I’m sorry for the confusion, I was addressing K W Leslie’s explanation of the soul in his previous comment. I have not yet read anything on your understanding of the soul so I hesitate to agree or disagree. I was mainly trying to point out that sometimes we are very confident about our understanding of something, but it may be a bit more complicated than we think.

On the one hand, I’m all for allowing children to experience and embrace mystery, along with awe and otherness, in worship and for assuring them that it’s okay with God if we don’t understand everything – He cares about what’s in our hearts alot more than what grade we can get on a theology exam.

But catechesis is important and should be a lifelong process. It’s just that forcing kids to sit thru long expository sermons is not going to help them learn anything (other than church is shear torture and God and/or your parents will be mad at you if you don’t sit still and stay quiet all the time). I’ve always liked the model I remember where the kids came in with their parents for opening hymns, readings and prayers, then went to something like a short Sunday class during the sermon and rejoined their parents for closing hymn and prayers. some churches even had a little children’s sermon before the kids left (and often I thought the children’s sermon much better than the one meant for us adults).

Nevertheless, we must be careful that we are not deceived as Jacob was, who supposed he had married Rachel, when in fact he had married Leah. There is such a thing as having faith in a false christ. That type of faith does not save. “Idols named Jesus” by Dan. covers this concern well.

We are not saved, baptized and called to the Lord’s Table on the basis of either mental nor physical age, but on the basis of faith in Jesus Christ. I am by no means a paedobaptist, and believe that true baptism must follow, not precede true faith. Yet, I also believe that some children, even as young as two years old, truly believe, and should therefore be eligible for baptism as well as communion.

What must I then know in order to believe and be saved? That God exists and hears us (Heb. 11:6), that I am a sinner in need of Salvation, that God supplied this salvation in Jesus, Who became flesh in the incarnation, died for me, and rose from the dead (1 Cor. 15:1-4). That Jesus died for me. Can a child know and believe this? Yes!

Amen to that! I am so sick of the heathen world defining Christianity. Look at the music, look at the way we do church.

I disagree with K. W. Leslie that the responsibility of a Christian teacher is to explain mysteries more fully. I believe it is the responsibility of the Christian teacher to help disciples conform more fully to the image of Christ. Sometimes this includes explaining a doctrine to them (as in the case of Apollos) sometimes it means throwing up your hands and saying “I don’t understand how it works but I know you need to do X”. It is not what I don’t know that scares me it is what everyone else thinks they know.

Incidentally, perhaps the nature of the soul is a bit more complicated than your understanding.

Great insights! Let me go one step beyond,though. I think our children, whatever their age, deserve more than a subtly dismissisve “you don’t have to understand it to believe it” response from adults when they express questions about faith. That’s probably not what Piper was intending, but I think we need to guard against the temptation to fall into “the Bible says it, I believe it, that settles it” mode as parents.

We never dumbed down truth with our children, and they will tell you now that’s what helped them become articulate and confident in their faith as young adults. We never shied away from “hard” biblical terms, or from talking honestly about difficult and confusing truths. The vocabulary of truth strengthened our children’s faith and, I believe, increased their intelligence and their ability to think deeply and clearly about matters that go beyond intellect.

In Matthew 18:2-6, Jesus points to a young boy of no more than about seven (a paidion). He rebukes his disciples by saying “whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to stumble” had better learn how to hold their breath in deep water. The word “believe” (pisteuo) is the same term used of adult faith. It’s nascent and undeveloped belief in a child, to be sure, but Jesus clearly recognizes it as valid faith.

I believe God has hard-wired our children to expect “the discipline and instruction of the Lord” from their parents. My exegesis of Eph. 6:4 suggests that children are provoked to anger when we fail to give them what God has prepared them to receive. Sidestepping difficult truths of Scripture is a sure recipe for “exasperating” the faith-ready little ones God has put under our care.

Let me clarify a few things that I have learnt – which may still be wrong, but I have honestly learnt so much from the children themselves about this.

Confusion is definitely part of growing up. A child told me with great confidence “Jesus wears blue!” I told him that the Bible doesn’t say so. (Arguably only white was mentioned in Revelations right?)

However our very task is to bring across the gospel sensitive to the context of the listeners while not losing the gospel. Which has two aspects as mentioned – “sensitive to context of listeners” and “the whole gospel”. That is, how to make the examples and ideas relevant in the limited scope that the children have been aware of thus far.

How can the children understand sin at that age other than being “naughty”? So we tell them that sin is being naughty against God. How can we get them to understand how far Paul went in his ministries? We take a map and show them how far it is from this block to that – and show it relative to the actual map of the area that Paul travelled.

But we cannot leave out the gospel in anything that we teach. Always we start from the Bible, work on the verses to see what they mean, and then no matter how complex the issue is, we try and bring it into the children’s lives. Even bringing across Paul’s journey was a challenge – we got them to repeat (till they started to look bored but a month later they still remember) “Talk about Jesus”. We brought them on a little “trip” around our church where they would “visit” other countries and a teacher would prompt them to “talk about Jesus” to the “natives”. And what about Jesus? That He died for our sins, that we’re naughty from young, that He is the Son of God for example. It IS possible to have the whole gospel in “simpler terms” without losing the gospel in the process.

I think your pastor is not being very helpful in his insistence that he wants “every child possible to be in church as soon as possible and to be confused about what was going on”. For he has neglected that children would be bored with sermons that they cannot relate to – and would end up either refusing to come (no matter the explanations, boring is boring), or coming and dozing off, or worst – coming and causing trouble for the rest of the pew-sitters by making noise despite the parental discipline. By creating a separate section for them and teaching them in a creative yet correct way (with emphasis on correct), the children now ENJOY coming and actually tell their parents about God. Not to mention the pastor will have to use “child-friendly” words to engage the children – which is infinitely more tiring for someone used to using difficult words. We’re not here to teach vocabulary – we’re to teach the gospel.

Truth in point – one girl who was a non-Christian comes because her aunt brings her. Her own parents refuse to come yet allow her to come to church. Her aunt recently told me that her dad was alarmed at what we were teaching – because his daughter told him that “if you believe in God, we don’t have to be afraid of death.”

She’s five. And been with us for 3 months. And amazingly, I don’t even remember covering that lesson with the kids.

We must teach the gospel first and foremost – correctly and accurately, not losing any of the meaning of the gospel (or risk Hell ourselves). But I believe that just as Paul preached to the Athenians, there are various methods of delivery and we cannot stand fast on one method for all – but see which is most appropriate.

For despite all this, God IS a wonderful and awesome God and we still wonder. One child – out of the blue – while playing with his sandals before class, told me seriously that his mum told him that if you don’t believe in God, you will go to a Hell of fire which is very hot. A little unprepared for this, I asked him back – what do YOU think? He thought for a second and then nodded tentatively, searching my face to see what I would believe about him. And I told him that it was true, but that as he believed, he would go to heaven. I don’t remember if he smiled back.

But the mystery of God doesn’t go away by “dumbing” down the words we use so that children can understand the Bible and enjoy it better for their age.

Please note that I do question people who believe that concepts like Hell, sin and death should not be brought before the children. We have to be careful with it (they may cry) but we have to do it as it is simply the sinful reality we all live in. Anyone who takes away from the gospel (and causes a little one to sin) should fear the punishment that comes after. My issue is with even the possibility that children should be assimilated into the church directly, at any age.