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Faith is First Learned and Then Lived
Parents play an essential role in their child’s spiritual development and understanding of the importance of family in God’s kingdom. Additionally, imparting faith in your children is one of the most important things Christian parents can do.
Proverbs 22:6 says, “Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.” Parents teach their kids to look both ways before crossing the street because of their love and desire to keep them safe. The same reasoning applies to passing the torch of faith to our children.
One of the easiest ways to teach faith is through actions. Kids learn to navigate life by listening to how adults speak and by watching what they do. For example, according to a study on faith transmission within families by Michael A. Goodman and W. Justin Dyer, “From a social learning theory perspective, adolescents learn from what they observe and experience in their social environments.”
When parents model a behavior for their children, it establishes familiarity and meaning. According to Goodman and Dyer, “research in the sociology of religion suggests that the most important social influences in shaping young people’s religious lives is the religious life modeled and taught to them by their parents.”
Goodman and Dyer argued that higher levels of family involvement in religious beliefs were likely to produce higher levels of faith transmission from parent to child. According to them, “Practices such as family prayer, family scripture study and family worship are theorized to be an integral part of parents’ efforts to transmit their religious traditions to their adolescents.”
According to Dr. Harold Koenig’s study on Religion and Medicine, “Religious belief provides a positive worldview that gives experiences–whether positive or negative–meaning. Meaning, in turn, provides a sense of purpose and direction in life, and a more hopeful and optimistic attitude.”
God is the perfect example and role model for parents as participants in family's lives. By taking the same lead to guide children and families, they will be better prepared to face the troubles of life. Additionally, children are positively affected when a parent or guardian emphasizes the importance of understanding Biblical lessons and applying these teachings to their lives.
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The Need For a Daily Relationship with God
Regent University’s Adjunct Professor of Theology, Rick Nugara, said, “The number one aspect of the Christian life is a personal, intimate relationship with God. Each one of us is on a journey to know Him in this life, because He is definitely the main focus of the next life.”
Nugara reminds us that when, “God says, ‘They themselves will be my people, and I myself will be their God’ (Jeremiah 32:38), He brings it down to a personal level. And there comes the devotional aspect of you as an individual, so you can’t get past that. Each one of us has to have a personal devotional life, a personal praise and worship life apart from the church.”
That is where the personal responsibility of parents or guardians as leaders of the family comes into play.
Nugara explains that, “The crown of God’s creation was a couple, a man and a woman, and from that would come children. They were the basis of His creation, and the family is the basic building block of society. Everything in the earth was a backdrop and a stage for His main event, which was the person made in His image.”
According to Nugara, “The family is the first ministry; that’s where the ministry is. It has to be. There is a passage that says, what good does it do a man if he gains the world and loses his soul? (Mark 8:36) Well, let’s bring that into a church thing; what good is it if you gain the whole world for Christ, and you lose your own family?”
Nugara advises parents to remember that, “You can teach your kids all you want about what they should do, but are they seeing it reflected in our lives? When the pressure goes up, do they see me praying to God or studying the Word on my own? The words are only so much, it is going to be the reality as it’s lived out that is important for them to see.”
Nugara advocates for the importance of the personal responsibility that each believer has to the kingdom of God on our earthly journey, “Moses isn’t coming back. Noah’s not coming back. Abraham and Sarah aren’t coming back. The same Spirit that filled their shoes is filling our shoes, and we’re on the stage now.”
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The Church as the Foundation for our Everyday Relationship with God
Children begin to learn about God and Jesus on Sunday and in Vacation Bible School. As parents and family members, developing this familiarity with the Bible and its lessons within our children gives us a sense of security. However, one ministry leader cautions that these programs alone are not equipping children to critically apply Biblical lessons to their lives.
Jeremy Stephens, who is one of the Founders and Governing Elders of Underground Network in Tampa, Florida outlined three common issues that Christian parents face in developing discipleship in children in a webinar on Microchurch Church Life with Kids.
According to Stephens, “The first issue is that parents today tend to feel guilt that they aren’t doing enough for their kids' faith. He says, we worry that we are boring them or that we need more Bible studies or Vacation Bible School programs. However, this leads us into reactionary leadership, and that kind of leadership is not a good way to discern the will of God.”
