Adultery, murder, treason, rape,
and theft—would you give a book containing stories of such behavior to your
child or grandchild? Every year millions
of Americans do.
Many parents and grandparents will
give Bibles, perhaps as “stocking stuffers,” this Christmas. They will hope that as the excitement of new
video games and R/C vehicles wanes, children and grandchildren will pick up
their new book and begin to read. But
reading the Bible is not like reading the Harry Potter books or How to Train Your Dragon. At some point, the child must be told, “The
Bible is real.” And, for the modern
child, that will birth a whole raft of questions.
How do we help our children
understand the strange and sometimes violent world of the Bible?
Attempting to introduce a child to theories
of inspiration and inerrancy may confuse the issue. Seasoned evangelicals have a hard time
articulating those concepts and agreeing on their meaning. Eventually, every reader should attempt to
resolve what it means to describe the Bible as “God’s Word;” but it may be too
much to assign the task to a child or teen.
Of course, you might simply encourage a youngster to read the Bible by
saying, “This Book is important because in it God speaks to you.” While true, many a candid pre-adolescent
might say, “Maybe, but I’m not sure what God is saying.”
This
is not the place for even a cursory review of the principles of interpretation
as they apply to the Bible. Two good
books for non-specialists are:
R.
C. Sproul’s Knowing Scripture from
Inter-Varsity Press and
Gordon
Fee and Douglas Stuart’s How to Read the
Bible for All Its Worth from Zondervan.
Fee and Stuart’s book is available
on Kindle.
Keeping such a young person in
mind, I am going to offer some maxims to help you help your child or grandchild
have a fruitful experience reading the Bible.
As that child’s parent or grandparent, you are best suited to translate
these maxims into terms appropriate to the child you have gifted with a Book
you do not want to be lost in the back of the closet.
Children
need to know the Bible approaches human behavior with realism.
In the early twentieth century,
heroes in books intended for children and adolescents were often flawless
characters; you would be pleased to have Tom Swift or Nancy Drew living in your
neighborhood. Not so, modern
heroes. The latest incarnations of the
Marvel or DC cast of heroes have wounded psyches manifested in sometimes
disturbing behavior. We have recently
learned both Captain America and Batman have serious trust issues, Batman’s
bordering on xenophobia. The Punisher’s
revenge-obsessed behavior makes the Hulk’s antics seem like a kindergartner’s
tantrum. If arrogance were a
super-power, Tony Stark (aka Ironman) would possess it in excess. While comic book writers took a while to
discover the best of us have dark sides, the millennia-old Bible presents most
of its heroes as flawed.
Abraham, famed for admirable faith,
could demonstrate reprehensible cowardice. David’s songs still influence our
hymnody but he plotted the murder of a military hero so he could take his wife.
Exposure to this realism can help
older children prepare for life. You can
advise them to admire heroic behavior while accepting but not emulating
less-heroic behavior.
Reckoning with this realism may
help a child realize we all need God’s grace, the same grace in evidence as God
uses imperfect servants to advance the Kingdom.
Then, too, facing this reality may
prepare your children or grandchildren for their eventual, inevitable,
discovery of your imperfections.
Finally, the Bible’s realism
prepares us to introduce the children we care about to the One who never
betrayed his integrity, who exhibited no flaws in his character.
Children
should know the Bible emphasizes the consequences of human behavior.
From the Bible’s opening pages,
with its story of Adam and Eve, we see the consequences of bad behavior;
indeed, this partaking of “forbidden fruit” and the subsequent expulsion from
Paradise became a paradigm of the pain, loss, and chaos caused by humanity’s
ongoing rebellion against God.
With the occasional exception of
characters on crime dramas, movie and TV characters of all ages can hook-up or
sleep around with few repercussions.
Albeit entire episodes of both comedies and dramas can be built around
the poor soul who believes a one-night stand promises commitment, most
characters have a more mature, modern perspective. Divorce, unwanted
pregnancies, and STDs are seldom consequences of such behavior in the world of
situation comedies, no matter how common they may be in the real world. Yet, as I write, the Center for Disease
Control is reporting an increase of sexually transmitted diseases across the
nation. How interesting that Paul (I
Cor. 6:18) suggests there may be self-destructive consequences to sexual sin;
although The Message makes it clear
Paul is discussing consequences beyond the physical: “There is more to sex than
mere skin on skin…. We must not pursue
the kind of sex that avoids commitment and intimacy, leaving us more lonely
than ever.”
Of course, the Bible also speaks of
the soul-numbing consequences of resentment, materialism, hatred, bitterness,
and selfishness, to mention only a few of the vices portrayed in its pages.
In
reading about the consequences of sin, the sensitive child might be troubled by
the image of a God who brings judgment down on peoples and nations. While almost any book on apologetics should
address the issue, Paul Copan’s Is God a Moral Monster?: Making Sense of the
Old Testament God (Baker) deals
with the matter at length. It might not be a book to give your child or
grandchild but it might help you answer their questions.
But it would be imbalanced to
suggest the Bible only revels in the consequences of sinful behavior. You can help your child or grandchild see how
loyalty, friendship, generosity, and selflessness make our world better. You may point to Joseph to show the
consequences of forgiveness, to Ruth to show the consequences of hard work, to
Esther to show the consequences of courage, to Daniel to show the consequences
of integrity, and to many other individuals whose behavior is worthy of
admiration.
Children—and
not a few adults—need to understand the difference between “the descriptive”
and “the prescriptive” in the Bible.
