In need of a Saviour too

I drove past a sign the other day:

My first thought was: “who can disagree with that?” Then, thinking further, it's also a statement that is nearly impossible to agree with! At least, any number of people might agree with the statement, without agreeing with each other. Do we all agree on what the “positive direction” is?

I want to make a case that:

• There is only one positive direction for our children (and indeed for all of us): to God through Jesus Christ. 
• As parents, we will be held to account for our leadership of our children – either toward or away from Jesus. 
• As a church, it is a vital part of our mercy mission to help parents discharge this duty, and to help children start in the right direction. 

One positive direction

All people are in terrible danger. All people are at risk of great judgement, wrath and punishment. All people are rebels against God, trying to wriggle out from His rightful authority and establish their own rule in God's place. Paul puts it succinctly in Romans 3:23:

for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.

But surely this doesn't apply to children! Children are so innocent, so trusting, so good. Surely Paul is only talking about grown-ups? This is a tempting objection, because it plays to closely held cultural values about childhood. But to accept it requires us to ignore the plain language Paul uses here and elsewhere in Romans (eg. 3:9-18). It also requires us to ignore the consistent teaching of the bible elsewhere. Here is one example from Psalm 51:

Surely I was sinful at birth,
sinful from the time my mother conceived me. (v. 5)

If David, a man whose heart was fully devoted to the Lord, can write this, then it is clear that the description applies generally to all people.

So children are alienated from God, just as adults are. They too are “without hope and without God in the world” (Eph 2:12), unless they too are “brought near through the blood of Christ” (Eph 2:13).

Society and the church have too often been satisfied with the lesser benefit of keeping a child out of trouble. As long as a child or teen doesn't get arrested, get drunk, or have a child out of wedlock, we think that the child is turning out OK – the more so if a child makes some positive contribution through music, sport, work or school. We have seen already that this obscures a child's separation from God, and his or her great need to be saved!

The remedy, the only “positive direction”, is to hear and believe the gospel – to trust in the person that gospel proclaims! As Paul wrote: “I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes.” (Romans 1:16) And Peter proclaimed: “Salvation is found in no-one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.” (Acts 4:12).

The instruction of the Lord

Parents bear a heavy burden in ensuring that their children have a chance to hear the gospel and respond. This is clear common sense – who else spends as much time with a child as a parent? Who else is the child's first and most important role model? Whose words sink deepest into a child's heart, and exert the greatest influence over the person that child grows to be?

The bible emphasises this common-sense conclusion with a command and a warning. The command we see in Ephesians 6:4: “Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.” The warning is implicit in Mark 9:42: “And if anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to be thrown into the sea with a large millstone tied around his neck.” Jesus said this while holding a little child (see verse 36), which adds a sharp edge to his words!

So parents are charged with the responsibility of bringing their children up in the Lord, and are warned not to be the cause of sin in their lives! Not something to take lightly.

But is this too much to put on parents? Don't children themselves bear some responsibility? And what about the church, doesn't the church have to reach out to children as well?

Firstly, the responsibility of children. Of course, they must make their own response to Jesus in due course. But this does not absolve parents of their responsibility. As Paul writes in Romans 10:14:

“How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them?”

What's more, the capacity to believe in Jesus is itself a God-given gift, outside the control of the parents: “It is by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God” (Eph 2:8). We rightly celebrate God's greatness and goodness whenever anyone turns to Christ and is saved!

Parents are not responsible for results – they are responsible for their own obedience in presenting the gospel to their kids.

Where does the church fit in?

Secondly, the role of the church. There are two main jobs for the church in this area:

• Preparing God's people for works of service (Eph 4:12), particularly preparing parents for the task of leading their children towards Christ! 
• Going into the world to make disciples (Matt 28:19) – including of children and particularly of those children who will not hear of Jesus from their parents! 

We must do these things because God has commanded them. But aside from that, it is good sense to reach out to children and to parents of children. People become more set in their ways as they grow older. Reaching children when they are still young gives them the greatest opportunity to respond positively to Jesus, relatively free from the prejudices and attitudes that harden as they grown older. Twelve seems to be the crucial age. We need to be showing primary-school aged children the wonder and glory of God, and inviting them to accept Jesus as Saviour and King!

