The Word and the Spirit

Jesus is preparing his church the bride. That’s us! We will be a people who know God’s word and who know God’s Spirit. We want to encourage you to raise up a generation who know the Bible and are truly led by the Holy Spirit.

Here are a few thoughts to encourage you as we seek to do both these things with the children around us.

Helping them to become word based:

When you share Bible stories with the children, do it with a Bible open in your hands, even reading directly from the Bible so that children see the value you place on the Bible. In the modern era of visual aids and DVDs it is possible to run a whole programme or family time with your Bible sat untouched on a shelf.

Have set verses that you expect every child in your church and family to know. Every child raised in church should at least know John 3:16 from an early age.

Do you set out challenges for them to live our the word in their daily lives and then follow up to see how they did?

Helping them to be Spirit-led:

In recent times its great that many children are given opportunities to hear from God and pray for the sick in the church. This is a great starting point, but just because a child does what we tell them to do in a meeting, does not mean that they have learnt to obey the Holy Spirit when they are in school.

We need to nurture this obedience to the Spirit by giving opportunities for them to grow in their relationship with God and their ability to hear Him. We also need to share stories and encourage them to share times when God has spoken to them outside of church.

Above all let’s encourage our children to cultivate their own relationship with God through daily times of Bible reading and prayer (check out the Spy Kit which is designed to help children with this).

As they learn to approach every problem they face with prayer, using the Bible as their source of truth in each situation and looking to the Holy Spirit as their guide, then they will be growing as disciples of Christ.

www.childrencan.co.uk

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