Show Them Jesus: Teaching the Gospel to Kids

by Jack Klumpenhower

Just make sure they’re responding out of faith in the love of Jesus, not out of mere moralism.

Sin means we had no hope of lasting happiness. But Jesus suffered sadness to give us eternal joy. “Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows” (Isaiah 53:4).

But Jesus used the imagery of being born to show him that his trust in religious deeds was actually keeping him from putting his faith where it should be—in God. Being born is not something you do; it’s something that happens to you. No one can be truly spiritual unless the Spirit has worked in him, sprouting spiritual life.

one seldom comes by pressing for an external decision. It comes from being convicted of sin, hearing of God’s saving love, and finding delight in the matchless person of Jesus.

Teachers: The next time you teach a lesson based on a Bible story, test your class by asking them how they would apply the story. Use the same open-ended question I asked at camp: “What can we learn about life with God from this story?” If your students have much to say about how they need to behave better but little to say about what God does, it’s a safe bet they aren’t used to hearing the good news. Tell them that learning how to behave is an excellent way to use the Bible, but often the very best thing is to notice and appreciate how God behaves. Keep asking the question, lesson after lesson, until they learn to look for God and find delight in him.

The good news is the Bible’s drumbeat. To ignore it at any point is to misplay the theme song.

I’m always baffled when people say great music and an energetic leader, combined with fun games to create a high-energy event, will get kids excited about Jesus. Really? Those are all fine things, and I can see how they might get kids excited—about the music, about the leader, or about the games. But if we want them to get excited about Jesus, don’t we have to make sure we show them Jesus?

Yet I’m convinced it’s unwise to use fun social events as the primary draw to get kids in the door of the overall ministry. We shouldn’t let fun become a tool to keep kids interested so we can feed them some good news on the side. Jesus isn’t a side dish.