Love your neighbour as yourself

I was reading this post on the blog Stuff Christians Like the other day.

(For those who have stayed with me and not been distracted by Jon's great blog - thank you both.)  

Image: 'The Good Samaritan' by Chinese artist
Dr He Qi as found at He Qi Gallery. 

Anyway, the gist of the thing is that Christians like to pride themselves on being loving, especially to non-Christians.  It's kinda our thing.  We all know bits of 1 Corinthians 13 (Love is patient, love is kind, love is not love which alters when it alteration finds, - or something like that).  We remember three of the four characters in the parable of the good samaritan (there were the levis, the guy who got robbed, the samaritan and the ... other unhelpful bloke).  And we're really good at the "by this shall all men know that you are my disciples, if you have love one for another."  Someone even wrote a song.

Problem is, as Jon pointed out on his blog, most of our love and service is directed inwards toward other Christians.  In our enthusiasm for the Great Commission, we oftentimes forget the Great Commandment.  Don't get me wrong, we should be loving other Christians (and let's face it, who would want to join the church if we didn't?), but when I look searchingly at my own behaviour, I see a worrying pattern - I spend very little of my time with non-Christians, and almost no social time with non-Christians.

We know that love is not primarily a feeling (like I discussed here), but rather an intentional action to work for the good of another.  If that is true, then one implication is the need to spend time with that other person.  If I don't, how can I be acting for their good?  Examine yourself - am I all alone here in my insulated personal Christendom, or are you nodding along?

It's about here that I'm meant to start making a whole lot of resolutions about inviting non-Christian co-workers, neighbours and school parents to barbecues - in fact I did in my head, before another thought occurred to me:

How will my children learn to love their non-Christian neighbour unless they see me doing it? 

My children get lots of time with their non-Christian friends - they go to a State primary school.  But how will they learn to be a Christian person in a non-Christian setting, rather than a chameleon that can adapt rapidly between church and school circles?

First and foremost, my trust is in God, that through greater knowledge of his Son, and through the gift of the Holy Spirit, my children will learn to look beyond themselves, their family and their church to the needs of the world.  I know that these lessons will not be downloaded Matrix-style to their minds, but that God will use people (primarily me and my wife!) as instruments to teach them.

So here are the thoughts that occurred to me - perhaps you have other ideas that you could contribute in the comments:

Incidental ideas:

• We've started praying each night and (when we have time) each morning, that the Holy Spirit would be with the children through the day, and that they would be good representatives of Jesus;
• We try to open our home to their friends for play dates, and then be present while the kids are eating and playing together;
• Do you do school pick up? Make time to chat to other kids and parents, or to keep kids company whose parents are late or need to meet with teachers;
• Volunteer in your child's classroom, music group, sports team, dance class, and look for opportunities to serve and to explain to your children why you do it;
• I really do need to invite the families of their friends over for a meal!

More structured ideas:

• For older kids, could they get involved in a family or church activity that is run for the benefit of others? Like landscaping the school, or shopping for a housebound neighbour, or inviting the migrant family for a meal and regular English conversation, or volunteering with City Mission, Salvos or Anglicare?
• Pick a cause - national or international - that demonstrates Christian love, and encourage the kids to learn about it and think how to support it.  It might be something like Samaritan's Purse "Operation Christmas Child", or sponsoring a child overseas, or supporting the work of the Leprosy Mission.

"Did they just want to get unmarried to each other?"

We'd been talking about people we knew in our last town when my 5-year-old came out with this question.  The couple had separated and were heading for a divorce.  My kids were trying to understand why.  Tricky topic, but a great teachable moment. What is love?  Why do people stop loving each other?

from 1 John 3

I had to explain that sometimes I don't feel like I love them - feelings come and go.  But even when I don't feel loving, I try to do things that show love for them, like making breakfast, like helping them get ready for school, like getting up to them in the night if they have a bad dream.  I usually don't feel like doing any of this, but I do it because I love them.  In fact, it is in doing these things that I am loving them.


