Let’s read that scripture from Deuteronomy once more with a few side comments:

“Hear O Israel: (listen attentively) The Lord is our God, the Lord alone. (Not school or work, not band or soccer, not golf or fishing, not shopping nor anything else). You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, (with every part of your being – your mind and your will) and with all your might with all your strength and capacity). Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart. Teach them diligently (not just when it’s convenient, but repeatedly, daily, consistently) to your children and talk about (those words) when you are at home (not just on Sunday morning) and when you are away (even on vacations or outings), when you lie down (every night) and when you rise (every time you awake). Bind them as a sign on your hand, fix them as an emblem on your forehead and write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates (well, not necessarily literal tattooing, but at least metaphorically, don’t let others wonder if you are really a Christian).

The Lord doesn’t ask much of us, right? Wrong. If we really stopped to think about how much this passage says the Lord is expecting of us, half of us would be tempted to get up and leave right now. God is not asking us to be a “part-time” Christian! What is being asked of us is none other that this – to let the love of the Lord so drench every fiber of our being that we cannot help but weave this love and heartfelt knowledge into every aspect of our daily lives, into the daily lives of our children and grandchildren, and into every interaction we have with those in our family, in our community, and in our world. We are being called, individually and corporately, to take seriously the sacred responsibility of passing our faith to the next generation. We need a “whole heart” for God in order to be the selves that God intended us to be and to live as Christ’s representatives in the world.

So, the heart of the matter really comes down to, how do we go about having the kind of Christian home that is intentional about passing on our faith and heritage to our children and grandchildren, about sharing our faith reflections with our spouses, and that is serious about being a witness in the world? Are there some examples we can look to? I recently re-watched a favorite movie - My Big Fat Greek Wedding that gives us a model for having the passion needed to transmit a particular heritage.

• This family was so passionate about passing on their Greek language and culture that their children attended afternoon Greek school. There were routinely quizzed about the derivation of words from Greek. Their garage door and even their wedding invitations boasted a Greek flag. Statues of Greek heroes filled their lawn. None of the neighbors had any question about this family’s heritage! They regularly celebrated the rituals and traditions of their culture, from Greek ethnic foods to Greek Orthodox baptisms.
• But all of this emphasis on family heritage came with a price. Their children did not fit easily into the surrounding culture, and were often teased for being different. It took years for them to understand how to honor family traditions yet also find a loving and secure place within the world. And daughter Nia’s fiancé, his family of origin was in some ways the opposite of hers. His parents were loving, but boring and mostly silent about their beliefs and heritage. Yet he recognized the importance of Nia’s family to her and humbly asked to be a part of that life. Nia’s mother reminded her that they had come to this country of America so that their children could celebrate their heritage in this free and better place.

Many people who saw this film commented that it could just have easily been called “My Big Fat Italian Wedding,” or  “My Big Fat any ethnic group Wedding.” This title could also be “My Big Fat Christian Wedding” for any family intentional and passionate about passing on its faith heritage We could ask:

• Do we have the same passion for our Christian ideals?
• Do we teach the language and songs of faith to our children and grandchildren?
• Do we celebrate with familiar rituals – seasonally, weekly or daily in our homes?
• Do we practice our faith heritage intentionally, or only when it is convenient?
• Do we sometimes feel uncomfortable fitting in with the rest of society?
• Do we recognize the new life of freedom possible through Christ?

“Hear O Israel: The Lord is our God, the Lord alone. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your might. Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart. Teach them diligently to your children and talk about them when you are at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you rise.”

These words, spoken by Moses as instruction to the Hebrew people, were part of his farewell address to them on the eve of their entering their new homeland; a place also inhabited by other peoples who worshipped many other gods. Moses knew that the threat of forgetting God was greater than the task of defeating the Caananite people. Moses begged them to love the Lord. He knew that they would have to be disciplined enough to follow a daily devotion to the Lord in order to withstand the pagan influences all around them. The first part of this passage is called the Shema (literally means “to hear,”); and faithful Hebrews were to recite this phrase twice daily. These instructions to love God and obey God’s commandments were to be internalized and displayed outwardly.

