True Stories? A Word to Parents
ByThe belief that the Bible is true is a basic one in our house. The dramatic difference such a belief has made in my life naturally leads me to want my children to believe it as well. It hit me the other day, however, that I have never exactly spelled this out for my children. Though we read the Bible consistently, review its numerous stories, and even memorize various passages of Scripture, I don’t often think to remind my children that the stories we are reading are absolutely true. It is so assumed that I am not apt to make it explicit.
Yet I think this is necessary. After all, the vast majority of stories my children read (through Erin and I most of the time of course), are not true. They are fanciful and even funny. Usually entertaining and engaging. But not real. Not true.
I thought of this while in the car with my oldest the other day (she is turning six next month). So I asked her, “Abby, you realize that all the stories we read in the Bible are different than the others you read, right?” She said, “What do you mean?” To which I replied, “I mean, they are true stories. They really happened. They are not just imaginative tales, but real people doing real things.”
Like most conversations with my children, it didn’t last much longer than that. We easily move forward to something else. But I believe it helped her tremendously. And I believe it is something I must return to consistently. Reminders of the Bible’s historical reliability certainly cannot hurt.
All the parents out there may have already known this for years, but if you have young ones like myself and haven’t thought to do this, check it out and let me know how they respond. And be sure to do so more than once.
1 Comments
March 4th, 2010 at 5:24 pm
In principle I agree. I and my wife are experiencing something that is quite similar with our baby, who is 7 years old. She understands very well that Jesus Christ was really born and lived in the past, although she clearly states that it’s quite challenging for her to pay attention on Mass and on passage from the Gospel. As we join a group of families who like to meet each other once a month to talk about own experiences from a Christian standpoint, just last month there was a conversation about the ability of kids to understand the meaning of the Bible: there were different minds among us, but I was impressed from the statement by all priests attending the meeting: do not take care of it! The faith is for adults; in Occident the faith is falling down, looking insignificant; therefore it’s much important to have adults being Christians. If parents are really a good example of Christians for the kids, for the future they will be good Christians as well.
I admit I believe in this statement, even though it seems not making sense.
To sum up: I agree that all stories read in Bible are true stories and due to that they are different from all other ones, but I realized I don’t have to force my daughter on reading the Bible hopefully she understands the passage. Right now, I’m asked to be a good example as a Christian: a challenge for me and, I guess, for most of people.