Love, first and foremost, is a verb - it is what we do.  We see this in the quote from John's first letter.  What is love (noun)?  We know what it is by Jesus' action in laying down his life.  Not Jesus' feelings towards us; not some tangible thing; not some intangible concept; not even Jesus' passive acceptance of fate; but his active, chosen deed. 

The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life - only to take it up again. No-one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again.

John 10:17-18

Our society misunderstands love.  We are fed the lie that love is how we feel, and that if we feel love, our highest duty and highest good is to act on it.  Conversely, we're told that when we stop feeling love, we need to move on.  As if all our morality hangs on how we feel in the moment.  We get this message in countless novels, movies and tv sitcoms.  We see this message implicit in the celebrity news, in magazines and on lifestyle programs.  


I even heard of a wedding where the couple, writing their own vows, promised commitment to each other for "as long as love shall last".  I suspect that many couples have this rider in mind, even if they don't say so out loud: "I'll be committed to you forever, until I don't feel like it any more."  How romantic.


Real love is active.  It is often hard work.  It is gritty and determined.  It is persistent.  It exists regardless of feelings, and sometimes despite them.

My eldest daughter got it pretty quickly: love is not how you feel, but what you do. 



Who has the strength for such love?  One man only, and he is not me.  Only Jesus has proven equal to such a high ideal.  It is only in Jesus' strength that I can follow Jesus' loving example.

icky jobs

I'm talking to the kids at St Aidan's this Sunday about Jesus washing the disciples feet (John 13:1-17). What fun can't you have telling a story to a bunch of 5-9 year olds about an insanely disgusting cleanup job.


It feels like I've known the story from my mother's womb - just before the last supper, Jesus knows he's on the way to the cross, he strips off and washes the road grime, mud and animal droppings off his disciples' sweaty, stinky feet. Peter protests; he's overruled. Jesus tells his disciples to mimic his humble actions.  


I've always seen it as an example Jesus set us to follow, so my thinking has usually been - "knowing this story, what do I need to do to copy Jesus' example? How should I be serving others?"


But this time, I was struck by something new: 

He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, “Lord, are you going to wash my feet?”

Jesus replied, “You do not realize now what I am doing, but later you will understand.” 

“No,” said Peter, “you shall never wash my feet.” 

Jesus answered, “Unless I wash you, you have no part with me.”

John 13:6-8

Jesus answer to Peter doesn't make sense if he is just setting an example to follow.  Jesus can hardly be saying: "Come on Simon, I need to make a point here!  Just cooperate."  By the time he'd got to Peter, he'd already washed enough feet to make his point.


No, Jesus' act was more than an example to follow (although it is that too).  Jesus was acting out a parable. This event is firstly about what Jesus does for me and you, and then secondly about what we do in response to and imitation of him.


He lowered himself to the meanest level, to clean his followers' feet, ready for the great supper that was prepared for them.


And the following day, he suffered an even greater humiliation to carry out an even greater cleansing, to prepare an even greater number of followers for an even greater banquet!


Are you one of them?

Meeting the King

I had grown up knowing that Jesus was my saviour. My church and Sunday school taught faithfully that I can't live up to God's standards, but that through Jesus I had a way back to God. As I passed through my teens and early twenties, the evidence of my life showed how far short I fell. So it was a great comfort to me to know that my sin-debt was paid by Jesus on the cross, and that I was adopted as a son of God. What great news!


Problem was, hardly anyone would've been able to tell the difference. Why, given such good news, did my attitude and behaviour not change much at all?


I'd only understood half the story (although I'm sure that my church taught me the whole truth).

C. S. Lewis

C. S. Lewis once wrote of himself:

A young man who wishes to remain a sound atheist cannot be too careful of his reading.

That is also true of casual Christians (like me) who try to retain authority over their lives.


One year, my wife bought me a new NIV bible for my birthday. It had a “bible-in-a-year” reading plan in the back, which I followed. As I read chronologically from Genesis to Revelation, my eyes were opened to some of the great truths of Jesus:

• Jesus the life-giver, who met me and raised me and restored me when I was helpless to do those things myself;
  
• Jesus the go-between, who bridges the yawning chasm between me and God;
  
• Jesus the ransom-payer, who had bought me from my enslavement to sin and death and now owned me;
  
• Jesus the King, who owes me nothing, to whom I owe everything, to whom I can deny nothing.
  