The Bible describes some behavior
in the lives of individuals and nations to help us understand what these people
and nations were like. We are not
intended to copy such behavior, even if it is worthy of admiration; though we
are especially to avoid it if the behavior reflects an individual’s
estrangement from God. Despite his
celebrated wisdom, Solomon took many wives, clearly unwise behavior and clearly
behavior we should not copy. (Of course,
the Bible shows the consequences of his behavior.)
In Acts, Barnabus sold all his property to support the infant
church. Such generosity is praiseworthy
but it does not demand we divest ourselves of homes and cars to give to the
church. His behavior is exceptional, not
normative.
The Bible also prescribes
behavior intended to mark us as Christians.
Commands like “Love one another” are incumbent upon each of us; Barnabus
his love in one way, we will likely find another.
Discerning the descriptive and the
prescriptive is not always easy; your child or grandchild may need wise counsel
to make that distinction.
A directive given to an individual
might not be intended as a universal instruction intended for all persons. Though it may have valuable implications.
Paul instructed Timothy, “Drink a
little wine for your stomach’s sake.”
That instruction to Paul’s protégé implies neither that wine is the best
remedy for all digestive ailments nor that we should turn to wine when Pepcid
AC is available. Perhaps the instruction
reminds Christians they should look after their health, while also reminding us
the mentoring relationship ought to include concern for every aspect of our
mentee’s life.
Children,
like all of us, benefit from studying their Bibles with others.
Given the low literacy rate in the
first-century world, not to mention the high cost of producing manuscripts,
“Bible reading” was usually a community activity. We have long imagined Christians gathered to
hear Paul’s letters to their churches but, doubtless, Christians gathered to
hear Mark, Matthew, or the other gospels read as they became available. Christians eagerly listened as a literate
fellow believer read the story of Jesus.
It seems likely these sessions included opportunities for questions and
discussion.
Puritans, believing the ideal
Christian family to be “a little church,” spent time each week reading the
Bible together and discussing its meaning; as well as exploring the
implications of the previous Sunday’s sermon.
Indeed, Puritan fathers in New England could be fined for not leading
their families in this activity.
Members of evangelical families in
Victorian England gathered, often with their servants, for daily Bible reading
and prayers. Of course our culture is
different, not better, not worse, just different. Schedules might not allow today’s families to
gather every day. Our less
patriarchal culture will allow and, likely, expect mothers and children of both
genders to have input in discussions.
And, of course, we should, especially as children grow older, allow respectful
differences of opinion. (We can hardly
imagine a nineteenth-century Baptist footman to have been free to offer his
opinion during a session led by his Anglican master.)
Whether or not you initiate such
regular times for family Bible reading, you should assure your child or
grandchild that no question about the Bible is off limits. That being said, you might wish to purchase a
reliable one-volume Bible commentary, one that honestly deals with puzzling
passages and the questions raised by them.
The key point is: we should not
expect children to get a crucial grasp of the Bible on their own. Sunday school can help, though lessons are
not intended to be deep. The “community”
which leads them into the Bible may include the church but certainly should
include the home. If you are known to
study the Bible, your child or grandchild will be more likely to come to you
with questions. In doing so they will
reflect the spirit of the Ethiopian Bible reader who admitted, “How can I
understand unless someone helps me?”
******
Before I conclude, let me speak of
a few practical matters.
There are many “Children’s Bibles”
available. They often have colorful
covers and lots of pictures. Though
younger children might find them appealing, I suspect older youngsters find
them childish, even embarrassing. For a
pre-adolescent, go for a more subdued format.
The market is flooded with study
Bibles of all sorts. Some aim to simply
explain the Bible, some reflect a denominational perspective, some are based on
the teaching of popular preachers; and some are thematic and specialized, like
study Bibles for nurses or study Bibles prepared to help defend the faith. You may be tempted to buy one. But, I am not sure newcomers to the Bible
should start their reading experience with a study Bible. Yes, study Bibles can be useful tools. Their comments and outlines often enhance our
understanding, as long as we do not confuse the editor’s notes with the
Scripture itself. A child might find it
hard to make that distinction. Just a
simple Bible, perhaps with a dictionary, might be the best gift for a child.
But what translation? Years ago, when I first became a pastor, a
dear Sunday school teacher in my church advised parents to buy their children
the King James Version of the Bible.
Why? The teacher and others like
her argued the Authorized Version, to give it its proper name, was the version
children would hear read from the pulpit, the version used in most Sunday
school literature, and the best version for memorizing. The first two reasons are no longer valid and
the third is purely a matter of opinion.
Many fine translations are available. All attempt to be as faithful in
communicating the message of the Bible as the translators of the Authorized
Version were. All acknowledge English
has changed in four hundred years. The New American Standard Bible and the
Holman Christian Standard Bible have a more “traditional” sound. The New International Version and the New
Revised Standard Version are widely available and represent a middle
ground. The New Living Bible and the New
Century Version have a more “contemporary” sound. Begin your shopping for a Bible by looking at
these. A paraphrase like The Message is fun to read but probably
is not the first Bible a child should be given.
I
deal with translations at greater length in my June 2016 post, "Verily, Verily," or Should I Say,
"Truly, Truly." The post
includes some elementary observations on translation philosophy.
If you are among the many parents
and grandparents planning to give a Bible this Christmas, you are part of a
grand tradition. You will be giving a
child you care about a book with stories of love, forgiveness, hope, grace;
and, most important, Jesus.
