Tell Your Story

Will our children know how to endure in their faith if we haven’t shared with them our own experience of doubt and difficulty?

Will they know God is near, and faithful, if we don’t take the time to tell them how we, ourselves, have experienced Him?

As our children began their teen years God was nudging me with these questions.

As a result, I resolved one night to tell my teenage daughter about an undeniable encounter I had with God as a child. I was nervous. It is an experience I hold close. I’ve shared it with very few.

My story began with, “I don’t tell very many people this, but…”

I told her how – when I’m struggling to believe God is near, and faithful – it is that experience I look back on. It carries me through more than anything else – convincing me of God’s nearness and individual care for me, His child.

When I finished, there was silence. I wondered what was going on in her head.

After a little more silence she shocked me with her own story: “Daddy, I've never told anyone this story, but…”

She went on to tell me of her own experience of God's voice in her life. She had been treasuring it and keeping it to herself.

We will carry that shared moment for the rest of our lives – both of us strengthened by each other's faith story of God drawing near.

•       •       •

In the eleventh century a theologian named Anselm coined this phrase:

“Faith seeking understanding.”

He was expressing how a real and lasting understanding of God emerges from our lived journey of faith.

This is profound. We don't need high theological training to disciple our children. What we need is to be on our own journey – and to share it.

Discipleship of our children must be grounded in bringing them along on our faith journey and, with them, memorializing times when He has shown Himself to us:

[Regarding a memorial to God's faithfulness] he said to the Israelites, “In the future, when your children ask their fathers, ‘What is the meaning of these stones?’” you should tell them, [...]

– Joshua 4:6 & 7a