The Contagious Faith

Lies Parents Believe – Part 3

H1N1, or more commonly Swine Flu, garnered a lot of attention nearly two years ago. The media was abuzz with dire predictions and calls rang out for mass vaccines. People were more frequently seen wearing the basic breathing masks in a further attempt to avoid infection. Still others spoke out warning against vaccination and citing the health risks that came with receiving it. After all the attention, vaccines, or lack thereof, H1N1 hasn’t really proven to be worthy of the fear and attention it received.

But how contagious is our faith? If you listened to the media and the groups bringing legal cases against churches and government bodies, you might think it was highly contagious. The existence of a time of silence (designated for prayer), a listing of the Ten Commandments, the sight of a nativity, or the offering of prayer elicits outrage from numerous groups along with threats and litigation.

However, as long and prominent as these items have been displayed, they seem to have done little by way of serving as a pathogen for faith. Lawyers and judges don’t seem more prone to faith by the presence of the Ten Commandments in courtrooms. School children are not more obedient and prone to faith because of a time of silence for prayer or a display of the Ten Commandments. I’m not opposed to religious displays in public areas and events. In fact, I believe they are good for the same reason the opponents despise them. But, again, they are not a pathogen of faith.

There is a lot of talk about contagious faith and contagious Christianity, but for all the talk and attention the topic receives, there seems to be little results within the home. Referring to previous articles, the best and most dynamic church youth ministries are not resulting in the best and most dynamic believers. So what makes the difference in students of much faith and those of little to no faith?

The students with much faith possess a faith that is taught as much as it is caught.  And if you have been following you know the primary teachers were their parents. Studies show, and the experience of years of youth ministry confirm, students whose parents have an active faith and discuss their faith with their children are much more likely to have an active faith themselves. Reflect for a moment on the younger adults you know that possess an active faith and then consider the faith of their parents.

Young children see their parents as their own personal heroes. Who else can heal pain with a kiss? God intends for the strong bond between parents and children to be the bond that allows for sincere faith to be communicated from one generation to the next. Children look to their parents to understand where it is they have come from and who they are. It is the parent’s responsibility to communicate to their children the heritage from which they come and to tell them who they are. If a parent doesn’t communicate to a child who they are, the result can be a child wandering aimlessly through adulthood trying to discover who they are. Unfortunately, this pattern is seen too commonly in our world today.

In scriptures we see parents taking great care in naming their children and their names reflected elements of who they became. Sometimes God, himself, provided their name or gave them a new name. Lisa and I tried to take as much care in naming each of our three children and they each know what their names mean because we communicate these elements to them through the stories of when they were born and how we named them. They also love to hear stories about our own childhood, stories about their grandparents and great grandparents. They eat up every bit of information we can give them about their family history.

As much as children look to their parents as their heroes and models for who they will become in physical realities of life, they also look to them for who they will become in the spiritual realities of life. Parents do themselves a great disservice when they send their children to a children’s or youth minister for all their spiritual training. In essence, parents communicate they have little or no spiritual “stuff” to offer them. The ultimate message the child receives is they, too, are deficient spiritually.

It may take some time for a parent to realize the true potential they carry to impact their own children spiritually. No one is truly spiritually deficient, unless it is by choice. Conversely, no one is truly spiritually perfect, except Jesus. The spiritual leaders your local church are not as perfect as you might imagine. Many, if not all, have had to struggle through periods where they felt ill equipped to parent or lead also. But our God is a God who delights in displaying his strength in all of our weakness.