny crayons—16,
twice the number you had in
kindergarten. As you walked out of the
store, you couldn’t wait to color with
them. This was great! You
ceremoniously donated your jumbo
crayons to the ice cream pail for your
brothers and sisters and cousins, and
headed off to first grade with your box of
16. You were so proud of your 16 skinny
crayons …until February when you
heard the rumor: the third and fourth
graders didn’t have 16, they had 24. Oh!
How would you make it another years
and a half until you could have 24?
Somehow you managed to survive. After
plodding along with a mere 16 colors for
two whole years, third grade came and
you graduated to 24. And the same
excitement you had felt as a
kindergartner and as a first grader
returned. But that, too, would wane,
when you realized that fifth and sixth
graders could have 64. And their box
was really cool because it opened
differently and the crayons were
displayed in ascending rows to help you
see them and select them more easily.
Your coveting of the special 64 box went
on for the next two years. Then your
dream came true. Heading into fifth
grade you got your own box of 64. But
the really cool thing, what set apart the
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64 box from the rest of the pack—do you
remember what it was? It had its own
built-in sharpener around the back. Oh!
Nothing could top this ...until they came
out with the big box of 96—50% more
colors than you.
Have we learned anything from this little
Parable of Crayola? Sure, if they keep
coming out with better stuff, we’re going
to be poor. Actually it reveals how hard
we find it to be content with the gifts
God has given us. If he has blessed us
with our eight jumbo crayons, we can
easily stop seeing them as blessings from
God that he has picked out especially for
us. All we see are the 16 crayons that he
picked out for somebody else. You’ve
seen this play out in real life, right?
Maybe God blessed you with a talent for
singing or playing an instrument. Instead
of being content with that talent and
using it to glorify God, you wish you
could be the popular athlete, the sports
star. Or maybe God blessed you with the
spiritual gift of intercession—you have a
heart for people and you spend valuable
time praying for them. But nobody
notices, nobody thanks you. So you envy
the people who do visible acts of
kindness and receive many thank yous
from their beneficiaries. Or maybe God
has blessed you with an income that
continues to put food on the table plus a
little into savings. But you spend
valuable time wondering what it would
be like not to have to scrimp and
struggle, or how nice it would be to live
somewhere warm.
22 January 2012
Epiphany 3 – B
Jeremiah 1:4-10
It’s pretty easy to look at the success of
others, to gaze at the good life of others,
or even to remember the good life we
used to enjoy. Shall we pitch a pity party
in our paltry pad for our present position
in life. No, brothers and sisters. Instead
let’s be content with the crayons God has
given us. Why can I say that? Because
God himself wrote our supply list. He
determines how many crayons we will
have in our box. And then he makes all
of us different from each other,
equipping us with different gifts for
different purposes so that together we can
have a complete church. We are who we
are because God has made us that way.
It’s the same message we find in
Jeremiah’s words. Jeremiah was called
by God to carry out a daunting task. He
was going to have to preach a message of
impending punishment to rebellious
Israel. When he heard his assignment,
Jeremiah tried excusing himself with,
“But I’m just a kid.” Technically true: he
was younger than 30, perhaps even a
teenager. But the Lord answered, “You
have the gifts. In fact, before you were
born, I had this in mind for you. I set
you apart. I appointed you as a prophet
to the nations.” God equipped Jeremiah
for a certain task, just like God equips
you as an individual, us as a
congregation, and us along with our
sister churches as a synod, all so we can
carry out certain functions for him. He
determines the amount of crayons we
should have in our box.
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So I guess that means we ought to take a
closer look at our crayons, huh? It’s one
of the first steps of stewardship: knowing
what crayons we have. Good
stewardship means managing well. It’s
important to know the time, the talent,
and the treasure God has given us, or
more accurately, which of his stuff he has
put under our management. And how
can we do this? How can we know what
God has given us unless we continually
return to the Bible. That’s where we
learn all about the spiritual gifts God
promises to cultivate in his people
through his Word. But how do you know
which spiritual gifts you yourself have?
You could try doing various things for
others and see what God has made you
good at. You could ask other believers
for their opinion about what activities in
God’s kingdom he might have gifted you
for. There is also an instrument, a tool, a
series of statements you can give your
reaction to. Your reactions can point at
your strengths and weaknesses. If you
put in some time and effort, it will soon
become clear how God has blessed you.
