Monday, March 16

How do you raise Godly Kids?

Hello All,
I am sure this question has been asked several times, but I think it bears repeating. How do you raise Godly kids?

At my church right now, I am working with Awana, and teaching Sunday School with Chris on Sunday mornings. We are learning about Joshua in Awana, and about Daniel in Sunday School. Before we started each of these lessons series, we asked the kids what they knew about the charachters. (Daniel and Joshua) We were shocked to find out that not even the kids who have been in church their whole lives knew anything about these people, accept the pastors kids. My awana girls do not know their books of the bible, and really, they do not memorize any of their verses. It is very, very sad.

So, I am doing some brainstorming. Mainly, how do I teach my child all these things.. and secondly, where do I start with my Sunday School and Awana kids?

I am very tempted to do a little Bible trivia game, and cover several of the main Bible stories, and see where the kids really are. I am kind of scared of what I would discover.

I have already made up my mind, that when Judah is old enough to talk, he will start memorizing the book of Romans. This will give him a nice foundation on which to build his worldview. Then I figured we would move on to Pauls other letters, some Psalms, and mainly the idea is to have him leave home with a considereable amount of Scripture memorized. In addition to this, teach him the Good News and the Old Testement. This is very scary. How in the world am I going to have enough time to teach all these things to my child? What if instead of giving him a firm grasp of the faith, I make him so sick of it, he will reject it as soon as he can? It is no small task. But by the grace of God, we will be able to instill these essential truths.

I have noticed over the last several years, that in the American church, kids are very biblically illiterate. They dont know the stories, or the basic truths about who God is. I want to teach these things to the kids that I have. I only have about 2 hours a week with them total. Where do I start? How do I go about this? The other thing that makes in complicated, is that kids are at the point where if it is not fun, and entertaining, they do not want to sit through it.

Here are some ideas I have had.
1.) Write my own curriculum. My youth pastor from Wy. did this, and it was great. He started in Genisis 1, and covered the entire Bible, and wrote worksheets that kids could understand. He even referanced other scriptures for the kids to cross-referance. And also included a memory verse.
2) Start a quizzing. Make a list of questions and answers from a certain book of the Bible, and then teach the book to the kids, have them study it on their own, and then have a quizzing contest.
3) Assign the kids a lesson project. Give them a story and a text, and have them prepare a short lesson about their story, and give it to the class. This would encourage them to learn it for themselves.
4) Teach them how to be taught without always having to have games or rewards.

If any of you have more ideas, let me know.

I really want these kids to learn the Scripture.. Kids seem to get one message these days. "Jesus loves you and died to save you." This is a GREAT lesson kids need to learn. But if we dont teach them the context, and give them the whole picture, we are cheating them.

Thankfully, there are lots of awesome programs at the church I attend for these kids, and the other lady that teaches with me at Awana does an AMAZING job. A lot of the kids are from unchurched homes. I really want to make the most of the opportunity that I have to reach these kids.
Chris is an amazing partner as well. I love how hard he works preparing for Sunday School, and the interesting ways that he presents the lessons. And we also have the support of the Pastor, and other parents. Our church seems to handle it in a better way than many churches do.
Please keep Chris and I in prayer as we prepare our hearts and our lessons to teach the kids.

3 comments:

Hannah said...

One sure way to get kids to memorize is rewards!!!! When my Dad taught Sunday school, he said at the end of the quarter, he would have a lazer tag party for all the kids who memorized their verses and did their lessons. Only 1 kid didn't make it! It doesn't have to be that fancy. It could be a candy bar, a toy, you name it!

Naomi K said...

Great post! I've been surprised a few time to by finding out someone I thought should know thier Bible well - doesn't. You have some great ideas though and I'm sure that's just what a lot of parents/churches are lacking - a plan. So I was trying to think how I learned Bible knowledge, and I thought of a few ways...first - I owe what I am to my BMA Bible Alphabet book! so that might be an exaggeration - but it was a book that had a picture and Bible verse for every letter of the alphabet and my parents must have read it to me everyday when I was little b/c I feel like I was born knowing them! Then we had these Bible reading tapes we listened to as we were going to sleep. I've never even tried to learn the verses we have on our walls, but I know them well. When we were younger, for family devo., Dad would tell Bible stories in order - including the less common ones. Then there's Miriam's new method - this winter she's taught us a ton of verses by her method - no ice cream (or anyother snack) until you say your verse! I'm thinking of suggesting it to Doug for camp...The only other things I can think of for classes is lots of repetition, and maybe songs that teach things...Probably, "Bible literacy" is a combanation of lots of things all together. If you can just reach their hearts...sorry this is so long - you just got me thinking.

Bruce and Linda Mitton said...

I was thinking about what you said concening the chance of Judah becoming sick of what you teach him. I don't think there is any way this will happen if he sees Christ's character, joy and presence in your life, and you do the projects with him. If he sees that you are teaching him and having him memorize all of this stuff, but does not see you memorizing or obeying God's word, I could see him being frustrated.
Good post... it made me think!