Why We Must Tell Our Kids What God Has Done
Let it be known: I am a history nerd.
I majored in history in college. I read biographies for fun. I prefer documentaries. I visit historical sights on our travels. I adore museums.
I am a history nerd.
History teaches us the best and worst of humans. What we’re capable of is vital knowledge. It pushes us further and higher. It also warns us of evil we could succumb to. History matters.
Getting Our Kids Prepared For Hard Things
My personal history of walking life with Jesus matters too. My honest stories of where He’s carried me, of where I’ve failed Him, of when He’s forgiven me, and of all the honest, embarrassing or surprising stories in between, tell of His great love. His power to redeem my life from the pit can encourage others.
As our kids look into the future, do they know that the Lord is there? Do they know that everything looks bleak, Jesus is still there? That He will never leave them?
And who do I want to put courage in more than my kids? Let me answer that: no one. They matter more to me than anyone. And their ability to live for Jesus in a world that seems to darken a little bit more each day, is my prayer.
How will they accomplish victorious living in our current realities? They must walk in the knowledge of what the Lord HAS DONE so they can believe that He WILL DO it again.
Dark and terrible atrocities happen daily. If those come to our shores, will our kids be able to stand for Jesus? The early Christians had to be willing to face hungry lions. Victorious living looked like not denying Jesus in a dusty arena. If they’d turned from Jesus and bowed in idol worship, they could avoid the horrible fate. In other centuries, men and women who’d rather obey Jesus than the King or Queen were burned at the stake. How could one willingly keep living for Jesus with that cost facing them?
They had to know something more was going on.
Tell Your Kids
Psalm 44 is the perfect illustration of this truth. The first three verses are a ringing endorsement for teaching our kids the history of Jesus in our lives. Then through surprising twists and turns, we find even more reasons why it’s so important.
“O God, we have heard with our ears, our fathers have told us, what deeds you performed in their days, in the days of old: you with your own hand drove out the nations, but them you planted; you afflicted the peoples, but them you set free; for not by their own sword did they win the land, nor did their own arm save them, but your right hand and your arm, and the light of your face, for you delighted in them.”
The psalmist knows and writes about God’s powerful deeds and salvation because his father told him. The plural in verse 1 means this was the norm.
The next five verses tell what God can do. It’s His power that conquers and protects, not our own abilities. The stirring proclamations inspire great hope.
“You are my King, O God; ordain salvation for Jacob! Through you we push down our foes; through your name we tread down those who rise up against us. For not in my bow do I trust, nor can my sword save me. But you have saved us from our foes and have put to shame those who hate us. In God we have boasted continually, and we will give thanks to your name forever. Selah”
BUT…
And then everything changes.
Here’s something I love about the Bible. It is so honest. If the psalmist was going to sugarcoat things, he’d stop writing at verse 8. However, the entire psalm pivots at verse 9.
When a verse starts with BUT or HOWEVER, we know we’re in for a change. Psalm 44 changes from a song of praise and hope to despair and accusation. The psalmist is mad at God. Are you ever mad at the Lord?
That’s not something we admit much, but sometimes it’s easy to look from our circumstances to the heavens and call, “Really??? THIS is my reward for following You?”
Here’s what the psalmist says,
“ But you have rejected us and disgraced us and have not gone out with our armies. You have made us turn back from the foe, and those who hate us have gotten spoil. You have made us like sheep for slaughter and have scattered us among the nations. You have sold your people for a trifle, demanding no high price for them.”
Life is bad and apparently it is all God’s fault. If He’d just do His job and keep life humming along, wouldn’t that be better?
Psalm 44 records the complaint through verse 22, and then goes on to really put God on the judgement seat. Psalm 44:23-24 states, “Awake! Why are you sleeping, O Lord? Rouse yourself! Do not reject us forever! Why do you hide your face? Why do you forget our affliction and oppression?”
Have you ever felt like, “Hey God, are You asleep? How about noticing what’s going on down here!”
No resolution appears in this psalm. It ends with the desperate please from a broken people.
Why We Must Tell Our Kids What God Has Done
That there is no resolution is EXACTLY why we must teach our kids the history of walking with Jesus. Life isn’t a kids’ story book with a guaranteed earthly happy ending. Our happy ending occurs in eternity in the presence of the Lord.
God works extraordinarily in His people, but not every generation experiences victory. Some are fighting or simply persevering through the onslaught.
Psalm 44:11 accuses the Lord. It states, "You have made us like sheep for slaughter and have scattered us among the nations.”
That might sound familiar because Paul quotes this verse in Romans.
“As it is written, “For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.””
But Romans 8 isn’t accusing God of not doing enough. It exhorts the readers to not despair, because while every bad thing in the world might happen, NOT ONE THING can separate us from Jesus.
“Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written, “For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.” No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
Paul turns the bad situations from a place God isn’t working into a place we more fully experience Jesus’ presence. In the middle of the worst situation, we remain in His care. These difficulties CAN’T separate us from Him.
Why Must We Tell?
Here’s my list of my why I have told, and will keep telling, my kids and grandkids of God’s mighty hand and Jesus’s never-leaving love.
If they don’t know how God worked in the past, they won’t know He can do the same in the future.
If they don’t know He always ultimately wins, they won’t be able to endure when all seems lost.
If they don’t know horrible things happen to God’s people, then they’ll be shocked when their false view of who God is and what He does is shattered.
If they don’t know Jesus stays with them IN the hard stuff, they’ll crumble under the weight and be mad at Him for what they falsely assume is abandonment.
If they don’t know they can cry and complain to the Lord, then they’ll either turn their back on Him, or carry a false load of guilt for feeling those things.
Tough Times Are Coming
Are we ready for persecutions? Are our children?
It’s not by accident that we live NOW. But we need to prepare ourselves and them to walk tough roads ahead. And we need to prepare the generations to come.
Let’s teach our kids and grandkids God’s history. ALL of it.
We MUST tell them.
We MUST teach them.
We MUST walk the truth in front of them.
God NEVER leaves or forsakes us. Never has it been more important that they KNOW that.
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