At New Life, we teach that every child should be trained and taught about Jesus by their parents in the home. Our role is come along side and assist you, but we not replace you. 

Right along with this, is the decision on whether your child is ready to receive communion. We leave this decision up to the parent, but find if the child has been raised learning about Jesus since birth it is typically around age 7 or 8. If your child sees the bread and the cup as snack time, they are likely not ready. 

We found a great article recently about this topic and we will share an excerpt below. 

Sooner or later, a child who is regularly sitting through a Sunday morning worship service is bound to ask something like, 

“Why can’t I have a ‘snack’ like everyone else?” So it is not surprising that the second most-frequent question I am asked in children’s ministry is, “When should my child take the Lord’s Supper?” Since it is such a prevalent question, I have been encouraged to write an article on the subject.

A General Response:

When people inquire about children taking the Lord’s Supper, I have two perspectives to share with them. The first is that our communion services are open to all present, including children, who are:

• trusting in Jesus Christ alone for the forgiveness of their sins and the fulfillment of all his promises to us (including eternal life); and
  
• who intend to follow him as Lord and obey his commandments. 
  

Therefore, children are welcome to participate in the Lord’s Supper:

• when they can understand its significance; 
  
• when they are able to give a credible profession of faith in Christ; 
  
• and when they consciously intend to follow the Lord in obedience. 
  
• There is no test they take or class they attend to help establish their readiness. We simply leave it up to parents to decide when their young disciples are ready.

Below is a helpful article to assist you in deciding if your child is old enough to understand for baptism in water.  We leave the decision to the parents, but in general we suggest waiting until the child is age 10 or higher.   

We do not teach that baptism saves us, that we are saved through faith alone.  We affirm that a child can be saved at any age by receiving the gift of forgiveness and following Jesus.   We do suggest that they are aware of and have counted the cost of discipleship before they proceed with baptism in water, as Jesus taught in Luke 14 and the end of Math 7. 

Is my child ready for baptism in water?

A well done video clip explaining Faith at Home.

Data shows trends, but God is changing everything!

The church that meets at your house must be congruent with the one that you attend on Sundays. I have repeated this every Sunday for the last month! Sorry for the repeat, but I wanted us to get deep in our thinking as we have been rediscovering God's plan for health in the family.

Why? This past Sunday I noted that there is a lot of data showing that we have been losing 60-90% of the next generation by the time they are out of high school 2 years! Only a small portion ( 20 - 35%) ever return to church. Most young people do not change to a different religion, but simply drop out from faith. There are many reason for this, but most of them point back to the home. Our time in Dt. 6 pointed us back to the home as well.

I wanted to share the sources for this information. In my last sermon, I was in particular quoting Family Driven Faith by Voddie Baucham Jr., but there are many studies showing similar data. The data varies based a little based on denomination and region, but it overall is shows an trend that is very concerning.  

That is the bad news.

But there is good news too!

God has brought this awareness to our attention, and families are rising up and taking their place again. There is restoration and healing. There are more resources then ever before to help parents. We are regaining the truth that Faith is Better Caught than Taught!

Every Christian Family Needs Internet Protection.

Here is where you can start...

By now, most know that the internet is full of sites that can damage your family, your kids, and even your faith. Temptation is right at the door for most families. It is becoming a serious problem in the home, I get to hear the stories often when the damage has already been done. And the surprising part is many parents had no idea their kids would do anything wrong.

In addition to the bad sites and dangers that lurk, the simple amount of time many spend on the computer is a problem by itself. I know it is a parents responsibility to protect their kids. So I am writing today to give you two free tools we use in our home to practice accountability, filtering and time usage control.

The tool we use at our home and at our church is www.opendns.com. This a great tool if you use a router as it blocks questionable content at the router level therefore it is effective on any device connected to the network, including mobile ( without having to put something on every device). They have a free version, and paid version. You can use their default settings without creating an account or create an account and customize the settings. Highly recommended.

Another tool that may have a place for some is http://x3watch.com/ It is free, and when installed it sets up accountability reports sent your accountability partners automatically. At last check, it does NOT filter though, it is accountability ONLY. It is geared more adults who are struggling than for family protection.

Lastly I also recommend K9 Web Protection for families. It both filters 'bad' sites and allows a parent to set time controls so our kids are not spending all their free time in front of the screen. What I also love about it is that it will shut off the internet when you want it off. I highly recommend this software, it is a must for all families. It is found here: http://www1.k9webprotection.com/

~ Pastor Ray