Prepping Parents to Disciple their Children
How can side effects of the COVID-19 lockdown help establish our kids in the faith?
Andrew Kirk, who directs a non-profit devoted to reconnecting generations, names one positive offshoot of the isolation: “For years, we have spoken to church leaders about empowering parents to be the primary disciplers of their children and to move away from churches taking that role. While in many nations [churches and cell groups] have been in lockdown, this ‘crisis’ provided a great opportunity for churches to empower parents at home . . . Momentum gained—not lost.”
Parents—not churches—as the “primary disciplers” of children? Is this an absurd, out-of-touch idea? Or a biblical one practiced by our spiritual foreparents?
How God Sees the Parental Role
Early on God set into motion the ministry of parents taking the lead role in discipling their children. When God describes why he singled out Abraham, he says: “I have chosen him, so that he will direct his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing what is right and just” (Gen. 18:19). Commenting on this verse, Calvin writes: “Wherefore, it is the duty of parents to apply themselves diligently to the work of communicating what they have learned from the Lord to their children.”
Fast-forward a few hundred years to Moses, as he explains why God told him to teach his commands to the Israelites: “so that you, your children and their children after them may fear the Lord your God as long as you live by keeping all his decrees and commands that I give you” (Deut. 6:2). In that same chapter, Moses says: “Write these commandments that I've given you today on your hearts. Get them inside of you and then get them inside your children. Talk about them wherever you are, sitting at home or walking in the street; talk about them from the time you get up in the morning to when you fall into bed at night” (Deut. 6:6-8, MSG).
The Psalmist echoes all this by recalling that when God “decreed statutes for Jacob and established the law in Israel . . . he commanded our forefathers to teach their children, so the next generation would know them, even the children yet to be born, and they in turn would tell their children” (Ps. 78:5-6). We see the same expectation in the New Testament, when Paul tells fathers to “bring them [children] up in the training and instruction of the Lord” (Eph. 6:4).
Clearly, God assigns to parents—not to church leaders—the principal responsibility for seeing that their children grow up knowing him. Today, though, the spiritual nurture of young people has too often been handed off to Sunday School teachers and youth pastors. Parents who should themselves be maturing through the shouldering of child-training responsibilities are deprived of that means for their own growth.
“Let the Church Train the Kids”
An older Barna study revealed that 85 percent of parents recognize their primary responsibility for discipling their children. But too often acknowledging the assignment does not translate into carrying it out. According to Barna, “The survey data indicate that parents generally rely upon their church to do all of the religious training their children will receive. Parents are not so much unwilling to provide more substantive training to their children as they are ill-equipped to do such work.”
What does “ill-equipped” look like? The Barna research found that parents . . .
typically have no plan for the spiritual development of their children;
do not consider it a priority;
have little or no training in how to nurture a child’s faith;
have no related standards or goals that they are seeking to satisfy; and
experience no accountability for their efforts.
The Unexpected Shutdown Benefit
The current COVID-19 lockdown has forced a shift in focus for both parents and churches. For parents, the pandemic often means they and their children are spending more hours with each other every week. For churches, restrictions on gatherings have resulted in canceled or sharply curtailed programs, including youth events. But inside this minus lies a plus—an opportunity for churches to hit the pause button and do a reset. What if this makeover were to take the following two forms?
First, coaching parents. Suppose church leaders were immediately to step in—even if online—with training and tools that will equip parents to use their added time together to disciple their children. Plenty of resources are easily available. The Focus on the Family website includes a whole section on parenting (click here).
Jana MacGruder, Director of Kids Ministry for LifeWay Christian Resources, has created Settle for Nothing Less: Workshop for Parents Leader Kit. Her book and this kit grew out of a study of 2,000 churchgoing adults with kids ranging from ages 18-30 who have remained in the faith. (To read Ed Stetzer’s interview with MacGruder, click here.)
Second, remodeling church meetings. What if—when in-person meetings resume—pastors and church leaders were to reshape weekly gatherings to access the wealth of parenting wisdom hidden in the congregation? Imagine a new Sunday meeting format that retains sound biblical teaching but provides more room for participation by members of the body. The typical church will include young parents as well as those who have navigated the currents and rapids of parenthood. As those new to parenting voice their dilemmas and questions, seasoned moms and dads can respond. Such sharing will also foster connections that bear fruit outside the gathered church.
Unleashing Untapped Resources
The participatory format will release the full priesthood of all believers for ministry to each other. After listing the five kinds of church leaders, Paul says, “Their job is to give God’s people the equipment they need for their work of service, and so build up the body of Christ.” Just four verses later the text calls for “each member doing its own proper work. Then the body builds itself up in love” (Eph. 4:12, 16, TKNT).
In what major arenas do Christian serve in through the week? Neighborhood. Workplace. Family/parenting. What equipment do believers need to do their serving work? One tool they need is a meeting structure that permits the body to build itself up in love. Leaders should not do all the building-up work themselves. Their task should include creating a setting, a meeting framework, that lets members to do their building-up work. This is shared church—much like the meeting Paul instructed the Christians in Corinth to engage in. How does this relate to the raising of children who will continue to follow Christ? A shared-church agenda can tap into the hard-won wisdom of older parents. How? By providing openings in church gatherings in which they may share their experience with younger moms and dads.
Much of the sharing will come through five-minute stories in which older parents tell what they have gone through. Stories, for example, like these:
How we learned to discipline our child.
What we discovered in teaching our children to know the Bible.
The response when I confessed my sin to my family.
Things I wish I had known as a new mother.
How we addressed LGBTQ issues with our children.
How we taught our kids to pray.
Our struggles following the death of our daughter.
You can be sure stories like this will have the younger parents (and everyone else) leaning forward to listen. And after the meeting, they will seek out those who told the stories for more.
A Parent Looks Back
The importance of parental discipling came home to me just days ago. In a Zoom adult Bible study class, I read what a mother typed into the chat box. Recalling her husband’s and her parenting experience, she wrote: “We felt the ‘experts’ (church/youth leaders) would do a better job of teaching our daughter about Christ.” Later, when I asked this mother to explain, she said, “We thought that maybe we didn’t know so much. Those in ministry were much more equipped to preach the gospel than we were. We felt too inadequate—bound to screw things up.” With this mindset, they handed off their responsibility.
And the result in the life of their daughter? “She is 25 now and creating her own truth.”