Discipling the Next Generation

If you want your kids to follow Jesus, the most important classroom is your home, not a weekly program. Faith passes to the next generation mostly through ordinary life: mornings, car rides, bedtimes, and hard news. Deuteronomy 6 gives parents a simple order to follow. Get God's Word into your own heart first. Then press it into your children as you live.

Where does passing on faith start?

It starts with your own heart. Deuteronomy 6 holds the Shema, the great declaration of Israel's faith that the Lord is one. It may be the most important passage in the Jewish faith. It still shapes daily practice, down to what some families fix to the doorposts of their homes.

Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children.

Deuteronomy 6:4-7

Pastor Marty Sloan emphasizes that order at Calvary's child dedications: on your heart first. As he put it on Beyond Sunday, you can't give what you don't have. God designed the family to be the place where faith flows from parents to children.

The word "impress" pictures a press stamping a design onto a T-shirt. Before God's Word can be pressed into a child, it has to be pressed into you.

I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you.

Psalm 119:11

How do you get God's Word deep into you?

Read for substance, not speed, and read with other people. Calvary U, Sunday preaching, Bible reading plans, and men's, women's, and young adult groups all help get Scripture into you.

Pastor Marty has no problem with a verse of the day or a read-through-the-Bible plan. His encouragement is to make sure you're actually digging in. That way the Word grows deep and bears fruit in your life. From that growth, the overflow reaches your kids.

The Bible was also never meant to be read alone. When Philip met an Ethiopian official reading Isaiah, the man knew what the words said but needed help understanding them.

Then Philip ran up to the chariot and heard the man reading Isaiah the prophet. "Do you understand what you are reading?" Philip asked. "How can I," he said, "unless someone explains it to me?"

Acts 8:30-31

Parents are meant to be that first guide. They help kids see not only what God said, but what it means for them.

Why should you tell your kids your own story with God?

Because faith is passed on through experience as well as teaching. Israel passed down what God had done: the deliverance and the provision. They even set up stones by the river so future generations would ask what happened there.

Pastor Marty asked parents a direct question. Does your teenager know the story of when you gave your life to Christ? Do your kids know the moments when God showed up for your family?

Both hosts grew up in a pastor's home hearing those stories, including what God did before they were born. Church matters, and dropping your kids off is good. But a child's view of God forms first at home.

Do you need a formal family Bible study?

No. Deuteronomy 6 describes faith passed on in the flow of everyday life.

Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.

Deuteronomy 6:7, 9

Pastor Marty called this passage a template for parents. It doesn't call for a four-hour family Bible study. Both hosts laughed that one never worked in the home they grew up in. Faith gets passed on in the ups and downs of ordinary days: waking up and going to bed, job changes, medical news, the loss of a grandparent.

If God's Word is in you, it's easier to draw on when a challenge comes. Your kids watch how you walk through it and learn, "This is how our family faces hard things."

Parents already pass down plenty: love for a sports team, taste in music, even biases. Faithfulness to God belongs at the top of that list. Joshua said it plainly: "As for me and my household, we will serve the LORD" (Joshua 24:15).

Are you passing on faith even when you don't mean to?

Yes. More is caught than taught. Whether you intend it or not, you are already showing your kids how much God matters to you. Discipling your kids is shaping how they follow Jesus, by what you teach and by how you live. Kids are their parents' first disciples. Whether you're present or absent says something, and so does how you handle hard things. Children notice more than you think.

The Hebrew word behind "impress" carries a piercing sense: to implant something deep. The writer of Hebrews uses similar imagery for God's Word:

For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.

Hebrews 4:12

Now that Jesus has come, the responsibility hasn't ended. God still cares about kids. His Word still needs to be in you, come through you, and be trained into your children.

Common questions

What does Deuteronomy 6 teach parents?

It calls parents to love God with everything and keep His commands on their own hearts first. Then they impress those commands on their children through everyday life: at home, on the road, at bedtime, and in the morning.

How can I teach my kids about God if I'm not a Bible expert?

Start with what's in you. Read Scripture for substance, learn alongside others, and share your own experiences of God. Daily life and example teach more than formal lessons.

Isn't church responsible for my child's spiritual growth?

Church plays an important role, but the home comes first. Children are their parents' first disciples and learn about God by watching how their parents live.

What is the Shema?

The Shema is Deuteronomy 6:4-9, which begins "Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one." It calls God's people to love Him with all their heart, soul, and strength and to teach His commands to their children.