This week, I was reading a book that addressed the importance of the spiritual formation of children by their parents. It made me think about some things, and then after I thought them, I decided I should share them — especially since I’m not sure when will be the next time that I will address this.

So, here are my thoughts. I wanted to make sure that you knew that our children’s ministry (KidZone) doesn’t provide holistic and comprehensive spiritual formation for your child. In fact, it’s not even supposed to.

You may have already known that. I mean, I think we’ve sorta’ implied it in the way that we’ve handled things at Good News. For instance, I’ve never spoke about KidZone as a primary way for children to be discipled. And when I have covered this topic in a sermon (you can listen to the sermons from September 8, 2013 or from Father’s Day 2012 for examples) I’ve always acted like it is the parent’s responsibility to lay the foundation for their child’s faith. Additionally, our children’s program is simple enough that I would think people would be able to figure out it is not the ultimate solution to child discipleship. KidZone only meets for about 40 minutes per week. We have no extra activities, field trips, or a VBS. We simply provide a Bible lesson and an activity (a craft or a game) during the sermon. And I think it is important to always remember that bringing up our children in the “training and instruction of the Lord”, as the Bible puts it, is going to require more than this.

I believe that training up our children in the instruction of the Lord requires a life-on-life kind of mentoring that God intended for parents to do. Passing on our faith in the Lord Jesus is going to require more than occasional classroom instruction. It’s going to have to be modeled by parents who know and love Jesus, and who live with the children and spend lots of time with them.

Let me give you an example: Imagine that you take your child and one of his/her friends to a waterpark for the day. Imagine that you are all walking up one of those spiral staircases to get to the top of a waterslide. Under your right arms, you and your child both have the necessary inner tube that will be needed to go down the slide. You get to the top and see that your child’s friend doesn’t have a tube with him (because he was unaware that the lifeguard was going to require it. He thought he could go down without a tube.) Now the kid is sad because he will have to walk all the way down to the bottom and won’t be able to slide with his friend. Then, in that moment, you hand the kid your inner tube and you say, “You two have fun. I’ll see you at the bottom.”

I believe, in that moment, you are teaching your child something about “sharing” and “putting others first” in a way that will probably be much more significant than a classroom lesson on “sharing” and “putting others first” would be. These are the kind of mundane yet special moments that pile up and make an impact on a child’s life. And they are things that will happen more as you parent your children then they will happen between a teacher and a child at KidZone.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not bashing KidZone. I am glad that we have it. I’m glad that our kids can interact with other children their own age and make “church friends” (that’s what my son Joey calls the kids he knows from church). I’m glad we have people who get to use their spiritual gift of teaching in our program. (I am glad that when I was in my early 20’s people allowed me the opportunity to teach middle school and high school kids at my church. It was good for me and even served as the beginning of my journey toward being the pastor of this church.) And I’m glad that our young kids don’t have to sit through a sermon that involves things that they don’t understand yet, but instead are getting a lesson appropriate for their age-group.

I’m glad we have KidZone. But I just wanted to remind you that the bulk of the discipleship of your kids is going to take place at home, and in the car, at restaurants, at the ball field, and yes, maybe even at the top of waterslides. These “teachable moments” are important times that God has given to us (and parents are probably going to get most of those moments) to use to shape our kids for His glory.

Just wanted to make sure I said it.