The church had asked me to preach on Exodus 20:12, “Honor your father and mother” and I knew it was going to be a thorny subject.
With issues like divorce, domestic violence, alcoholism, and abandonment, I had a sense that I was going to be opening a “can of worms.”
One of the core elements of my message was that in order to honor our parents we have to forgive them for mistakes made. That truth was simple enough to communicate; however, the implementation was the problem.
One lady came up to me afterward and shared that she had a father who abused her mother and then left them. She knew God had called her to forgive him. With tears streaming she said, “I just don’t know how.”
Another man shared with me that the evening before he left for boot camp, his father came to him and with tears flowing, divulged that he was not his real father!
There had been another man and they had kept it secret until that night. He told me that he left the next day for military service and has been sorting it out since…. He is in his forties. It had been twenty-five years of sorting it out. They all knew that God’s desire was for them to forgive their fathers and honor them.
The problem wasn’t in understanding, but rather in responding to that truth in action. In my forty years of ministry experience, responding to God’s Word is usually more difficult than understanding His Word.
Helping children to respond to God’s Word (Deuteronomy 6: 8-9) is a key element of life-changing children’s ministry.
It was also a characteristic element of Jesus’ ministry, notable with Peter at the end of John 21.
“When they had finished eating, Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?” “Yes, Lord,” he said, “you know that I love you.” Jesus said, “Feed my lambs.” Again, Jesus said, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” He answered, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.” Jesus said, “Take care of my sheep.” The third time he said to him, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” Peter was hurt because Jesus asked him the third time, “Do you love me?” He said, “Lord, you know all things; you know that I love you.” Jesus said, “Feed my sheep. Very truly I tell you, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go.” Jesus said this to indicate the kind of death by which Peter would glorify God. Then he said to him, “Follow me!”” (John 21:15-19 NIV)
This is one of the great passages in the New Testament that features the magnificent grace of God as expressed to Peter.
There are some great theological truths in the passage as well as some crucial Christian leadership principles. However, our focus is on how Jesus focused on a “response” from Peter.
Looking at the “response,” we can take note of three qualities that are crucial for a life-changing children’s ministry.
Truth Anchored
All agree that Jesus is restoring Peter to ministry. The three-fold “Do you love me?” is obviously correlated to the three denials at Jesus’ trial. This restoration is rooted in God’s grace.
After the garden, where Peter impetuously cut off the ear of the high priest's servant, he did nothing to defend his friend and allowed Jesus to be humiliated, beaten, and brutally crucified.
Peter’s ministry restoration was rooted in the truth of God’s grace and mercy. The response that Jesus was seeking was a confession of love and commitment in response to the reality of forgiveness. In other words, the response was to the truth.
This is a crucial concept in life-changing children’s ministry.
Children need to be urged to respond to the truth of God’s Word. When we teach the Bible, we are establishing truth that God can use to move the child to respond.
Relationship building, experiential activities, Bible truth teaching, and discussing that truth and the real life of children all should lead to a child being given the opportunity to respond in their real life.
The phone rang in our apartment, and it was the wife of a church elder. She called to share a humorous anecdote. Their young four-year-old son had been in my Sunday School class. I had taught the David and Goliath story and used all my creative communication skills.
Apparently, in my efforts to describe the magnificence of Goliath as some kind of super warrior, I had caused their son to think he was the hero of the story. He wanted to become nine feet tall and have a spear like a “weaver’s rod.”
Oops! Chad had responded to the teaching, but the truth had gotten convoluted.
Action Oriented
When Jesus gave Peter the opportunity to express his love, He did so three times.
In each of those three exchanges, Jesus called Peter to action in response. The three calls to action were:
- Feed my lambs.
- Tend my sheep.
- Feed my sheep.
Certainly, Jesus was pleased by Peter’s three-time affirmation of love and commitment. However, He moved Peter beyond talk to an actual response.
- The flow of the passage is something along the lines of:
- Peter denied Jesus three times.
- Jesus forgave Peter.
- Jesus gave Peter three opportunities to express his love and commitment.
- As a result, Jesus commissioned Peter to take care of His flock, the people of God.
It is evident that Jesus had this response in mind throughout the questions and answers. He wanted to give Peter not just the opportunity to say the right thing but also to do the right thing.
This is entirely consistent with Jesus’ long-standing commitment to have His followers not only hear His words but act on them (cf. Luke 6:49, John 14:24).
This is a crucial principle for transformational children’s ministry.
Often, we are satisfied when the children get the right answer or say the right thing. That is certainly important, but a life response is the key to life change.
In our teaching ministry, we should begin with the response in mind and move the lesson to the place where children are given the opportunity to do something with what they’ve learned.
Jesus Focused
Finally, the focus of the response remains on Jesus.
In all three calls to action, Jesus uses the possessive pronoun “My.” He refers to “My lambs,” “My sheep” and “My flock.”
Peter’s response was to Christ Himself, commissioned to act on His behalf with His flock.
The sheep, the ministry, does not belong to Peter. The focus is on Christ and the response is to Christ. He is the source of transformation and change. Peter responded to His grace and mercy.
Transformational children’s ministry is not something we do. It is Jesus Christ who changes lives and not any children’s worker myself included.
When we create and implement a great response activity we are focusing on Christ and asking Him to spur the children to action.
We are praying that He will do the life-changing work that only He can do in the lives of boys and girls.
Our task is to create the response activity focusing on Jesus Christ and let Him do the spiritual transformation.
Closing Thoughts
I had served for seven years in full-time children’s ministry but was feeling God’s tugging at my heart to serve Him in another culture.
My wife shared that sense, and we were thinking and praying together with a group of leaders from our church.
It was December 1987, and we were leading a team of students from our church to Urbana, the student missions conference held at the University of Illinois. My wife was six months pregnant, and our team joined over 15,000 young people all committed to being part of fulfilling the Great Commission.
The evening plenary speakers were well-known and included Tony Campolo, Bill Graham, and George Verwer. George Verwer had founded Operation Mobilization and when he came to the podium, Billy Graham was sitting behind him on the stage. George was wearing blue jeans and a simple white t-shirt with binoculars.
He explained that it was the same outfit he wore twenty years earlier when Billy Graham spoke at Madison Square Garden. He had taken the binoculars to identify the mind trick that Billy Graham used on the unsophisticated.
While spying out Billy Graham as a non-Christian, he heard the gospel and surrendered his life to Christ. After leading a binocular-driven wave throughout the U of I arena, he gave an amazing message regarding the LORDship of Christ.
At the end, he called for a response. He asked anyone convicted of God, who was willing to move to another country and minister the gospel to stand up and make a public commitment. Marla and I both felt convicted and stood up.
Marla even claims our little baby wiggled in the womb! Three years later we were living in Poland, responding to the work of God in our lives.
Helping children respond to God is a final element of life-changing children’s ministry and we have shown how this principle comes directly from Deuteronomy 6:4-9, one of the few places in the Bible that speak directly about children’s ministry.
We have also shown how the “response” is found throughout the Bible.
This Sunday include a response activity and see God work in the hearts of children transforming them in Christ!