Another question we might ask ourselves is: Are the commandments of our Christian faith as vital to us today as they were to the Hebrew people on the edge of entering Canaan? Does the biblical text have validity for us today? We live in an age of reason and scientific proofs. So, in that spirit of truth, I’ll share with you a modern study from the 1990’s by the Search Institute. It involved looking at 6000 people in six denominations (including United Methodists) to learn what makes people grow in faith. They defined a person with a mature faith as one who has a strong connection with God, who participates regularly in personal prayer and Bible study, and who is involved in loving service to neighbors so that the world can be transformed.  

The study discovered that there were three circles of influence on a person’s faith development - with each circle larger and more influential than the previous one. The first circle was worshipping in a faith community. The second circle represented active involvement in Christian education group like Sunday school or Bible study. Yet as important as worship and education were, they were not as influential as the third circle. The largest influence on developing a mature faith was a family who regularly talked at home about God, and who participated in service activities as a family.

This is only one of several studies that show family life to be the most important factor and absolutely essential in forming children’s faith in God. Our families today are struggling under the effect of lots of toxic cultural influences, and congregations need to be working to teach basic parenting skills, and to provide experiences that support faith sharing in the home. That’s why the ministry you provide through our Bluebonnet Country Preschool is vitally important.

The NT scripture from Mark that we read today is that well-known passage where Jesus tells his disciples not to hinder the children from coming to him. There are a lot of ways to hinder children from coming to Jesus. As a congregation, are we welcoming to children & youth in our midst? Do we welcome them in worship as full participants in the body of Christ? But beyond even “not hindering” children, Jesus also said that they are to be a model for us of what to be like if we are to enter the KOG. Children are full of awe, loving, trusting and accepting God. They can also be messy and noisy; God says, welcome them anyway. Do you know the names of the children in your church? If not, you need to learn their names and welcome them each week. Does our congregation intentionally structure opportunities for faith conversation among generations? Are we willing to volunteer for children and youth ministries – to teach them, to host or chaperone their activities, or even to pray with and for them as we rock them in the nursery? Do we remember our baptismal promise to so order our lives that they may be established in the faith. Our baptismal liturgy reminds us that children are not our property; they are gifts of God to parents and to a community. Children are our blessing and our responsibility – and they belong to all of us.

And how will be know when we as families and as a faith community have been faithful to our promise and our pledge? We will only know we’ve been transmitters of the faith if the faith has been transmitted. So let’s see how we’re doing in today’s world.

We live in an age of technology, high stress, and high-speed living. We see people rejecting church but open to “spirituality.” We see a world intent on getting ahead or getting rich. With our busy lifestyles, we find ourselves increasingly distanced from others. We see harried lifestyles and families often breaking down. We know that parenting requires enormous time and energy over long years. And yet, we are often too busy, distracted, and exhausted to care for our families each evening in the ways we’d like to. “No single family can bear the burden of living faithfully out of its own resources alone.” As a congregation, are we providing our time and resources to support parents?                         

Yet a changing world is nothing new. See this quote about moral standards deteriorating, excessive preoccupation with material success, entertainment and social status. Do you think that applies to our culture today? Well, it was written – 4^th century. Christians have always had challenges; each generation has choices to make – choices about how to spend their money and their time. Derek Maul, in his book The Un-Making of a Part Time Christian, writes his response to people who say they don’t have time for daily spiritual practices because they are just too busy.

He says:  “last time I looked, it still takes the earth 24 hours to rotate on its axis and a little more than 365 days to …(go)… around the sun. That’s true if we live in Tampa, New York, London, Paris, (or Burnet). The Bible tells us that the sun shines… on both the just and the unjust. At the end of (each 24-hour) day – your family or my family has either made the choice to be grounded in God’s Word and the fellowship of prayer – or we have made the choice not to.”   