Stephens says, “The second problem parents face today is that we think of discipleship in terms of programs, pipelines and events. We believe that if our kids follow steps one, two and three they will become disciples.”
According to Stephens, the problem with this is that “with all good intentions, we are putting our hope in a program, a manual or a Christian trend.” He warns that “this is a lopsided way to make disciples of adults or children. These programs do have a part to play, but we overdo it.”
The third issue that Stephens addressed is that “we act like church/microchurch is an event-based construct, rather than a family that God is making. We act like all the good Jesus stuff happens at this event once a week from 4:30-7 pm. So, if our kids are not fully involved with every aspect, then they are missing out on being the Church. But, there is too much of the Kingdom that is needed to be able to fit it into any one event or space or gathering time.”
Stephens cautions people to remember that the Church is a family, not an event. One analogy he uses to illustrate his point is that the family dinner is not the family, the family dinner is an event that serves your family, but it is not the family.
According to Stephens, “the discipleship of children happens when we are saturated in an environment where everyone is trying to learn from Jesus. In terms of impact, overhearing adults talk about Jesus and having a home life where parents make Jesus-first decisions in their lives have the biggest impact on the discipleship of children.” In fact, he argues that “this is an under-rated technology in the discipleship of children.”
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Worship as a Lifestyle
The point of worship is to draw close to God. Psalm 145:18 says, “The Lord is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth.” Establishing that there is value in our time with God necessitates taking time out of our everyday activities to seek and spend time with Him.
When worship is done together as a family, this relationship with God is elevated, not only for ourselves but for those around us. With that said, worship is not only about singing praise; it is something that can saturate our whole lives.
Charles Nieman is a motivational speaker and the founder and Senior Pastor of Abundant Church, with branches in El Paso, Kyle and Lockhart, Texas.
Nieman says, “In John 4[:23], Jesus says, ‘True worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth,’ and the word, truth, means in the way you live. It's in the way my kids see me drive my car. The way they see me treat other people. The way they see me respond to the poor. The way they see me treat their mother. I believe that all of that is an act of worship. More than anything in the church world, there is a disconnect between what is preached and what is lived.”
Nieman illustrates the importance of the example that parents set. He says, “Ephesians 5[:1] says for us to imitate God as their children imitate their parents. So, we see a twofold right there to imitate God. But we also see that children learn by imitating their parents. I think a lot of times parents make the mistake that they expect a behavior from the child, but they themselves do not exhibit that trait or they exhibit exactly the opposite.”
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Nieman says that “the Old Testament use of the Hebrew phrase, ‘the fear of the Lord,’ means that you live your life with a deep reverential sense of accountability to God. The term ‘reverential’ comes from the same Hebrew word that means, ‘worship.’ It’s all tied together. Parents have to model that this is an important aspect of their lives, and it is also an important aspect to us as a family.”
Nieman states that two things are paramount for building the faith of children. “They have to see it in the sincerity with which we live, and that the Bible isn’t a weekend thing. It’s a daily thing to live by. Not because you are trying to get something from God, but out of respect.”
Our Family is a Reflection of God’s Creative Purpose
Sharing faith as a family and applying the Word of God to our actions is of the utmost importance for fostering faith in others. In the book Introducing Evangelical Theology, Daniel Treier says, “In the gathered community and in daily life, worship bears witness to God’s saving work via word and deed. In regathering us around the Word as well as sending us out in the Spirit, corporate worship regularly reorients the church toward living as God’s covenant people.”
The family was meant to walk as a cohesive unit in love and unity with God –not in perfection because all people are imperfect– but, as a cohesive unit, nonetheless. Jeremy Stephens put it beautifully when he said, “Be the disciples you want your kids to be.” By emphasizing the importance of our relationships with God in our household, a fire can be kindled in the hearts of our loved ones for knowing God in a deeply intimate way.
Jessica Brown is a homeschooling mother of three who is working on a B.A. in Biblical and Theological Studies from Regent University, and a Certificate in Weather Forecasting from Penn State.