There was no way I could read this and stay the same.


Jesus didn't pick me up, set me on my feet, pat me on the back and wish me luck on my way. Jesus tells me to count the cost of being his disciple, to abandon friends, family, comfort and even life (Lk14:25-33). He tells me that I am no longer my own, but that I have been bought at a great price (1 Cor 6:19,20).


And so began the process of abandoning myself – of abandoning my Self – and acknowledging Jesus as my King, as well as my saviour. So began the exhilarating adventure of truly living for His glory and for the good of others. So began the truly surprising realisation that in giving up my plans, desires and dreams – in giving up my life – I get it all back, richer and more joy-filled than before.

Overly coy?

Sasha and Beck choose some beads for him to wear 
From Cambridge News

I stumbled across this article from Cambridge the other day - about a couple in the UK who concealed the gender of their child for some years after his birth. The boy, Sasha, is now 5 and attending school. The "experiment" is about to get a whole lot more complicated.

Why do it? The mother, Beck Laxton, said that her motivation was:

“Because I wanted to avoid all that stereotyping,” she shrugs. “Stereotypes seem fundamentally stupid. Why would you want to slot people into boxes? It’s like horoscopes: what could be stupider than thinking there are 12 types of personality that depend on when you were born? It’s so idiotic.” 

But for Beck, slotting a child into a ‘male’ or ‘female’ box isn’t just idiotic, it’s potentially damaging. “It affects what they wear and what they can play with, and that shapes the kind of person that they become.” And if that’s skewing their potential, she believes, then it is wrong. 

“That’s when I start to get cross about it: it’s not just a harmless bit of silliness, like horoscopes, it’s actually harmful.”

I'm willing to concede at the outset that we should, generally, avoid stereotyping - slotting people into boxes. Stereotyping practically denies that a person is "fearfully and wonderfully made" by God (Ps 139:14) - a unique individual. A stereotype diminishes a person's humanity. It diminishes the person Jesus died to save.

There are still some big questions about Ms Laxton's actions and motives. Can't you avoid stereotyping, and still identify with your gender? What is the cost of Ms Laxton's decision? Who bears that cost? Is that cost worth paying to make a point?

To her, the cost of her decision is nothing - her decision frees Sasha to become whatever sort of person he would like to be.

But I think that her reasoning falls into two significant errors. Firstly, she has swallowed the idea that ones biological gender is irrelevant; that it forms no significant part of ones identity. This is a position that is impossible to maintain biblically. The Bible speaks clearly about mankind being made "male and female" (Gen 1:27). It emphasises further the different purposes for which man and woman were created (eg 2:15,18), the different roles they were to play in God's perfect creation, and consequently the different effects on each of the decision to rebel against God (eg 3:16, 17-19). This theme is carried throughout Scripture - that men and women are different in fundamental ways, and that biological gender is an important factor in ones identity.

Even without the biblical witness, this conclusion is inescapable.  In just about every society on earth, and in every system of thought, the distinction between men and women has been recognised and respected. The detail differs between cultures and times, but the fact of the distinction does not. The distinction is real, unlike the imagined differences in horoscopes!

So in refusing to acknowledge her son's maleness and masculinity, she is denying him, from the earliest age, a significant part of his own identity. Who can say how that will affect him as he grows?

Secondly, she seems to believe that one can make a neutral decision about child rearing, one that leaves the child free to become whatever he or she wants. But why would this be so? Why would a decision to dress a little boy in boy's clothes affect (skew?) the man he grows to be, while a decision to dress him in "girl's clothes" leaves him unaffected? Why would playing with "gender-neutral toys, as well as plenty of dolls" have no effect on his emerging personality, where playing with cars or guns or robots or barbie dolls might limit his full potential?

The truth is that this is nonsense. Every decision concerning the raising of a child communicates some value judgement to that child. Every decision draws lines: this conduct is acceptable, that is not. More fundamentally, the potential of a child is not something that will grow and flower beautifully if left to its own devices; rather, a child must be carefully tended, nurtured and trained so that he or she can blossom into a mature man or woman. 

