Preparing the Next generation

Moses was preparing a new generation of families to enter the Promised Land. The previous generation had spent 40 years wandering in the wilderness because they refused to trust God to lead them in. Now he wants to make certain this new generation doesn’t jettison the commandments God had given them and the faith relationship God wanted them to have with Himself.  How are they to accomplish that “so that you, your children and their children after them may fear the Lord your God as long as you live….” Here is the strategy God gave them: “These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the door frames of your houses and on your gates.”  (Deuteronomy 6:6-9).  In other words, the only way the next generation can grasp the significance of our faith is to see it, hear it, taste it and smell it daily in the lives of their parents.  This is more than just a commitment to “be there” to preside over their growth years. This constitutes a definite strategy to produce godly people as genuinely Christian role models for the next generation.

Since the time of Adam and eve we have pointed a finger in the wrong direction when it came time to explain the reasons for human failure. Groups, agencies or movements are not the reasons our kids are acting like wild animals. The home is where they see their first role models and where they receive their earliest directions for living. It is refreshing to hear the increasing number of voices, even from social and political liberals, who have come to agree with the much-maligned assessment of some that children were intended to have two parents and that we should quit accepting as normal any departure from that. But that is only the beginning of the process. Our God wants to see both of those parents unselfconsciously living out their faith in full view of their children, as if it were the most important thing in their lives (which it is).

 At CCF we have no political agenda to follow and no pressure groups to please. We have only the clear teaching from the Word of God to guide us. And that clear teaching is this: God has entrusted into our care and guidance His precious little ones. It is up to us as parents to accept joyfully this task of training them to follow His direction. We must take seriously our ministry to the next generation. It is one of the reasons we exist as a family of believers.


 

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