In a worship experience recently, the words from the fourth stanza of We Worship at Your Table stood out to me. They read:

Into the world again we take your covenant of grace.

Refreshed by taking time to pause from our own selfish pace.

Bishop Robert Schnase, in his newest book Five Practices for Fruitful Living, wrote that one person makes a “prearrangement” with himself. He said: “I manage to do other things on time – go to the gym, take children to school and to soccer practice, eat, work. I look at my Bible study as a support group, a regular appt with God’s grace. I make it a priority, as if keeping an appointment with Jesus.” Are you keeping a daily appt with Jesus?

Statistics from 2000 and on show that fewer people, especially in Europe, are making appointments with Jesus. See the following statistics on the screen.

• Church attendance in Ireland, though still among the highest in Western Europe, has fallen over 30 years from 85% to 60%.
• A 2000 study shows that the percentage of people who "never" or "practically never" attend church in France is 60%; in Britain is 55%.
• In 12 major European countries, 38% of people say they “never or practically never” attend church. In the USA, only 16% say they rarely go to church.
• Although some 85% of Swedes are church members, only 11% of women and 7% of men actually go to church.
• In the last 20 years, 49% of men under 30 left the church in the UK.
• Generally, about 5% of European men attend church.
• In America, on any given Sunday, 2/3 of church attendees are women; 1/3 are men. 90% of men say they are Christian, but only 1 out of 3 will be present in worship on any given Sunday.
• It’s not that men are not interested in spiritual things. There is no gender gap in Islam, Buddhism, Judaism or Hinduism, or in the Eastern Orthodox Church. In each of these faith traditions, more men than women attend worship.
• Yet, research by the George Barna in the US shows that while 17% of families follow a mother into becoming Christians, 93% follow a father into becoming Christians.

I’d like to share with you some statistics that I’ve discovered from my own life experiences.

• For 30 years, our family attended a church in San Antonio about the size of Burnet FUMC. For about 20 years, we were active in an adult Sunday school class with 9 active, long-term couples who collectively had 21 children. Of those 21 now grown and married, only 7 are still actively attending church. Only 1/3 of those kids who had been raised in a church, who attended regularly as a child and as a youth are still active.
• Even more painful – when I look at my four closest, enduring friends – I am even more discouraged. These four women have all been life-long, active members in UM congregations. They all are spiritually mature and take their faith lives seriously. They have “intact” families and their husbands attend church with them. Of their ten grown children raised in the church, only one is still active in a life of faith today and a second is beginning to return.
• Are you feeling my pain? Are you beginning to get the picture that simply attending and begin involved in a church are not enough to support our children in growing as faithful Christians – especially in today’s secular, pluralistic, and materialistic world? There are no guarantees  - but we can improve a person’s chances of sticking to the faith by involving him or her in daily faith talk within their homes.

What would it be worth to you to have your children and grandchildren learn to love the Lord with all their heart, with all their soul, and with all their might? What would it be worth to have them see the sacred in the midst of their everyday lives? Would it be worth changing from a “part-time” Christian to a dedicated one? Would it be worth a few minutes each day for your family to share their highs and lows, to read Scripture and talk about what God’s word is saying to you that day, to pray for each member of your family, for your friends, and for situations in the world, and to send each person in your family off to bed with yours and God’s blessing? This is powerful stuff; easy stuff, but also hard to do intentionally with diligence and persistence. I urge you to do so in the power of the Holy Spirit, and asking Christian friends to hold you accountable.

This fall we will be starting such a group where you can learn to use tools like FAITH 5 to apply daily involvement with God in your home in a significant way. We’ll also be having classes in Faith Stepping Stones for parents of preschoolers. Call and offer to support that learning.

Henry Nouwen once said that we can’t force a plant to grow; but we can remove the weeds and stones that prevent development. We can create space where growth can occur; we can provide vital, daily nourishment. Close with prayer.