The Starting Point

The importance of having a common purpose in both the home and the Sunday school cannot be overemphasized. This has been stressed many times in many ways by those who have had the spiritual education of our children at heart. Here are a few voices from the past that have spoken on the subject:

“Wise parents will recognize the obligation of privately doing their utmost to instill the principles of scriptural wisdom into the minds and hearts of their children. At the same time they will not despise the help afforded by a Sunday School, which … is a great aid to the private efforts made by parents.”1

“Brethren and sisters, we ask you to render every aid in your power in assisting the teachers. Home influence is a great factor in the process.”2

“Children are quick to note any touch of insincerity in their teachers’ words and deeds and in those of their parents. Much of the effect of the teacher’s work is lost if it is not supplemented in the home life of the child.”3

“What patient hopefulness is required to think anything can be done in one short hour a week! Of course, little can be done without the faithful co-operation of the parents, and my main object is therefore to help the parents to keep their children’s interest alive, and most weeks I try to send them home with a difficulty on which to ask the help or opinion of their parents. The children have to be very exceptionally endowed to win through to the Truth without parents who are of it. That there are many such cases known as the result of Sunday School work — with the blessing of God — encourages us to keep on.”4

“The co-operation of the parents is earnestly asked for, that home and school influences may be in the same direction and the hands of the teach­ers strengthened in their good work.”5

It is now our turn to speak on the subject. Apart from completely relying on God’s help, it is difficult to think of a more important place to start when it comes to considering the spiritual education of our children. The first three articles in “The Joy of Sunday Schooling” section of the Tidings will therefore focus on the Sunday school and the home. Your response to these articles and your own additional thoughts on the subject are invited. Please send them to me, Bro. Jim Harper, at2harps4u@gmail.com. We would like the Sunday school section of the Tidings to be as interactive as possible.

Sunday School and the Home: A Cooperative Venture

The home is a child’s first Sunday school. In many respects it is also his or her most important one. All Bible truths can be taught in the home. And almost any spiritual virtue can be undermined there. By itself, the ecclesial Sunday school has only limited power to affect either course.

Public school educators know that the home is the most important single factor in the success formula for any child. Certainly the values of the home and the active involvement of parents in the education process impact significantly on a child’s achievement in school.

Here are the kinds of things that professional educators say on the subject:

“If school improvement efforts are judged successful when they raise stu­dent achievement, the research strongly suggests that involving parents can make a crucial difference. Parents who help their children learn at home nurture (in themselves and in their children) attitudes that are crucial to achievement. Children who are failing in school improve dramatically when parents are called in to help. Some of the major benefits of parent involvement include … positive attitudes and behavior, more successful programs, and more effective schools.”6

The same things are true for the spiritual education of our children. The home can make or break the success of any Sunday school program. A strong partner­ship between the Sunday school and the home is crucial if the Sunday school is to be fully effective.

A case in point

Several years ago the New England Christadelphian Sunday School Association ran a questionnaire7for Sunday school parents and teachers. Twenty-one replies came from parents of 12-14 year olds. Of these, 12 parents were directly involved in Sunday school work and nine were not. On a question that asked the parents if their children regularly did Sunday school homework, the children of involved parents came out well ahead in terms of performance.

In this case, the involved parents were almost certainly role models for their chil­dren. Sunday school was important for the parents. It was therefore also important for their children.

Of course, not all parents can be Sunday school teachers. But we don’t have to be. There are many other ways — more direct ways, in fact — that parents can enter into partnership with the Sunday school and have a positive impact on the spiritual welfare of their own children. We will look at some of these in the next article.

Are we products of our society?

One of the drawbacks of free public education is that we can let it do too much for us. As parents, we can easily fall in with the idea that it is the sole responsibility of the schools to educate our children. It’s not our job to do it, and becoming involved in the education of our children is optional, perhaps even counterproductive.

The problems go further. More and more of what used to be home responsibilities are being loaded onto school systems, and the results are not always impressive. The fault does not entirely lie with the schools. It also lies with the modern ap­proach to family life itself.

Slowly the public schools are realizing that they cannot do it alone. In some places schools have begun to train parents how to be parents again, so they can get the support of the home that is crucial for the success of education.

Do we need to learn the same lessons as far as Sunday schooling is concerned? Our children simply cannot receive an adequate spiritual education in one hour a week (or less!) at Sunday school. The home has got to help.

It’s a cooperative venture

Christadelphian families must not abdicate on the spiritual education of their children the way many families have completely handed over secular education and more to the public schools. And our Sunday schools cannot, wittingly or un­wittingly, adopt an institutional mindset: “Send us your kids. This is where they will learn the Truth.” Neither way of thinking is right.

In God’s arrangement of things, families existed long before Sunday schools.8The spiritual education of the children was therefore once the primary responsibility of the home. There can be little doubt about this, scripturally. Have a look at these passages: Genesis 18:19; Deuteronomy 4:9, 6:4-9, and 11:18-21; Psalms 78:1-8; Proverbs 22:6 and 15, and 29:17; Ephesians 6:1-4, and 2 Timothy 1:5 and 3:15. Fathers rose up and told their children about the things of God. Grandmothers nurtured faith in mothers, and mothers did the same with their children.

For Christadelphian families and Sunday schools to fulfill their potential before God, it is best done in close partnership. Ongoing communication between the Sunday school and the home has to be the rule rather than the exception. Parents need to have the interests of the Sunday school at heart, and Sunday schools need to see their role as one that complements rather than replaces the spiritual influ­ences of the home.

Christadelphian parents and Sunday schools need to view the comfortable ways of secular society as suspect and join forces against them. A strong partnership needs to exist with the view to cooperating in one of the most important responsibilities we have: the spiritual nurturing of our children.

  1. Robert Roberts, announcing the publication of The Christadelphian Instructor, The Christadelphian, 1886, 358.
  2. From the Birmingham Sunday School Report, The Christadelphian, 1921, 515.
  3. Bro. C. A. Ladson, introducing an unsigned article, “The Ideal Sunday School Teacher”, The Christadelphian, 1923, 349-351.
  4. A sister in Christ, mother, and Sunday school teacher, “The Ideal Sunday School Teacher”, The Christadelphian, 1923, 349-351.
  5. From the Birmingham Sunday School Report, The Christadelphian, 1927, 519.
  6. Anne T. Henderson, “Parents Are a School’s Best Friends,” The Kappan, October 1988, p.149. Anne T. Henderson is a Senior Consultant with the Annenberg Institute for School Reform in Washington, D.C.
  7. Report on Questions #1-#11 of NECSSA Evaluation Questionnaire, February 1974.
  8. The Sunday school movement began in England in the 1780’s.