Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it
Proverbs 22:6 (KJV)
This is a very controversial verse as there are many children who have wandered and gone their own way, despite being taken to church every week and being from a respectable family.
However, it is my belief that it is all in the quality of the training. Read that again. That means that it is a great responsibility that church kids clubs/VBS workers and that parents have. To give the child the best possible quality training. If the training is up to scratch then I believe that this promise is true.
Of course the decision is up to the child ultimately, but with the right structures in place, they shouldn't ever want to leave God and so are much less likely to go astray.
A few practical tips
1. Make sure discipline is tight, letting children get away with things is implicitly telling them that sin is OK, which I'm sure you don't want to do.
2. Watch your implicit messages in other ways
3. Clearly teach the Bible and be well prepared. Have a theme for the whole club so that they can really understand it, do crafts that relate to the theme you are doing
4. Have a natural transition from childrens work to teenagers, this is the pitfall of many churches and have teenage bible studies relavent to them.
Your thoughts on this issue?
Proverbs 22:6 (KJV)
This is a very controversial verse as there are many children who have wandered and gone their own way, despite being taken to church every week and being from a respectable family.
However, it is my belief that it is all in the quality of the training. Read that again. That means that it is a great responsibility that church kids clubs/VBS workers and that parents have. To give the child the best possible quality training. If the training is up to scratch then I believe that this promise is true.
Of course the decision is up to the child ultimately, but with the right structures in place, they shouldn't ever want to leave God and so are much less likely to go astray.
A few practical tips
1. Make sure discipline is tight, letting children get away with things is implicitly telling them that sin is OK, which I'm sure you don't want to do.
2. Watch your implicit messages in other ways
3. Clearly teach the Bible and be well prepared. Have a theme for the whole club so that they can really understand it, do crafts that relate to the theme you are doing
4. Have a natural transition from childrens work to teenagers, this is the pitfall of many churches and have teenage bible studies relavent to them.
Your thoughts on this issue?
No comments:
Post a Comment