by Ryan McAdams

For some of you, this may seem like a question with an obvious answer. But, for many parents and children’s ministry servants, myself included, we have had to wrestle with whether or not we should require obedience to God’s standards from unsaved children. The logic against requiring children to obey God’s commands flows something like the following: knowing that without faith, it is impossible to please God, we cannot expect children without the Holy Spirit in them to obey; we are asking the impossible from them.

We have touched on this subject previously in the Beacon, as well as in an excellent treatment on the topic from this year’s GraceLife Weekender (Weekend Conference), and many if not most of the arguments for obedience from children within a family will apply to children within a children’s ministry.

In spite of the seemingly impossible task we are expecting from the unregenerate children, we do require obedience in the classroom. Do we do it for the sake of maintaining order in the classroom and having the events run smoothly? Tempting as it is to let that determine what we do in the ministry, no, we do not require obedience for order in the classroom alone. In short, we require obedience because God requires obedience, for the Lord Jesus himself said “You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly father is perfect.” (Matthew 5:48).

Now, the astute Biblical scholar might note that Jesus was speaking to his followers about life in the kingdom of God when he made that statement, and argue that this returns us back to the starting question of how we can expect this perfection from children who have not been born again. But, God had given the children of Israel a very similar command in the book of Leviticus, saying that “You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy.” (Leviticus 20:26). Before you object that God gave that commandment solely to the Israelites, remember that God judged non-Israelite peoples throughout history for their wickedness, for the very lack of conformity to God’s holiness, starting with the people in Noah’s day, to the Canaanites throughout the Israelite conquest, to the judgments against nations around Israel from Nahum, Obadiah, Amos, Isaiah and other prophets. God very much expects obedience from all peoples everywhere, and this includes the children in our classrooms every Sunday.

Understanding that the heart of the natural man is desperately sick, wicked to the core, we understand that without divine help nobody can be holy as God is holy, and thus we all are in big trouble. But, as Jonah also knew, “God is a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and relenting from disaster.” (Jonah 4:2b). And so God has revealed his law, as an act of divine grace. To the nation of Israel, God provided the sacrificial system, where a person would sacrifice an animal to atone for a sin. And this sacrifice served to remind the individual of the seriousness of his sin, that he should have died in the place of that animal. But even more than that, God gave the law, not so that anyone could attain righteousness by adhering to the rules, for all who rely on works of the law are under a curse, but that the law would imprison us, acting as a harsh tutor or taskmaster, as Paul explained in the third chapter of his letter to the Galatians. Essentially, the law should drive us to despair as it reveals the myriad manifestations of our sinfulness. But, this despair should drive us to the great hope of Jesus Christ, who God made to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

So, we uphold God’s standards in the classroom, like showing kindness, speaking truth, obeying authorities, and try to explain to the children when they have transgressed these things with the hope that with each transgression, they will understand more and more their inadequacy to be holy as God is holy, and the futility in trusting their own works to save them. We want their hearts to beg for God’s help and we want each of them to cling in faith to God’s mercy in the life and death of Jesus, the perfect Son of God.