On entering the main hall I am faced with a sea of orange: More than 60 children are wearing bright orange T-shirts with today’s theme, “CHOOSE THE GOOD” embossed on the front.
It’s Children’s Day at the 2012 summer conference at the conference centre south of Sydney, Australia.
I take a seat about halfway up the hall. I’m not taking an active part in the traditional morning meeting, but I confess I am a little curious as to how this theme will be presented to the children (aged between 2 and 12) in a way that will be interesting to the older ones and understood by the younger ones.
Solomon David, a Sunday school leader from Sydney, explains that choosing the good is not always easy. He tells us that hundreds of years before Jesus was born, a man called Isaiah prophesied about Him, saying, “Curds and honey He shall eat, that He may know how to refuse the evil and choose the good.” Isaiah 7, 15. Jesus was also a child once, and also had to make choices about what was right and wrong, good and evil.
“Sometimes you can feel that ‘I don’t have to share with those people over there, because they weren’t nice to me before, so I don’t have to choose the good with them,’” Solomon says. “But did Jesus say nasty things to people because they did bad things to Him? Of course not!” Solomon tells us that Jesus was always good to others, no matter how they acted towards Him, and that our calling is to be like that too.
During the course of the meeting the children are eager to voice their ideas of ways in which they can choose the good.
“Being willing,” suggests one girl.
“Sharing,” volunteers another one.
“When Jacob has a toy that I want to play with, then instead of grabbing it off him I can ask him nicely if I can use it next when he is finished with it.” I cough to conceal a giggle. This one is from my 4-year-old nephew, and from the sound of it I’m pretty sure that it is not a hypothetical situation.
Following the meeting, the children get the chance to do various activities, all of which reflect the hot, humid weather.
Why should we choose the good?
Kirsty-Ann is one of the lucky few who is starting high school this year, and is therefore allowed to participate in both the children’s and youth activities during the conference. She gives everything in the various obstacle courses, water fights and treasure hunts that have been organized.
I’m curious to know what she thinks about this morning’s meeting, so I catch her at a quiet moment and ask her why we should choose the good.
“If we’re being bad we’re not going to get happy”
“If we’re being bad we’re not going to get happy,” she replies.
I’m impressed. It’s not a deep, profound response, but it certainly gets to the heart of the matter. That “being bad” makes you unhappy and “being good” leads to happiness is a truth that I personally have discovered in my 25 years of life, but hearing it out of the mouth of a 12-year-old, spoken with such simple assurance, is something else.
If all the kids got that much out of the meeting, I believe it could be deemed a resounding success.