As the proverb goes: "Start children off on the way they should go, and even when they are old they will not turn from it." (Pr 22:6) This is not an optional instruction, along the lines of "if you want to be sure how your kids will turn out, then start early".  Rather, it is a truism: "the way that a person is trained as a child is the way that person will turn out as an adult."

The final, alarming thought that struck me about this article is Ms Laxton's attitude toward parenting:

But she also admits to an ulterior motive: to make mums who choose overtly ‘girly’ garb for their daughters think about what they’re doing. 

“These women dress them up like dolls, but they’re not dressed like that, so why are they doing it to their children? ... 

So is she hoping that dressing Sasha in pink will change anything? “Yes. If it just made one person think: ‘No, I won’t put that frilly dress on her because it’s a bit silly’ or: ‘Yeah, if he really likes that doll, then that’s OK,’ then that would be really brilliant. 

“All I want to do is make people think a bit.”

Did I read that right? Is she seriously using her son as a means to change the behaviour of other parents with their children?

As a Christian dad, my whole attitude toward my children must be markedly different.  They are individually created by God, loved by Him, saved by Jesus.  They are beings who will live eternally with Jesus (or separated from Him, if they choose wrongly). I get to love and nurture and protect them to the best of my ability, and have the joy and burden to train them up for maturity and independence. I must not treat them as tools to be used for my own ends, but help them to see their true identity - as sons and daughters of God.

ad hominem attacks (teaching our kids to think: Part IV)

... the next step? ...

We have heard the contribution from the Leader of the Opposition and I have to say from a personal point of view I felt sick listening to him.  I felt sick because what he espoused was actually bigotry, effectively.

- Ms O'Connor, MHR (Tasmania - Labor), 21 September 2011, 12:58p.m.

Your views are offensive, oppressive and unacceptable ...  It is little wonder that the Leader of the Opposition, Mr Hodgman, made a speech unbefitting of a leader of a political party.  It was a shameful, divisive, reactionary, unpleasant speech that made me feel ill to even hear him utter the words that he spoke.  ...He is a man who clearly does not understand what discrimination means, a man who in my view has abused his position to represent people. ...In stark contradiction to the cowardice shown by the Leader of the Opposition ...

- Mr Booth, MHR (Tasmania - Greens), 21 September 2011, 3.01p.m.

Why on earth are we paying these people? I would have thought, in a supposedly rational age, that we are to be governed by evidence and by reasoned arguments. Instead, I find that we are governed by the delicate stomachs of some Labor and Greens MPs. 


Obviously that is overstated - I'm sure I hope I pray that the decisions of government that count (as opposed to symbolic motions such as the Tasmanian same-sex marriage motion) are made on the basis of evidence and reason.


This exchange in the Parliament shows a side of argument that is all too common, and extremely ugly. It's called an ad hominem attack (or argument), and just means an attack/argument directed at the person (rather than at the content of what a person is saying).


An ad hominem attack is a distraction - it could be intentional (to divert attention away from an argument that a proponent knows to be weak) or unintentional (I can't think of anything else to say, so I'll attack the other side). Frankly, it doesn't matter which. The point is to recognise an ad hominem attack, and to know how to sidestep it. It is vital not to engage with it (waste of breath), or descend to such tactics (because the person you're speaking with will stop listening!)


An easy technique to sidestep such an attack is to step out of the argument for a moment, and to narrate what's been going on.  For instance:

I've just supported my opposition to same-sex marriage by arguing that marriage is not just a word that can be redefined. It describes, in a unique cultural context, a treasure and widespread commitment between a man and a woman. You have responded by saying that my words made you feel sick. How does your physical reaction to my argument, or your guess about my motivations, have any bearing on the evidence or reasons for my position?

How might our kids benefit from such a technique? How could they use it? What about:

• I might just be a kid who knows nothing about this, but what would you say to an adult who asked the same question / raised the same objection?
• I know I still need to learn a lot. Can you please help me? Can you please tell me why you think my views are wrong?

Can you think of other examples? What do you get your kids to say in response to a personal attack?