The editorial last month dealt with the negative side of this subject under the heading, “Sacrificing Children.” In this month’s issue, Hannah’s loving influence on Samuel is discussed by Bro. Booker and Sis. Perry addresses at some length the potential for raising our children in the Truth. That may seem enough on this subject for now.
Furthermore, any consideration of the matter hurts those whose children have reached maturity and have not been baptized; and one must face the fact mighty men of faith did not have faithful children. So why bring the issue up again? For two reasons.
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Lots of children
There seem to be many more young children around our meetings today than was true a few years ago. It may be the demographics of the population; it may be that Christadelphians are having larger families than the norm but for whatever reason, there are a lot of children growing up in our community. Welland, ONT ecclesia regularly reports they have more children than members; the same is true of two out of three Detroit ecclesias; this year Midwest Bible school had their largest-ever group of children; we just returned from Western Canada where the same situation was evident in several smaller ecclesias; San Francisco has a sharp jump in Sunday school enrollment and the list could go on.
There are a few exceptions, but generally speaking we are presently faced with a tremendous opportunity of raising children in the Truth until the Lord comes.
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Success is possible
The empirical data is so conclusive that it would be foolish to ignore it. In areas of the brotherhood, virtually every child raised in a certain Christadelphian environment is baptized. In other whole segments, the percentage runs 50% or less.
If we were discussing temporal matters, we would never ignore statistics like this. Businessmen, scientists and politicians would immediately take note and try to figure out the factors making for success. We should do the same.
It is true that being a baptized Christadelphian is no guarantee of the Kingdom. But it doesn’t hurt.
Some object to citing statistics because this is a spiritual not a temporal matter; we have to take into account God’s selection — He doesn’t want everybody! As Sis. Perry points out, that is wrong theology when applied to those who know the Truth. If a person knows the Truth, God does want them; their salvation is up to them. Who else is going to prevent them from being saved? Is it God? “He that spared not his own son…shall he not with him also freely give us all things?” Is there some spirit power who can condemn those whom God justifies; can someone overrule God? Of course not! The one exalted next to God, Jesus Christ, is our friend working for our salvation. Will the angels keep us from eternal life? They encamp around us, regulating circumstances for our eternal wellbeing so that we can be developed in character and not overcome by cruel circumstances. Is the flesh too strong for us, will we be overcome by lust, or hatred or despair in spite of our prayers, our devotion and our reading of the word? “Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.” (Rom. 8:32-39)
Once we come to a knowledge of the Truth, the choice is ours. The only one who stands in the way of our eternal salvation is ourselves. The same is true of our children who know the Truth. If they do not accept and live the Truth, it is their fault, not God’s. And in the case of children that we raise in the Truth from a very young age, the parental role is of such tremendous influence that we can virtually guarantee they will accept the Truth. Whether they live it or not is up to them.
This may seem a hard position to take in respect to those whose children have never been baptized. But remember, this is only one area of service to God. Apparently Samuel, David, Jehoshaphat, Hezekiah and many other worthies failed in it. So if you have failed in this regard, you’ve got a lot of good company who will be in the kingdom.
Yet we feel there is no value ignoring the facts staring us in the face or the scripture passages Sis. Perry draws to our attention. What’s the point of losing yet more of our children simply to make those parents feel better who have already apparently lost some of theirs? (Remember, as well, that some go through a long period of rebellion before finally submitting to God so don’t give up on older children.)
Key factors
What are the key factors that make a difference? From our own observations and reading of scripture, we can make some suggestions that may prove useful. Last month certain negative points were noted and we would suggest a quick review of some of those. This time we would submit some positive steps that we have noted are a big help. Nothing, however, substitutes for our own
loving, prayerful, devout approach to our own situation.
The first principles
Know the first principles of the gospel, teach them all of the time, never express any doubt about them and have the child Bible mark them.
The first principles of the gospel are the keys to knowing and living the Truth. The nature of man, the nature of Christ, the oneness of God, the necessity of obedience, the cause of sin, etc. These doctrines distinguish the system of Truth from the apostasy around us and are vital to the practical living of the Truth. Take the definition of death, for example. Once any idea of the immortality of the soul is out of a person’s head they can see the folly of the trinity with relative ease. These two points alone distinguish us from virtually every other religion and denomination and leave the child convinced Christadelphians are the only group with the Truth of scripture. Not only that, these doctrines are critical to a right attitude to daily life. If a person thinks he has an immortal soul, he intuitively realizes something bad has to happen to the souls of bad people after death. Nobody really thinks they are bad enough during the few years of this life to justify their soul suffering for millions of years. Consequently they take a casual attitude toward religion feeling they are at least half-way decent people, certainly not worthy of being punished for eternity.
