How do You Talk to Your Kids About the Gospel?

Here's a great, practical post from Doug Wolter over at the Life Together blog on ways you can teach your kids about the Gospel. It is amazing how I have already started praying for my new daughter. There is a spiritual urge there that I doubt will quit until she comes to Christ. Here are some things Doug and his wife do to teach their three kids:

Modeling — What are your children observing?

• Seeing God in everything – we try to see God throughout the day and point our kids to Him (e.g. as we take a walk, we remind our children of God’s beautiful creation; as we watch a TV show or movie we try to talk about how it either supports or goes against a biblical worldview of life)
• Praying at all times — we try to stop and pray throughout the day, thanking God and acknowledging our need for God (i.e. trying not to make prayer just a dinner table experience!)
• Not hiding our emotions — we try to be real with our kids and let them know when we are feeling happy or sad (if it’s appropriate) and then going to God together as a family in those times
• Admitting our sins to them — many times I have messed up and needed to go and ask my girls to forgive me for my sin (this inevitably creates another opportunity for me to let them know how much “daddy” needs Jesus too)
• Inviting others into our home — this has gotten somewhat more difficult with three kids, but Jaime and I want to model for our kids an atmosphere of love and openness to others

Teaching — What are your children learning?

• To Begin the Day — I usually get up and get the girls breakfast (Jaime does so much, I try to serve her in this way — plus I’m a morning person and she’s not!). During breakfast, I read from a couple different devotional materials (Big Book of Quesions and Answers by Sinclair Ferguson and A Faith to Grow On by John MacArthur) and we talk about them. It only takes about 5 minutes, but it’s one way I start the day teaching them about the gospel.
• Sometimes at Supper – Although we’re less consistent with this routine, we’ve found that it’s fun to pray for someone in our family by having each person take a picture off the fridge and pray for that person before we eat. After we eat, sometimes I’ll pull out My First Book of Questions by Carine MacKenzie and “quiz” the girls for fun.
• To End the Day — Nearly every night we try to read from The Jesus StoryBook Bible by Sally Lloyd Jones and pray with our girls. We like them to pray with us as I believe it’s good to have children learn to pray as they hear us pray. We’re also teaching them the Lord’s Prayer.
• Listening to Music as we drive — Jaime likes to put in CD’s for the girls to listen to. Here’s one that our girls really like: Seeds of Faith
• Reading Good Books Together — There are so many books I could mention here. I’ll just mention two: Big Thoughts for Little Thinkers by Joey Allen, and The Priest With Dirty Clothes by R.C. Sproul.

Maybe you have some ways of your own. Please share them!