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I often hear of Christian parents in various churches being very concerned that their children no longer want to come to church. "And what," they ask, "is my church doing about it?" In response Christian parents sometimes demand that their children immediately start attending church regularly. And youth leaders feel the sudden burden laid on their shoulders to suddenly turn the youth into committed and responsible Christians.

But this generally is the culmination of a string of events through the life of the child. And we need to consider: how have Christian parents been influencing their children all along? Have they in fact been modelling that Christianity is second in importance to money, studies and marks? Have they only been asking about how they are going at school, and never asking about how they are going in evangelism? Have they always insisted passionately on tuition, and only been half-hearted about the church’s youth group?

And so it’s no surprise that sometimes we do see children of Christian parents growing up to see Christianity is unimportant – unfortunately, that’s what has been modelled to them in the home for 15 years. At that stage, it’s generally too late for parents to positively influence their children – if they are no longer interested in following Christ, there is little that Christian parents can do.

I do notice that relationships can sometimes open up again later in life. And so sometimes Christian parents can get a second chance at influencing their children – but it is only sometimes. And their ability to influence is much reduced.

Instead what parents need to do is to consciously bring up their children to love the Lord early on in life - and to keep on doing it consistently, all through the troublesome teenage years. You can’t switch from being interested in marks and studies, and then all of a sudden later on in life ask them "so… how is your prayer life?" That is just going to come across as awkward and weird! It has to be done consistently, from an early age.

Note that this doesn’t mean that parents stop talking about marks – it actually is a wise thing to know about this world, and to prepare well for living in it, and so parents want to keep training up their children in that kind of wisdom. But biblically, the cornerstone of true wisdom is the fear of the Lord, and parents will only do a complete job of raising wise children by also training them to be strong Christians. They need to train up their children for worldly wisdom (by getting them to study diligently), as well as for godly wisdom (by nurturing their relationship with God).

Furthermore it’s the role of parents to be bringing up children in the fear and knowledge of the Lord – not the role of the church! Yes, the church can help with things like Sunday School and youth groups - but these should only support the role of Christian parents, and can never replace it. After all the youth group leader only sees the children once or twice a week for a few hours – and isn’t living in the home with them, modelling Christlike living and gospel-transformed values. That, only parents can do.

How then are parents to do this earlier on in life? Here are some simple ways:

• Make it obvious that you are doing your devotions, and tell the kids not to bother you because it’s important. This models that your own relationship with God is important to you, that you also fear God.
• Start talking about God in your normal conversations: "Yes, God is saddened when he sees that sort of thing happen in his world." This makes it more normal to keep on talking about God later on in life.
• Always do a short devotion together over the dinner table – have one person read a short Bible passage, and then another person pray based on that passage. It takes less than three minutes, but they hear their parents reading the Bible and hear the content of their prayers (the XTG series put out by Matthias Media is excellent).
• Avoid using Christianity as a tool to get what you want out of the kids: "Practice your piano, or God will be angry at you!" This is actually called religious abuse! And moreover it will sour their experience of Christianity.

A saying goes that the best time to plant a tree is twenty years ago, and the second best time to plant a tree is now. So if you have primary aged children, now is the best time to start influencing your children! Because if you leave it too late, you may have lost your chance to train your child…

[ PS: am going up to Engage this weekend... ]