Is Your Sunday School Communicating Shame in the “Shoulds”?

Do all of our “shoulds” teach children that being a Christian is more about rules than it is about relationship with Jesus? 

I failed him. His drawing made it clear.

I’d asked the kids in my Sunday school to draw pictures of their favorite Bible stories. Alex drew an open Bible, and inside he wrote, “Be nice. Be good.”

Would I be happier if he’d put, “Be mean. Be bad”? Of course not! So what was the problem? This child, when choosing one sentence to represent the Bible, chose rules. Alex believed the main message of Scripture is “do the right thing.”

Don’t get me wrong! God does want us to do the right thing. We want the children in our ministries to do the right thing. Parents bring their kids to church in hopes that their kids will do the right thing.

So, again…

What’s the Problem?

The problem is that none of us does the right thing simply because we are told to do so. In fact, the Bible teaches just the opposite. Being told what to do brings out our worst. Romans 7:8 says, “But sin used this command to arouse all kinds of covetous desires within me!”

We might pass 10 closed doors on a given day and not notice any of them until a “do not enter” sign appears. Suddenly we want to know what’s inside. We’re fascinated with the forbidden. It’s in our fallen natures.

How do we resist opening the door? Maybe we resist because we remember a bad outcome from breaking a similar rule. Maybe we’re afraid of punishment. Or it might be that we trust the person who put up the sign.

Whatever the case, knowing a rule doesn’t equip me to follow it. The rule alone only frustrates me. Knowing I “should” follow it can invoke shame for failing even before I do. My ability to follow the rule comes from something greater than me and the rule itself.

Alex, the child in my program, knew the rule “Be nice. Be good.” Without something greater to stand on than just the rule, though, he will sink under its weight.

What’s the Answer?

Jesus explained this most clearly in John 14:21: “Those who accept my commandments and obey them are the ones who love me. And because they love me, my Father will love them. And I will love them and reveal myself to each of them.”

Alex, like all of us, can be equipped to obey only through a relationship with Jesus Christ. Only through knowing Christ does the law lose its sin-causing power over us. Romans 7:4 says, “You died to the power of the law when you died with Christ. And now you are united with the one who was raised from the dead. As a result, we can produce a harvest of good deeds for God.”

Sadly, we’re as quick in leading kids to the law as to Christ — though we usually don’t realize it. See if you relate to any of these statements:

“I want kids to apply the Bible, so for each passage I tell them something they can do.”

“I give kids God’s rules to protect them from the immorality of today.”

“Sin is serious. I want kids to know and fear it.”

The above statements raise valid concerns — each has some truth and some danger. The effectiveness of our ministries hinges on how well we keep sight of the goal as we deal with these issues. Let’s take a closer look.

How To vs. Who Is God?

“I want kids to apply the Bible, so for each passage I tell them something they can do.”

Sometimes our desire to help kids apply Scripture turns a Who Is God? lesson into a how-to lesson. The difference? A how-to lesson could slip almost without notice into a public school curriculum and focuses on simply being a good citizen. A Who Is God? lesson focuses on the Creator and Savior of the world.

We do want kids to apply Scripture. That’s a no-brainer. Where we get off track is thinking that “apply” always implies a “moral.” That is, we want every passage in the Bible to tell us something to do.

For example, we might take the Bible story of baby Moses in the basket and focus it on Miriam helping her brother. That way we’ve got a moral, something physical: “Let’s be helpful.” It’s concrete, easy to understand, and we’ve got kids applying Scripture. But will the kids apply what the passage is really meant to convey?

What if instead we focus on how in these worst of circumstances, God begins to save his people, starting with Moses. We see that God takes care of Moses, God takes care of his people, and we can trust that God takes care of us. The application for this story then is not so much something to do as it is a perspective on our relationship with God: God takes care of us.

How many kids in your class have parents going through a divorce? Are kids experiencing bullying? Are they afraid of the dark? Will we rob them of the message that God takes care of us, only to encourage them to “be a good helper”?

What if you began this lesson by first asking kids to tell you about a time they felt afraid? As you get them talking and thinking about their fears, prepare them for the truth of the story. Stir them up to receive the comfort and knowledge of God’s care shown through the story. Then we’re using Scripture for its purpose: to reveal God — not to deliver rules.

Rules or Relationship?

“I give kids God’s rules to protect them from the immorality of today.”

Our tendency to assign a moral to every Bible passage might have another root: the decadence of many modern cultures. We want kids to know the difference between the ways of God and the ways of the world.

God wants our kids to know the difference between his ways and the world’s, too. So God reveals what life in his kingdom looks like through Scripture.

God’s rules do protect us from immorality but instead of framing them as “we should” or “you should,” we can instill confidence that with Jesus, “we can,” and “you can.” It’s a small shift in language that can cause a huge shift in how God’s Word is received by young hearts.

Whatever the age group, we can teach how God wants us to live in the context of our relationship with God. And it’s vital that we do because God modeled this for us. More than 400 years passed between when God called Abraham and when God communicated the law to Moses. What happened in between? God built a relationship with his people. Relationship before rules!

Grace or Law?

“Sin is serious. I want kids to know and fear it.”

We teachers sometimes fear that an emphasis on grace will cause kids to take sin lightly. After all, kids need discipline. If they break their parents’ rules or their teachers’ rules, they need a consequence to prevent further rule-breaking behavior. So what happens if we tell them that God forgives them no matter what they do?

The seriousness of sin isn’t necessarily lost. We can model and tell about God’s grace while distinguishing between consequences and forgiveness. Hopefully, parents and teachers also forgive children no matter what they do — even as they administer a consequence. Kids are capable of connecting real-life examples of forgiveness alongside consequences to how sin has consequences, even as God forgives us. And, if you teach a broad range of Bible stories, kids will see that sin is serious and that God’s forgiveness restores our relationships with him.

Just think: Jesus taught that those who are forgiven little, love little: but those who are forgiven much, love much (Luke 7:41-47). We don’t need to fear leaning into forgiveness with kids. Grace is a good teacher.

I wanted Alex to take more from Sunday school than a batch of cute crafts, memory verses, and good morals. All these were supposed to be a means, not an end. The end — what I really wanted — was for Alex to know the love of Christ so fully that if he had to choose one sentence to represent the Bible, it might be something such as, “Jesus gave his life for me.”

Now, when preparing a lesson, I put my main teaching point through a litmus test:

1. Is it true to the Scripture passage, revealing God?
2. Does it highlight relationship over rules?
3. Are forgiveness and consequences accurately portrayed so God’s grace shines?

If the answer to any of those questions is no, I rethink what I’m teaching. Otherwise, I’m asking kids to serve a God I haven’t yet helped them get to know.

Lisa Wheeler is a Christian education co-director in Birmingham, Alabama.

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