From Generation to Generation

Deuteronomy 6:7 (ESV)

You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.

If you have been around me at all then you know that I am a diehard fan of the Chicago Cubs.  This year, for the first time in my life time, the Cubs are playing in the World Series.  Tonight is game 7.  Whoever wins this game wins the championship. This is going to be a fun ending to the season, whoever wins.

What you may not know is why I am a Cubs fan.  Quite simply rooting for the Cubs is for me, as it is for many, something that was handed down to me from my dad.  Now I could point to many things that were a part of that.  Today on my Facebook page I wrote about going to work with my dad as a child.  He would be working on installing or fixing some air conditioner.  My job was to hold the transistor radio.  For those of you who don’t know – that was a small hand held radio.  I still have the one from back then.  I wish I had it here to show you but it’s in storage in the states.  Anyway, my job was to hold the radio, listen to the game and tell dad the score.  However the real event where my dad passed on the torch was at my very first Cub game in 1969.  A foul ball landed in my dad’s beer, and spilled with the beer into his lap.  Without a moment’s hesitation my dad took that ball and placed it into my hands.  I have been a Cub an ever since.  That ball is still one of my prized possessions – mostly because of how it connects me to my dad. 

You know as much as I love the Cubs, the even more important inheritance passed on from my father and mother is my faith in Jesus.  Oh God used friends and teachers and pastors to pass on the faith to me.  However the most important people He used were my parents.  It all started on Jan. 1, 1958 when my parents took me to church to be baptized.  On that day, the took the faith and placed it in my hands as a gift… a gift just like that baseball, a gift more valuable that that baseball.  They kept doing it. They took me to church, to Sunday School, and to confirmation.  They talked about the faith at home.  They taught me to pray.  Teaching me about Jesus, making sure that I learned about Him is the most valuable inheritance they could pass on to me.  I may have groused and complained at the time, but now I am so thankful that they never let my grousing hold them back.  They never gave into me to please me.  They knew they were first and foremost my parents, not my best friends.  They knew this was the most important responsibility He had given them as parents.

That is how the faith is passed on: generation to generation.  That is God’s first and most important calling in our lives – to pass on the faith to our kids and grandkids.  That’s what Moses is saying here. “You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.”  As you bring your children to be baptized, as you read bible stories, talk about Jesus and teach them to pray in your homes… as they witness you going to church and reading your Bibles… as you take them to church and Sunday School regularly – you are doing what my dad did.  You are taking the ball… the faith and placing it in their hands. 

I don’t say this as a word of law but as a word of encouragement.  Sometimes we parents don’t know how important a gift we are in the lives of our kids and grandkids.  We don’t realize how God will use us to have an impact in their lives. We are all to aware that we make mistakes.  Yet God is gracious, God is loving and forgiving.  He will use us in the lives of our children.  So take that ball.. that faith and place it into their hands… let God write it on their hearts.  Jesus is the most important inheritance you can pass on to your children and grandchildren.