1 John 1:1-4

1 John 1:1-4 
English Standard Version (ESV)

  As a parent, I'm learning a lot of things I never expected to need to learn.  After I took the training wheels off my daughter's bike, I stood in the middle of the road with her and realized I hadn't the faintest idea how to teach someone to ride a bike.  Similarly, I wonder every evening if it's possible to teach someone how to like vegetables.  How do you make vegetables appetizing to small children?  Making airplane noises isn't nearly as effective when they're 7.  I took for granted that my parents knew everything when I was a child -- but they had to learn it, just like I do now, and I benefit because they have passed down countless lessons to me, just as I'm passing them down to my children.
  The Christian faith is like that.  We stand at the long end of a chain, with the truth of the Gospel having been passed down from one generation to the next.  We benefit from the faithfulness of those who have come before us.  The early church risked their lives to meet in secret, passing the truth from one to another, inviting others in, hoping the church visitors weren't really Roman spies.  Many of them were killed for sharing their faith, but it was so important to pass it along, it was worth their lives, because they were building something eternal.
  It's easy to receive something.  All we do is open our ears and our hearts and let someone else share with us.  The trick is to make sure that it doesn't end with us.  We have a responsibility to honor those from the countless generations who invested their time and energy in passing the truth along -- we join their work, looking for someone else to share this wondrous truth with.  What we have seen, what we have heard -- we are called to share this with the world, and in so doing we invite others and join with God in expanding God's Kingdom.
  Who are you inviting?  With whom are you sharing?  For whom are you praying?