Family Bible time
The other night we had the best family Bible time we've had for ages. In my family, there's four of us: my wife and I, and my 16-year-old daughter and 12-year-old son. We made the decision to do a significant Bible study together one night a week. (Hopefully making this commitment public via this CHN will help us to stick with it this time!) So the other night we did Study 1 of From Sinner to Saint.
And we really got into it. We pushed through and tried not to let it drag on too long. (Actually we finished in slightly less than the recommended time frame of 60 minutes). It really worked; my son even said afterwards how good he thought it was.
So what was it that made it work for this slightly odd ‘home group’? Two things, I think.
Firstly, it wasn't ‘Dad’ trying to teach the kids, and it wasn't 45 minutes of listening to him drone on, with the occasional (more telling) comment from Mum. Instead, we discussed and answered questions, then had a break from each other for a few minutes while we watched someone else on the video. This broke up the study and helped with concentration too.
The second thing was the ‘someone else’ on the video. John Chapman (‘Chappo’) is a master at keeping his Bible teaching simple and clear. He has honed this craft as an evangelist who has often spoken to people who had very little understanding of the Bible. In some ways, this makes him an ideal teacher for children (and for adults!).
Perhaps I'm jumping the gun here; it was just the first study. Maybe next week will be a different story. But I'm excited that we may have found a really good resource for studying the Bible with older kids. If your family is in the same stage of life as mine, perhaps you could give it a try too.