I had the privilege to speak in "Big Church" last weekend on discipleship. "Disciple" and "discipline" are related words, both stemming from "learning". In a Christian sense, discipleship is a type of learning that helps us both remain in Christ and keep growing.
And the principles of discipleship apply equally to adults and kids.
Do you believe that?
I'm afraid a lot of people don't. I'm afraid a lot of people are convinced that kids are somehow capable of less than the life-changing, robust learning that is the stuff of discipleship. And that view causes us to view them as only "eventual Christians" and to give them on a type of instruction that fills their heads but does not feed their souls.
That's a shame. And it accounts for the kids who are raised in church and grow up knowing all the "right" answers, who end up far away from church once they're older. Which is a majority of those who come through our churches.
Let me say that again: a majority - an overwhelming majority of kids who are raised in church - some surveys say 70%, others say 80% or as high as 90% - spend their young adult years away from the church. We've long comforted ourselves with the knowledge that "once they have kids, they'll come back", but the demographic reality of later marriage and elective singleness or childlessness makes that less of a certainty.
What's going on? Somehow, we are failing to capture kids' hearts, which is a critical component of developing disciples. When Jesus said, "Go into all the world and make disciples of all nations," he didn't say just teach. He could have, but the word he used that we translate as "make disciples" carries the sense of "teach them in such a way that they are changed into something else."
There is a magic moment that every teacher knows, when a student goes from just being a pupil, to being a learner - a self-motivated, devoted student of the subject at hand. Not every kid who receives art instruction is changed into a artist. Not every kid who sit under a music teacher becomes a musician. Not every history student becomes a historian. But when they do, the teacher has done more than just taught - they've changed a life.
That's disciple learning. And it's tied up in relationship. It doesn't usually happen without the influence of a teacher. It can happen that a kid falls in love with history from a book, and they find themselves changed into historians. But more often, there is that special teacher whom they admire and emulate. It is their pattern of speaking, of thinking, of reacting, of handling challenges - of simply living that becomes the living, breathing, teaching example.
That's why parents and the way home environments operate matter so much, because like it or not, if a parent self-identifies as a Christian, kids will learn powerfully from their examples. I do not, however, subscribe to any side in the "Whose responsibility is it - church or parents?" debate that has cropped up in the last ten years. On the one hand, no church leader or program can hope to have the influence that a parent has by virtue of the sheer amount of time they spend with their kid. On the other hand, some parents won't or don't want to oversee the discipleship of their kids, and churches have the size and resources to create worship and learning environments that you can't in your own home. It's everyone's job to disciple kids, and we should welcome that influence from wherever it originates.
The message is archived here; scroll to the 10:45 am service for September 13.
Info, articles, and thoughts for parents of kids at North Coast Calvary Chapel.
