When I grow up!

When I grow up,

I will be smart enough to answer all

The questions that you need to know

The answers to before you’re grown up.

And

I will be brave enough to fight the creatures

That you have to fight beneath the bed

Each night to be a grown up.

— From Dennis Kelly’s adaptation of Roald Dahl’s book, “Matilda the Musical,” lyrics by Tim Minchin

These are the words from the pivotal point of the musical “Matilda.” This story is about a special little girl, a wonderfully empathetic teacher, and a brute of a headmistress. My youngest son was cast as Miss Agatha Trunchbull, the bully headmistress at a boarding school. The odds were stacked against the little girl who had no one to support her and her sense of self-worth and value except a young school teacher whom herself was in the same place, constantly bullied and downtrodden by the “Trunchbull.” 

After watching this show about three times, I was always moved by these lyrics. I thought about when I was young. At 9-10 years old I thought adults had all the answers to every question and they could make things go the way they wished and that they had the power to be anything they wanted to be! I could not wait to grow up to get to the place where all my problems would be solved and all my fears relieved, where I and my loved ones could just be. 

Unfortunately, that innocent young boy has become a bit more jaded. There are things, dreadful things in this world. I realized that we adults are not in control.  Watching the news each morning one can glimpse all that threatens hearth and home for each of us! Caring and providing for home, family, and friends is am almost insurmountable task which never seems to end. The cost of living, the cost of staying well, the cost of dying, wow! I just realized why I would be crying as I listened to this song being performed on the stage. 

But part of growing up is realizing that you can’t do everything on your own! I used to think if I just had the funds to get this or the training to do that, I could live off the grid! No one would tell me what to do or how to live. I could truly be free. 

But in my life as well as in the story of Matilda, I have found that my freedom is all around me in the community of this life by serving others and in turn being served. Like in the natural world, each component exists to serve a purpose. I don’t have to know everything. I don’t have to make clothing, produce food, or have the right answer to every question. Because “When I Grow Up”, I will find what the Apostle Paul writes in the fourth chapter of his letter to the church at Ephesus, “The body of Christ”! The idea of “serving all; then all will be served” is the main theme in all his notes to the churches. Hello, it is the theme of the Gospels!

When I grow up, I will be willing to offer my help, my space, my life to others and they, in return, will do the same for me. When I grow up, I will be smart enough to know that the only way to live is to let go! When I grow up, I will have faith in this Christ! I will finally “let go” and be part of the community of Christ!

— Reflections appears regularly on the religion page. The column features a variety of local writers, coordinated through the Monroe Area Clergy Group. Lance Smith is pastor at Zwingli United Church of Christ in Monticello.