I Want to be 6-Years Old Again

During our Christmas Eve service of candlelights and carols, I preached a sermon about finding again the magic and mystery of Christmas without having to resign our adulthood and becoming 6-years old again. You can hear that sermon again by going here.

I opened up the sermon by reading a letter of resignation: a letter where an adult resigns from adulthood to become a child again. I have received several requests for that letter. Here is that letter in its entirety.

***

To Whom It May Concern:

I am hereby officially tendering my resignation as an adult, in order to accept the responsibilities of a 6 year old. The tax base is lower.

I want to be six again. I want to go to McDonald's and think it's the best place in the world to eat. I want to sail sticks across a fresh mud puddle and make waves with rocks. I want to think M&Ms are better than money, because you can eat them. I want to play kickball during recess and stay up on Christmas Eve waiting to hear Santa and Rudolph on the roof.

I long for the days when life was simple. When all you knew were your colors, the addition tables and simple nursery rhymes, but it didn't bother you, because you didn't know what you didn't know and you didn't care.

I want to go to school and have snack time, recess, gym and field trips. I want to be happy, because I don't know what should make me upset. I want to think the world is fair and everyone in it is honest and good. I want to believe that anything is possible. Sometime, while I was maturing, I learned too much. I learned of nuclear weapons, prejudice, starving and abused kids, lies, unhappy marriages, illness, pain and mortality.

I want to be six again. I want to think that everyone, including myself, will live forever, because I don't know the concept of death. I want to be oblivious to the complexity of life and be overly excited by the little things again. I want television to be something I watch for fun, not something used for escape from the things I should be doing. I want to live knowing the little things that I find exciting will always make me as happy as when I first taught them.

I want to be six again. I remember not seeing the world as a whole, but rather being aware of only the things that directly concerned me. I want to be naive enough to think that if I'm happy, so is everyone else. I want to walk down the beach and think only of the sand beneath my feet and the possibility of finding that blue piece of sea glass I'm looking for. I want to spend my afternoons climbing trees and riding my bike, letting the grownups worry about time, the dentist and how to find the money to fix the old car.

I want to wonder what I'll do when I grow up and what I'll be, who I'll be and not worry about what I'll do if this doesn't work out. I want that time back. I want to use it now as an escape, so that when my computer crashes, or I have a mountain of paperwork, or two depressed friends, or a fight with my girlfriend, or bittersweet memories of times gone by, or second thoughts about so many things, I can travel back and build a snowman, without thinking about anything except whether the snow sticks together and what I can possibly use for the snowman's mouth.

I want to be six again.