Bringing Scripture to Children

Yesterday, during worship Caleb (who is 3 years old) listened to his mom tell him the story from the scriptures. It was the story of the owner of the vineyard and the workers starting at different times and all getting paid the same. He and his mom were working together and later I went to see what he'd made. But he asked me to tell him the story. I hesitated and asked him to tell me the story, instead. One reason was that I was afraid I'd tell the story differently than his mom had. I was afraid that telling the story differently would be a bad thing to do. The second reason I let him tell me the story was because I wanted to see what parts of the story were important to him.

I wrestled alittle over having avoided a wonderful opportunity to share something special with someone small. You can buy a book, read the story and it's the same every time you read it and little children love the predictability. But to tell a story, the story takes on a different kind of life and as the storyteller you become responsible for the telling. When you tell a story over and over some parts stay the same and some parts change.

I think sometimes we're afraid to approach the scriptures with our children because we're afraid we'll get something wrong. Being responsible for the way I share the scriptures still makes me tremble. When my kids were little I read the passages verbatim for fear that just telling the story I'd miss something important or that I'd violate something sacred. They got Bible "stories" in Sunday School. I wanted them to hear the word the way God said it (right...LOL! literalist that I was...) I didn't like paraphrased Children's Bibles. I thought this thinking came out of my reverence for the Word. Maybe it did. But looking back, if I'd given them opportunity to retell the story or listened to the understandings that they came away with the time might have been worth even more.

But maybe I was afraid. Maybe I was afraid that God's Word was something fragile, breakable, corruptable when it is, in fact, something strong enough to create the universe and accomplish all that God sends it to accomplish. Selah. Let your imagination play with that a little.

Alot of the stories in scripture aren't intended for chldren. Some, as written, go over a child's head. But you can tell alot of them in a way that even a 3 year old will understand. Even a three year old will understand that the owner of that vineyard was a very generous man. If he understands that truth, you've not violated the story that Jesus told. But the more you choose to ponder the details that Jesus included, the more you see and understand as an adult. If you tell them in a child's language holding on to all of what God put there to begin with sometimes you see things that you didn't see before.

My point is that coming to a passage alone or with a child we really don't have to come with a Divinity Degree. In fact it might be a good thing to leave behind all the things other people have told you about what the passage means. Let the scriptures tell you what they mean. I think it's pretty clear in scripture that God's stories are there to teach us. Let the passage tell the story and teach both of you, together. See what God will show you. See what He'll show your little people as you tell the story for little ears. (example: the owner of the vineyard went out in the early morning when it was still dark, at lunchtime, at naptime, and right before dinner...) See what the Word will accomplish as you tell that story over and over. When I say telling, I'm not talking about adding to or taking away. I'm not talking about taking random verses out of context. Stories in scripture can hold their own as stories.

I've read in Bibles that the mystery term "Selah" in the Psalms implies a silence. There's often more to hear in what isn't said than in what's said. Sunday, I left the Bible people drawings without faces because their faces changed over the course of the story. It's empty space for your imagination. I think that the missing pieces in the stories of scripture are like that, too.