When doing daily Bible readings, consistently point out verses which reinforce first principles. Talk about them in casual conversation. Explain wrested scriptures (if you don’t know the explanation find it out). Have the young person mark his Bible with a chain of references proving each first principle.
Many people (Christadelphians included) object to this last point claiming it is a form of teaching by rote to indoctrinate a young mind with your own point of view. So what if it is! It is leading your child to salvation and that should be exactly what you want.
Do not play the devil’s advocate when it comes to confidence in the validity of scripture or of the first principles. Any doubts by the parents will be magnified in the mind of the child and may cause him to be skeptical of the whole system of truth.
Attend all ecclesial functions
Forget about all the excuses, your own weariness, the need for children’s sleep, noise at the meeting, half-sickness situations. So far as humanly possible, get the whole family to all the meetings. And make them fun!
If you live in isolation, move to an ecclesial area, create your own meetings or travel to functions whenever possible.
Of course this takes effort and time and discipline. But what do we think the mother does who wants her daughter to be a champion figure skater or dancer. Do you think they miss practice at every opportunity? And what about the poor family determined to see that all their children get a college education. Do they skip work and let their kids miss school for every little reason?
If we don’t want to put out the effort, then let’s not blame anybody else when our youngsters stray into the world later on.
If we want them to be baptized into the ecclesia, then we have to make it a vital part of their lives, and a fun part. You say that’s impossible?
It is if every time they run around in the meeting hall they are reprimanded.
But if they are permitted to make a little noise after meeting and play some games outside, they will look forward to ecclesial functions. We can be so consumed with the sanctity of the sanctuary that we destroy its desirability for the children.
There has to be some balance, but if the hall has no basement or extra rooms, the only place the children can play around a little is in the main meeting room. And if they bounce a ball off the outside wall, let’s put up with a few marks on the paint or some thumps interrupting our conversations.
Furthermore, don’t be in a desperate rush to get home yourself. One of the signs of a healthy ecclesia is when the members stand around chatting after meeting. We are family and that’s what families do.
God and family
Sometimes people list the proper order of priorities in life as God first, family second and work third. We are not certain the distinction between the first two is wholly valid. If the great objective with our children is that they grow up in the Truth, why should there be any demarcation between involvement with them and the work of the Lord?
How can you work on a paper and play with the children at the same time? By working on the paper with your youngster bouncing on your knee or playing around your feet. For that very reason we have never attempted to remove the scribble mark on Gen. 1:28-29 in our Bible. For one thing, it reminds us to watch out for little hands holding pens, but it also reminds us that no great disaster occurred because we combined duty to God and family.
Yes, a certain amount of considerate quiet may be needed when we are doing personal Bible study. But that need may be greatly exaggerated. The only way we could concentrate at work was when the presses were running full-blast making a terrific roar. Let them stop at an unexpected time and we could concentrate on nothing at all. If we want to, we can adjust to a lot of noise so that even our Bible study does not interfere with family interaction.
Another point to note is that our objectives should be clear to our children. We want them with us in the kingdom. If we have restrictions different from worldly families, then that is the reason. Make it clear that we are even more concerned with our child’s eternal welfare than we are with being popular with them by catering to their immediate desires.
Socializing with Christadelphians
This is not always so easy because of the distance involved. But we want our youngsters to grow up with their social circle in the meeting.
Obviously that is a lot easier when we are in a larger ecclesia. We have referred on several occasions, however, to some determined families who live 75 miles from an ecclesial area and spend countless hours on the road bringing their youngsters to all the young people’s activities. It takes a lot of work, but we can do it if we want to.
We should also remember that Christadelphian parents can provide Christadelphian social companions for their children. Many a worldly family spends a lot of time participating together in camping, skiing, hiking, etc. Our motivation for doing so may be different, but if we are in relative isolation, that may be the only way we can keep our children in a Christadelphian social environment with ourselves being the Christadelphians.
There are a number of specific ideas we have seen work well when there are other ecclesial families nearby. But all of them require work, planning, money and the willingness to use one’s house and car in God’s work. The house may end up getting dirty, but that’s a small price to pay to keep our children within an ecclesial social environment. Some of the specific activities work better with a large group but there is always something that can be done even with three or four youngsters.
Don’t force baptism
That may seem a contradictory comment to the spirit of the above. But a person must willingly decide to commit their lives to Christ or their baptism will be useless. However, it is our observation that if the parents really devote themselves to raising their children to be disciples, the bigger problem may well be holding them back from a premature baptism.
Our editorial opinion this month may seem pointed and over-stated. But we feel we have thousands of children in our North American community which offer us a field ready to harvest if we will but give ourselves wholeheartedly to their eternal welfare.
The Origin of the Organic World – Part One