What We Want Our Children to Learn in Church
God adores us. We are all, each of us, beloved of God.
God made us wonderfully and takes delight in each of us.
We each sometimes do things that are hurtful, and we fail to do things that we should. We cause damage to people and to God’s creation with things we do and with things we fail to do. This is sin.
God comes into our lives to teach us to live well and to love better so that we can be free of sin. Sin breaks relationships, and God calls us to move away from sin. God gives us the torah, sometimes we call this the law (like the ten commandments), to help us learn to live together in love.
Even when we do sin, God saves us from that, keeps loving us, and works in our hearts to make us full of love and joy.
We are made to love God back. Our first job in life is to learn to love God with all our hearts and mind and strength.
We are called to love one another. Our second job in life is to learn to be really good at loving other people. Jesus said people would know we follow him if we love others well.
God’s kingdom will come when we live as God has taught us to live. We have work to do.
The Bible is a collection of books written by people about their lives with God. The Holy Spirit uses this Word to help us grow together in faith and love. It is important that we read this book and that we ponder it (think about it hard). We are allowed to play with the stories, to use our imaginations and the stories of our lives, to make sense of what the Holy Spirit teaches us in the Bible stories.
The Word made flesh, Jesus Christ, is the one we worship because he is God in the form of a human being. God came to earth, in Jesus, to show what it means for human beings to live lives full of love.
Even death on a cross could not stop God’s love and power. Nothing can ever beat God and God’s abundant and steadfast love. Not even sin or death.
The Holy Spirit of God dwells within each of us. As we pray and read the Bible and do loving acts of peace and justice (like feeding the poor, comforting the sad, forgiving our enemies, and being fair with what we have), we grow in our ability to be guided by that Holy Spirit. We become true lights to the world, containers of God’s power. We share peace and joy and love with all the world. This delights God.