From Mother to Child

 I am grateful to God—whom I worship with a clear conscience, as my ancestors did—when I remember you constantly in my prayers night and day. Recalling your tears, I long to see you so that I may be filled with joy. I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that lived first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, lives in you. For this reason I remind you to rekindle the gift of God that is within you through the laying on of my hands; for God did not give us a spirit of cowardice, but rather a spirit of power and of love and of self-discipline.

—2 Timothy 1:3-7

Most of us readily accept the influence parents have over children, shaping their identities, forming their outlooks, and defining their values. Sometimes that happens through adolescent rebellion as a child will shape her identity contrary to Mom and Dad, but, as St. Paul indicates, it often profoundly comes through the positive infusion of parental presence into the person of a child. We form our children.

That is something the Bible stresses throughout its narrative as the people of God seek to become a communion of God within the world. Parents are instructed by God to share the faith—part of the Passover rite will be the oldest person at the family table instructing the youngest as to the meaning of the sacred meal; Israel will always identity herself by the faith of her ancestors—we worship the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; and it continues into the New Testament as Mary and Joseph are charged with shaping their son, Jesus, by conducting him through the initiation rites of his faith community, culminating with this observation by Paul to his student, Timothy—you believe what your mother passed to you, a faith that her mother passed to her.

Whether we acknowledge it or not, the most profound form evangelism is parents bringing their children into the faith community that formed their own spirituality.

Simply reflect on this dynamic for a moment.

Parents do indeed exert great influence over how their children interact with the world. By the way in which we adults meet the world, interact with people, and voice our opinions, we are coloring the way our children see the world. If we project a fearful sense of the world, our children will very likely share that trepidation. If we stress the value of education, our children will apply more effort to their studies. If we espouse a more closed worldview, our children will see the world more narrowly. Likewise, a more open view leads to children who do not necessarily think about the world in categories or groupings. ASIDE: I say all this knowing full well the flipside that parental outlooks can shape a child’s experience negatively, too. Listen to your children as they interact with playmates and friends. Listen for echoes of things you know flowed from you. The evidence of parental influence becomes inescapable.

Now carry that idea into the sanctuary.

In Presbyterian theology, we emphasize infant baptism, proclaiming that God already knows the child well, but that if the child is ever to know God, it will come as she experiences the community of faith. We charge parents with the responsibility to nurture their children in the faith as they bring them for baptism. We charge them to participate in ways that will communicate God’s presence in the life of their child. We charge them to teach them and bring them to teachers who will offer counsel and instruction in faith. We charge them to see their child through to a place where the child will decide for himself to enter the faith community as a confirmand. We have made Lois and Eunice integral parts of our theology!

But we go beyond that.

As well as charging the parents with this responsibility, we also charge the whole congregation to become parents to the child, in a manner of speaking. We charge the congregation to do for the parents and the child what we charged the parents to do—the vows in the rite are nearly identical. 

In sum—we are in this thing together as a family of faith.

So what we say and do as a community of faith matters intensely. We are shaping our children. We forming their experience of God through their experience of us. We are laying the foundation for whatever relationship they will have with God.

In short, ministry matters.

As we engage in service within the world, our children see it and share it. As we welcome strangers into our midst, our children see it and share it. As we practice stewardship, caring for church and world, our children see it and share it. As we care and comfort those hurting, hungry, or simply hanging on, our children see it and share it. 

Remember that.

Thanks to the faith of his family, Timothy found himself under Paul’s tutelage, becoming a missionary in his own right. He knew Jesus and Jesus’ love, compassion, grace, and welcome, so profoundly and deeply that he felt utterly compelled to share it, live it, and bring it to others.

May we take to heart Lois and Eunice, becoming such for the children around us, with God’s help.