One afternoon when my daughter was a little girl we sat together watching Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood. I remember Mr. Roger’s teaching both of us a lesson – one that I never forgot, one that would make a significant impact on Katie’s life, even though she might have been too young to catch the finer points.
   Mr. Rogers explained about the value of daily work. He said that, for children, their daily work consisted of chores around the house, going to school and playing. Their “job” was to play, to have fun, to use their imaginations. To listen to their teacher and do their homework. To clean up their rooms, pick up their toys, help with the dishes.
   The part that stuck with me was the revolutionary idea that a child’s work is to play. The value to Katie was that she got to have a childhood.
   I lied about my age to get my first paper route in 3rd grade. By the time I was in the 6th grade I had delivered newspapers, sold True Grit, sold garden seeds and greeting cards, set clay pigeons at trap shoots, mowed lawns and shoveled more snow than I care to remember. I started working for a farmer in the 7th grade and I’ve never had a time in my life when I wasn’t working a paying job.
   Somehow, in all of that, I learned the lesson that many boys, and more and more girls, have learned along the way – we are what we do. Our identity, our value, our worth is all wrapped up in our daily work. The value test is measured in dollars so the more we earn, the more valuable we are as people. It is a myth, an illusion and a lie. It drives us to high blood pressure, heart disease and broken relationships. But we cling to the myth because it is all that we know.
   I counter that with the philosophy of Mr. Rogers who taught that everyone makes a contribution, that each person matters, and that our worth isn’t wrapped up in WHAT we do but in WHO we are in the doing of it. Mr. McFeely might have been just a delivery man but he was a valuable person, a family person and a friend. Everyone in the neighborhood mattered.
  All parts of the body, each in their season and in their way, contributes to the functioning of the whole.
   Indeed, the body does not consist of one member but of many. If the foot would say, "Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body," that would not make it any less a part of the body. And if the ear would say, "Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body," that would not make it any less a part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. 1 Corinthians 12:14-18
   I invite you today to spend some time noticing the complexity of the life around you. Notice the people, the businesses, the products on the shelves. Realize that every man-made thing you see is the result of people’s time, energy and creativity. Understand that you are part of the whole. And, as you do that, look through the eyes of faith and see that every single piece of all of that happens under God’s watchful eye, and careful keeping.

Let us pray: Dear Jesus, we know that we are more than what we do in the world. Set us free from the compulsion to prove ourselves at the cost of living our lives. Set us free from evaluating the worth of our lives in dollars. Give us eyes to see the marvels of human beings working together in community. Use us to create a life where children are free to play. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
                                                                  Rev. Kerry Nelson