The home as the basis of faith!

Here is a quote from Rich Melheim’s blog I found very interesting:

“For those of you heaven-bent on changing the dying mainline before it turns into a flatline…

For those of you hoping to reform your church to look less like the last chapter of American Christianity and more like Deuteronomy 6 (when you lie down and when you rise) meets Acts Chapter 2 (they met in homes for the Apostles’ teaching, prayer, care)…

For those of you hoping and praying and working to kill the 240-year-old parentless drop-off spiritual warehouse we call Sunday School before it kills the church…

For those of you wondering and wandering and blundering and pondering what God’s up to next in a culture where Jesus is just one more guy among the gods…”

Rich has worked many years to instill in us the home based church.  Where faith is caught from the way we see our parents acting, and where faith is shared and talked about in the home.  Every night in every home.

WOW!!!!  What a concept.  I have known of Rich for a long time and read his thoughts, and studies and marvel at the simplicity and wonderment of it all.  But where is society at on this?

I believe church is like everything else: that is what we hire the professional for.  We send our kids to school so they can learn everything they need to know.  We send our kids to learn karate or gymnastics from the experts…  There is always someone out there who is better at that than us, and so it is with church. The pastor is the professional who needs to get our kids in the faith…

But if we look at this from a different angle it will change.  It is a proven fact that kids who parents are involved in their school work, and ask about what happened at school and help or at least know what their kids are doing for homework learn more or excel more than other students. Now there are exceptions to this rule, but that is the case, where the parents are involved in the school work, the kids do better.

I have a chart of a survey that asked 7th – 12th graders who the most influential people were on their faith life, and all of them said the most influential person on their faith life was their mother, and the father was always in the top 5.  It struck me as interesting that the family, i.e. mom and dad, were that high all the time, but it shouldn’t.  Kids as much as they say they don’t want you involved, really do want you to know what is happening.  The home is the place that we are suppose to be safe, and where everyone cares about us and loves us.  Are your children getting the faith from you?  Are your children seeing you pray and read the Bible?  Do you spend time with your kids each night in pray?  Do you bless your children before they leave to go to school?

5 minutes each night is all it will take. Rich says the home huddle is the place where faith is based, share your high for the day, your low for the day, read a Bible verse, talk about how they all fit together, and then pray for each other.  Image how our churches would explode with the Holy Spirit if we were united in the faith as families!!!  Image what God can do, and let’s get to work on reclaiming the home as the basis of faith!