thoughts on faith, church, and life

(apologies for this being late…my blog was unavailalbe for most of the day yesterday.)

A few weeks ago, we held our annual Vacation Bible School. The program went pretty well with over 30 kids participating, which is pretty good for the size of our congregation.

We used the program Crocodile Dock from Group publishing. The things that attract our church to Group materials are programs that are relatively easy to use and resources (DVDs, Songs, etc.) that children generally seem to enjoy.

As attractive and easy to use as the resources are, I have to admit that I struggle with Group’s theological orientation. This particularly came to a head for me as I was getting ready to teach the Bible lesson for Thursday evening.

The theme for the evening was “God Gives us Life!” Now, while this is indeed good news, the stress of the evening’s lesson was focused almost exclusively on Jesus’ death (Does no one else see the irony in that?) At one point the curriculum suggested that you help the children feel the weight of their sin that killed Jesus.

Wow!

How is it ever appropriate to make a 1st or 2nd grader feel shame in such away? Like their sins in particular were the sole cause of Jesus’ death? How can a kid, and should a kid, be forced to bear the weight of such a heavy burden?

Of course, we think we make it all go away by saying, “Jesus bore the penalty you should have received.” But really isn’t that just more of the shame?

Needless to say, I felt the need to re-frame the evening’s lesson a bit:

Despite the evil intentions of those who put Jesus to death, God gave him new life, raising him from the dead. When we ask God for forgiveness for the ways we hurt others, God forgives us, raising us up to new life. God gives us life!

If you are interested, Jenell Paris, one of the most insightful bloggers out there, discusses a similar thought on her post How to Leave Fundamentalism (without even trying.)