Think about the kids in your Sunday school class. Get their faces in your mind. Now
imagine it is 10 years in the future, and those same kids have graduated
from high school.
How many kids in your current Sunday school class will still be in your church when they turn 18?
How many will stay in church when they become adults?
Statistics show that 20 percent of the kids that grow up in church will stay in church when they become adults. Eighty percent leave the church they grew up in.
I don’t think that 80 percent of our kids backslide. Many of them are attending other churches or have moved to other cities, but we can be more effective in keeping the kids that grow up in church.
When I first started in ministry, I could not think past the next service.
I would make it through Sunday morning, and I would think, Whew, I made it. But then I would wake up on Monday morning in a panic: Oh, no! It’s almost Wednesday! I could never think past the next three days.
One Saturday night I was desperate. I was not ready for Sunday morning, so I was begging God for a new sermon idea, and I heard these words, “All you have is five years to prepare the kids for their teen years.”
Young children are created with a nature to believe, but during their teen years, their faith will be challenged.
They will start to ask questions like:
- “Is God real?”
- “Is the Bible really the Word of God?”
- “Do I believe in God just because my parents do?” Eventually, I began to think more long term. For me “the end” is that the kids in children’s church grow up in church and stay in church when they become adults. I like what Dr. Phil says, “We are not raising kids. We are raising adults.”
