The Summer is passing and school is rising in the minds of our
families. I’m thinking about teaching the faith at church and empowering parents to teach the faith at
home. On the one hand I know that the contact hours of Sunday School and
Confirmation are extremely few. There are only 36 hours of teaching in a whole
Sunday School year. Not much. In Confirmation those hours are deeply divided
because I’m sure that children who feel free to talk bring up the topics of
faith that are of most concern to them. On the other hand, there is the double
fear: of the size of the task to
teach the faith at home, and what if you teach it wrong? Here is the promise that parents make at
their child’s baptism:
...to live with (the child) among God’s faithful people, bring (her)
to the word of God and the holy supper, teach (him) the Lord’s Prayer, the
Creed, and the Ten Commandments, place in (her) hands the holy scriptures, and
nurture (him) in faith and prayer, so that your child may learn to trust God,
proclaim Christ through word and deed, care for others and the world God made,
and work for justice and peace.
Here is how I see teaching the faith: Faith is taught to the children
by the parents (and later the friends) all the time and automatically. Here is
what I mean: If you think that God is near at hand, you will behave that way.
You will pray, behave as if God were watching and caring about what you say and
do and you will teach that joy (and fear) to your child. If you think God is
distant and doesn’t see or care, your child will notice and adopt that point of
view. I recommend that you pray before meals as if God were there to hear and
when you teach what is right or wrong, go ahead and say that right behavior is
what God is looking for. You might say that God is watching to see if we care
for our neighbor. Speak as if God is close and caring, behave as if God cares
and if you remember the mercy of Jesus you will be teaching the Christian faith.
I hope that during the few hours spent here at the church; either in
Sunday School for the children, worship for the family or in adult Sunday
School, the clear and constant message of the close, intense and seamless love
of God through Jesus Christ supports your daily lives. We gather together to
support one another’s faith that Jesus is in fact really present and powerful to
do just what he did and said back then.
Sure the job of teaching the faith is big, and of course we will get
it wrong but supporting each other’s trust that Jesus is as close as the bread
and wine, remembering to do the Ten Commandments, believe the Apostles’ Creed
and pray often we will give our children enough holy power to grow into children
of God.
