Passing The Baton: Handing Our Faith Off To Another Generation


About a year ago I had the privilege of preaching at a great church in Clinton, NJ. I walked in to find Steven Blew. Steven was a child in children's church when I was a children's pastor years ago in Bridgewater, NJ. Steven wasn't simply at the church. He's the church's worship leader, and he's who you see in the picture above.

You may assume that I would be happy to see one of the children I'd invested in years earlier serving the church in this way, and you'd be right. The thing is I was more than happy. I was pleasantly surprised. Two songs in I turned to my wife and said, "Steven used to be such a troublemaker." (I meant that in the nicest way).

There's always some children in every children's church who sit still, help others, sing the songs, and pay attention. We call those children, "girls." Then there are the boys, and among that group there are "Stevens."
He wasn't a disrespectful kid, but he was a handful. If you've ever worked with children you know what I'm talking about. He's the boy who won't stop talking. You have to keep switching his seat. You better keep an eye on him. (He reminded me of me 😁).

Here he was on Sunday...married...a father...worship leader...God fearer. At first I couldn't worship. All I could do was smile and watch him. I was only a small part of Steven's life. For a few years I worked with him a couple services per week. Many others invested far more into him than I did. Yet, I felt encouraged. It was worth it.

The Psalmist wrote these words.
"One generation shall praise Your works to another, And shall declare Your mighty acts." Psalm 145:4.

If you work with kids at church know that it's worth it. The call to declare the works of God to the next generation is a high call. It's not always easy. The children don't always seem to be listening. The impact you're making though is lasting. Keep declaring the works of God to the next generation. Declare them to your own children. Declare them to children who are easy to work with. Declare them to the children who don't seem to even want to be there. As you do, "know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain." I Corinthians 15:58.
Thanks, Steven. You inspire me.

Following the Son,

James A Williams

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Get The Rebound

Image
If you've ever played or watched basketball you know that rebounding is a huge part of the game. If you're unfamiliar with the sport rebounding is quite simply getting the ball when a shot is missed. You can't score without the ball which makes the play of great importance. It's not unusual for a team with a higher shooting percentage to lose a basketball game because they were out rebounded. On the court what you do when you miss can be even more important than making shots. It's true in life as well. Everyone misses shots, but that doesn't mean you've lost the game. Get the rebound. "For though the righteous fall seven times, they rise again." Proverbs 24:16. People won't always give you the chance to rise again. For some your shortcoming is how they'll label you forever. Get the rebound anyway.  It was the historian Froude who wrote, "The worth of a man must be measured by his life, not by his failure under a singular a...
Read more

What’s In Your Cart?

Image
On this day in 1939, Sylvan Goldman who owned the Humpty Dumpty supermarket chain got an idea. He was trying to think of a way for his customers to transport more groceries around his stores. He attached 4 wheels to the legs of a wooden folding chair, and then attached a basket to the seat. The shopping cart was born.  Before this shopping trips to the Humpty Dumpty or the Piggly Wiggly would be limited to what you could carry in your arms. I wonder if Sylvan’s original patent stated that one of the wheels was to either not spin or rapidly shake back and forth? It’s possible that this is some modern improvement on his original design. However it happened the carts keep getting bigger. When I bring my groceries to the check out counter I sometimes use the self check out. I don’t like the self checkout because the computer keeps telling me I put things in the bagging area when I didn’t. When I get a real person they will often ask this profound question. “Did you find ev...
Read more

Mercy

Image
We visited our nephew and his family last weekend. They have three boys, and witnessing their interactions brought back memories of both fun and difficult days of raising our boys. Sometimes when my boys were young I felt like all I did was discipline them. It seemed at times like we couldn't make it through a meal, homework, or even play time, without a fight breaking out, some inappropriate comment, backtalk, or a hundred other random things they could find to do to push their Mother and I over the line. I remember calmly saying things like, "I need for you to understand that I can feel anger welling up within me."  Sometimes this would result in corrected behavior, other times they would look at me as though I were speaking Chinese (I know this isn't actually a language, please don't write me a letter). I realize spanking children is controversial, so I tried not to spank my sons over 3 or 4 times a day (That's called hyperbole). On one occ...
Read more