“How do we keep our young people faithful to the church after they leave home?” Local ministers were asked this question during the final session of the World Religions seminar conducted at a local public library in which I was a panel member. It was an excellent question and showed a deep concern for the loss of influence the church is having on teens and young adults.
The panel answered the question from
the perspective of what churches can do to keep our young people faithful. When it was my turn to speak to the question
I shared what my friend, Rev. Owen C. Carr says, “We don’t lose young people
from our churches. We lose them when they’re children, they can’t leave until
they’re teens.”
Churches should do everything they can to inspire and
connect children and teens to Jesus. Churches
must change, innovate and become relevant to our children and youth if we want
to increase the odds that they will remain faithful as young adults. But the
church is only a small part of the equation, and not even the most important
one. The primary factor in a young
person’s desire for God, the church and the things of God is not the
church. It is parents!
Ron Lee Davis in a talk entitled,
“Introducing Christ to Your Child”, made this statement, “An elder statesman of
a Christian church has devoted himself to a fifty-year study of Christian and
non-Christian families. He says that in
American culture today, most young adults following Jesus Christ either come
from non-Christian homes where they were converted to Christ in their teenage
years through a dynamic youth ministry, or they come from homes where they grew
up in love with Jesus because mom and dad were so in love with Jesus that His
love permeated their lives. It passed
through their pores. Very few believers
come from homes where there was a kind of indifferent, apathetic commitment to
Christ.”
“This is not my idea,” says
Davis. “This is the result of this
study. It is sobering and thought
provoking to suggest that, in American culture, the chances are better for a
child growing up in a non-Christian home to become a Christian than for a child
growing up in a home that has an indifferent, apathetic commitment to Jesus
Christ.”
Parents, if you are concerned about
whether your children will remain faithful to Jesus, stay connected to the
church, and have an eternal home in heaven -- make certain you are
fully-devoted to Jesus Christ yourself and passionate about your faith.
Warren Mueller writing in Leadership
magazine noted this about children and church attendance, “A study once
disclosed that if both Mom and Dad attend church regularly, 72 percent of their
children remain faithful in attendance.
If only Dad attends regularly, 55 percent remain faithful. If only Mom attends regularly, 15 percent
remain faithful. If neither attend
regularly, only 6 percent remain faithful.”
My friend, Rev. Terry Yancey,
Superintendent of the Kansas District of the Assemblies of God, when he
ministered to teens would often address them with words like these, “If you
don’t know how to get to heaven, I’m going there. Put your eyes on the back of my neck and
follow me. Do what I do, watch what I
watch, pray like I pray, live for Jesus the way I live for Jesus. Follow me, imitate me and we’ll get to heaven
together.” Mom, dad, could you speak
words like these to your own children or are you expecting the church, the
pastor, the youth sponsor or the children’s director to be the ones your
children are supposed to follow if they want to learn how to get to
heaven? Your children will first follow
you and then those in the church. As
Rev. John C. Maxwell says, “You teach what you know, you reproduce what you
are.”
What are you reproducing in your children in regard to God
and the church -- apathetic, half-hearted devotion, or vital, living
faith? The burden rests primarily not on
the church’s shoulders, but on yours.
Let’s partner together to hold on to our children.