He actually wants us to know what
crayons we have in our box.
But we’re not done yet. After God
shows us which colors we have in our
box, he wants us to do more than just
say, “I’m an 8” or “I’m a 24.” Now he
wants us to color our world with these
crayons. He wants us to use our abilities
to benefit others.
22 January 2012
Epiphany 3 – B
Jeremiah 1:4-10
If God blessed you with eight crayons,
use all eight. Maybe not all at once, but
use all eight. It’s okay to acknowledge
that God didn’t bless you with a 64-pack
and a built-in sharpener—as long as
that’s really true. But it’s also okay to be
honest about the eight he has blessed us
with. Let’s not get caught using just one
crayon when we have eight. If God gave
you eight, he wants you to color your
world with all eight crayons he provided.
Use your gifts to impact the world
around you. Don’t let your crayon of
hospitality sit in the box when there are
new neighbors who could be welcomed.
Don’t let your crayon of material wealth
sit in the box when there’s a blank
coloring book of missions that needs to
be colored with your support. Don’t let
your crayon of encouragement sit in the
box when a straying soul sees God in just
black and white and you have the way to
show how colorful God’s love and his
justice are. One of your crayons is
everything you know from having
listened to God’s Word. Color with that.
Your life and others’.
I’ve been addressing you as if you have 8
crayons. Some of you have 64 colors. A
few of you have 96. More colors means
more blessed. It also means more
responsibility. Jesus taught us, “From
everyone who has been given much,
much will be demanded” (Luke 12:48).
We’re so used to hearing that Christianity
is all about God’s forgiveness to us
sinners in Jesus. And that’s the most
important truth. But it’s also true that
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God blessed you all with various colors
for various reasons. He expects you to
practice good stewardship. And good
stewardship means using all the colors
God gave you.
point becomes dull. But instead of
looking at our used crayons, let’s look at
the beautiful picture God used us to
color. Look at the person who is
encouraged to come back to church
because you uncomfortably went out of
your way to say “God wants you,” or
“Welcome to St. Matthew’s.” Look at
the child who is grounded in the Word of
God because you said, “I want to support
Christian education with my financial
gifts.” Look at the hungry faces of the
people light up as they eat the food you
brought during the recent food drive.
Look at the life of the person you prayed
for, and how God chose to answer your
prayer. What beautiful pictures God
colored through you! This stewardship
thing is really important!
Granted, just because we have a gift or
ability doesn’t mean it’s always easy to
use. Sometimes it’s difficult to pull a
certain crayon out of the box because we
feel more comfortable using our favorite
color. For some it’s difficult to pull out
the crayon of reaching out to others, or
giving someone a loving rebuke when
they need to be built up by it. For others
it’s difficult to pull out the crayon of
generous financial support because we
are much more comfortable sitting on a
thicker wallet, or we are more
comfortable spending the money first so
that there is little left for spreading the
Gospel.
But it’s just as true that God will help us.
We aren’t stuck figuring all this out on
our own, or supplying the oomph to
move forward. God promises to bless us.
Listen to what he told young Jeremiah.
“‘Do not be afraid…, for I am with you
and will rescue you’ ... Then the Lord
reached out his hand and touched
[Jeremiah’s] mouth and said, ‘Now, I
have put my words in your mouth.’” This
is where I get my confidence about God
working through us. He says, “Don’t be
afraid.” This helps us when we bemoan
the fact that our crayons are shrinking as
we color our world. We get sad when
some wrapper has to come off or the
22 January 2012
Epiphany 3 – B
Jeremiah 1:4-10
“But I don’t have 64 crayons.” You
really only need five. The black crayon
shows the darkness of sin we carry in this
life. The red crayon reminds us of Jesus’
blood shed to pay for that sin. The white
crayon displays the robe of righteousness
our darkness is now covered over with.
The green crayon expresses the life and
growth we enjoy as forgiven children of
God. And the blue crayon points us to
the heavenly skies where we will go to
live with God when Jesus comes back on
the clouds. Those are the five crayons
used by our Savior. You have those five.
So you can color others a picture of true
Christianity, just like God colored your
life and your future with Jesus. May you
color your world with the crayons God
has given you.
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Pastor N Cordes
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