I Remember My Bible Class Teachers

Ask any deacon, or whoever happens to be in charge of getting Bible class teachers, how easy their job is, and I’m sure you’ll get a somewhat negative answer. It seems that more and more people just don’t want to put in the time and study and preparation needed to teach the Bible to our children and grandchildren.

I’ve heard excuses like, “I teach school all year, so I don’t want to teach on Sunday, too.” Or maybe this one, “I’m getting too old to teach. I put in my time when my children were little.” How about, “You have to be pregnant or dead to get out of teaching once you begin.” Or even, “Those kids get on my nerves!” Yes…I have heard all of these excuses. 

Now, granted, some children may get on your nerves, but does that mean we shouldn’t want to teach them what the Bible has to say about God? 

Let me hasten to say that teaching small children is not for everyone! I am an example of this fact. My comfort zone is with middle-school aged girls and up. However, there is a place for all in teaching our children during Bible class. (And I would get out of my comfort zone if a teacher was needed for small children!)

It’s an important job and one that is often overlooked. True Bible class teachers sink hours and hours into studying and preparing materials to teach. They decorate their rooms to make them inviting to the children who will be there.  They look for ways to impress upon these young minds the love that God has for them and how much they should learn to love God. They don’t settle for just a little story read out of a teacher’s manual…they make that account from God’s word come to life in the minds of those children. They arrive early to their classrooms in order to greet the children, and have a smile on their face and a ready hug for those little ones.

I have all of this on my mind because of a recent conversation with a gentleman where Jim happened to be preaching on a Sunday night.

After services, we were talking with the few folks who were left at the building, and we asked one couple how long they had been attending at that location. That answer was irrelevant, but what he disclosed about his life was of utmost importance to the topic of this blog post. 

This couple was in the vicinity of our age – old enough to be grandparents. He told us that he and his wife had let the world – jobs and recreation – come between them and their relationship to God. They had only been back in service to God in the last few years and were very grateful for this renewal to the right path in life.

He made this statement (or something very close to this), “I remembered my Bible class teachers and what they had taught me as a child. I couldn’t forget what they had said.”

Many years separated the time of that teaching and when we were having that conversation, but he remembered his Bible class teachers and what they had taught him.

Thank you if you are a true Bible class teacher.

You are important in so many lives.

You will be remembered.

More importantly, what you have taught will be remembered, and who knows whether or not it may lead to a faithful Christian life.

“…Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven” (Matt. 19:14).

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AUTHOR: Donna Faughn