5 Things We Can Do to Help Our Kids

VBS is wrapping up. We've spent the week investing in young lives, laughing, teaching, singing, dancing and sharing the love of Jesus. Over 40 people, from teenagers to senior saints, prepared the food, shepherded the groups, and sweated their way through the week for children in our community. 

It got me thinking about what really makes a difference in the lives of children. And specifically, I asked, "What should we hand back to parents as encouragement for the days ahead?"

Consider a modern parable as a reference point. On my last trip to the beach I watched a dad teach his daughter to surf. He didn't lecture her about balance or hand her a manual. He didn't hire a surf coach. He paddled out beside her, took the same waves she did, wiped out, laughed, and climbed back on to try again and again. By the end of the day she wasn't doing what he said — she was doing what he did.

That's a parable for raising children in the faith. Our kids absorb far more from the lives we live than the lessons we recite. The encouraging news is authors of Scripture pressed this truth onto parents centuries ago — Deuteronomy 6, the covenant our tradition experiences as family worship — is exactly what the social sciences keep rediscovering. Here are five places to begin.

1. Live it yourself. Sociologist Christian Smith's national study found the single most powerful influence on a child's faith is not their peers, their school, or even their youth group — it is the practiced faith of their parents. We cannot hand down what we do not hold. Before we ask our children to pray, to worship, to forgive, they need to watch us do the same.

2. Stay warm — especially dads. In the largest study of its kind, Vern Bengtson followed hundreds of families across four generations and found that warmth, more than strictness or even church attendance, predicts whether faith takes root. His sharpest line: religious example "will not compensate for a distant dad." Closeness is the soil; doctrine is the seed.

3. Talk about it on a Tuesday. Smith's team uncovered something surprising — ordinary, midweek conversation about God mattered more than the polish of what was said. So name the Lord's kindness in the small things: the meal, the diagnosis, the sunset. Faith handed down sounds less like a lecture and more like a running conversation.

4. Worship and pray together. A Harvard study tracking thousands of children into adulthood found that those who attended worship and prayed regularly became adults who were happier, more generous, and less prone to depression, with a deeper sense of purpose. The old means of grace are not relics. They shape the heart over a lifetime.

5. Gather at the table. Researchers studying tens of thousands of teens found that every added family dinner measurably improved their wellbeing — less anxiety, more trust, greater belonging. For us this is no coincidence. The God who saves us seats us at a Table, and the family table is its weeknight rehearsal.

None of this requires a seminary degree. We need only presence, warmth, and repetition. We plant and water; God gives the growth (1 Corinthians 3:6). So be faithful in the small, ordinary things, and trust the Lord with the harvest.

These are the practices, examples and habits passed on to my wife and I from our parents. These are the things we are passing along to our sons.

God wants surfers who ride the waves of life with their kids, not sunbathers who pass the lessons of life off to others. 

Grace and peace,