The way to teach our children to love the LORD is to live it out in our own lives

When I was in middle school and I started studying the Bible for myself, I remember getting excited about the Book of Proverbs. I developed my own set of emojis that I would draw in the margins to signify the various themes. I would put a ❤️ whenever a reference to the heart was given. I would draw a 🙂 for joy or happiness, a 💲 for money, and my personal favorite, a 👄 for the mouth. I had a whole list of characters I would use, and this was long before smartphones and emojis were even a thing. 

As a child coming into maturity, the proverbs really spoke to me. They offered me quick, short answers to the complex questions that were firing off in rapid succession in my brain. All of these years later, they are still with me, like spiritual time bombs, going off in my head as I face the various challenges of new life experiences. Those formative years were really helpful for me to learn about how the Bible works at communicating ideas and repeating variations of a theme. 

Train Up A Child…

Have you ever struggled with how to communicate your faith to children? We typically spend most of our time telling them the narrative stories of the Bible. We focus on the ones that seem particularly tailored for children: Noah’s Ark, David and Goliath, Jesus and the lost sheep, etc. Yet, while our kids might grow up with a familiarity with the Bible, it doesn’t always translate to how they ought to be living. 

The Book of Proverbs is a great resource for parents and grandparents, especially when thinking about how to pass on our faith to the next generation. In fact, Proverbs was written specifically for children as they grew up into adulthood. 

“Hear, my son, your father's instruction,

    and forsake not your mother's teaching,

for they are a graceful garland for your head

    and pendants for your neck.”

Proverbs 1:8-9 ESV

…The Way They Should Go…

Another way that we can steer children off course is by using the Bible as though it is simply a book of rules. This too fails to translate to a life of faith. While the Book of Proverbs seems to be making moral statements, and can easily be misinterpreted as a handbook for right and wrong living, it is actually teaching something much deeper. 

“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge…”

Proverbs 1:7 ESV

Behind every instruction and teaching is a call to direct the child in the way that they should go. What is the way that they should go? Is it simply to be wise with their finances, upright in their behavior, and respectful in their relationships? No. The very foundation of wisdom is fearing the LORD. If we simply demand conformity without teaching the fear and love of the LORD, we are not teaching them the way that they should go. 

(Teach Them Diligently) 

“Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart.”

Deuteronomy 6:4-6 ESV

This is the Shema. It is the Old Testament instruction to God’s covenant people, and it is carried through to Jesus’ teaching (Mark 12:28-34). It is the foundation for everything in Scripture. This is the way that they should go, but how do you teach a child to love something? 

“You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.”

Deuteronomy 6:7-9 ESV 

I remember when my mom would try to get me to do my homework by telling me that it was fun and exciting. I wasn’t buying it. It was hard. It seemed to exist in a world outside of my reality. In my limited understanding, school didn’t have any real world applications. Being able to diagram a sentence didn’t make me any better at baseball. Math didn’t help me in my Lego projects. It was purely academic, and I wasn’t going to enjoy it no matter how much my mom tried to make it exciting. 

Notice, the Bible doesn’t say that we should teach the Great Commandment in a classroom setting. It says that it should be discussed and lived out as we sit in the house and as we walk down the path, as we lay down to sleep and when we rise in the morning. 

The way to teach our children to love the LORD is to live it out in our own lives. It should consume everything we do with our hands. They should be able to see that it is our greatest desire as we keep our eyes fixed on Jesus. It should be the guiding principle of our home life, not just when we are at church. It should be the culture that they are steeped in every moment of their lives. That is how we teach them diligently. 

…When They Are Old…

One of the courses of my training for ministry was to preach at a nursing home. At times, it felt like a pointless exercise. Many of them had lost their short term memory and they wouldn’t remember anything I preached regardless of how much time I had prepared.

However, whenever we would sing an old hymn or recite the twenty-third Psalm, their faces would light up. There was something powerful that was clinging to every fiber of their being. Where their minds were fractured with sickness and old age, their souls would come alive when the water of the Word came into contact with the seed of the Gospel deep inside their hearts. 

That ministry would go on for four years and I still treasure its memory, not only for what I experienced in seeing the gospel bear fruit in their lives, but also for what it taught me about the importance of getting as much of the Word of God into my own soul before my mind wouldn’t let me process new thoughts. 

“I have stored up your word in my heart,

    that I might not sin against you.”

Psalm 119:11 ESV

The verses I memorized as a child are still with me. They are a guide to my feet and a light to my path. As I teach the children in my church, and as I instruct the adults, I want to provide them with something that will stick in their minds, cling to their bones, and take permanent residence in their hearts. I want to leave them with something that will last a lifetime. 

…They Will Not Depart From It

Proverbs is not a book of absolutes. It is speaking in general terms. That might be hard for many of us to understand when we try to take the Bible literally whenever it is appropriate, but if we can understand that the Proverbs are more than a checklist of do’s and don’ts, then we can wrap our minds around the fact that the underlying principles are true even if the the outcome is not guaranteed. 

Not everyone who was raised in the church remains as they become adults. In fact, we seem to be living in an age where deconstructing faith is at an all time high and even praised by the mainstream media. 

I have had countless conversations with parents and grandparents who are heartbroken over a prodigal child. Usually, they are beating themselves up for not doing everything right or not doing enough to keep them in church. 

As real and deep as the wounds of seeing a child walk away from the faith are, it is not appropriate to beat ourselves up. In fact, it conveys a false gospel. The message of the Bible is not about doing everything right and getting what we earned, but admitting that we were wrong and receiving something we could not earn. 

My instruction for parents in anguish is that they themselves should not depart from the way that they should go. Persevere in faith. Cling to the truth that your Heavenly Father loves your child more than you could ever love them. Cry out to a God who can do the impossible. Confess that your sins against your children were a greater offense to God. Wrestle with the beam in your own eye so that you can see clearly how to help your children with the speck in their eye. Admit to your children where you were wrong and testify to the glories of God’s grace to forgive. Then, live out your faith so that your children can see in you that your hope is in God, in Christ’s righteousness, and not your own works or past deeds. 

Entrust your prodigals to God, believe the gospel, and do not depart from the way that you should go.