The Parenting Moment
Your nine-year-old comes home from school and quietly asks, “Mum, how do we know God is real?” It’s not said with hostility — just honest curiosity, perhaps stirred by a classmate’s throwaway comment or a science lesson that felt bigger than it was. You smile, but inside you feel the weight of the question. You want to answer well. You want their faith to be real, not borrowed. And you wonder whether you’ve done enough to prepare them for this moment — or whether you’ve been waiting for a moment that was already passing you by.
Biblical Foundation
“These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up.” Deuteronomy 6:6-7
The Shema — the great declaration of Israel’s faith in Deuteronomy 6 — was never designed to be confined to a Sunday school classroom or a once-a-week Bible story. God’s instructions to parents were startlingly ordinary: talk about these things at the table, on the school run, at bedtime, first thing in the morning. The command is woven into the fabric of daily life because faith itself must be. Raising kids who know why they believe begins not with a curriculum, but with a conversation — and those conversations are already waiting inside your normal Tuesday.
Notice that God says these words must first be on the parents’ hearts. The discipleship of our children flows from the overflow of our own walk with Jesus. We cannot give what we do not have. But we also need not be theologians with perfect answers. What we must be is present — spiritually awake to the moments God places before us every day — ready to point our children, again and again, to the Jesus who is revealed and glorified in every part of life.
Practical Wisdom
- Start with God’s character, not just God’s rules. Long before children can understand systematic theology, they can grasp that God is good, that He made everything, and that He loves them. Narnia and a sunset and a newborn cousin are all age-appropriate invitations to ask, “What does this tell us about what God is like?” Build a vocabulary of His attributes — kindness, power, faithfulness — from the very earliest years.
- Explain the Cross simply and often. Children can understand justice and mercy earlier than we think. “We all get things wrong, and that separates us from God — but Jesus took the punishment so we don’t have to” is a truth a five-year-old can begin to hold. Revisit it at every age with growing depth. The Cross should never be a one-off lesson; it is the centre of everything.
- Make the resurrection a household fact, not just an Easter event. Bring it into ordinary moments: “Because Jesus rose from the dead, we know He has power over everything — even the scary thing you’re worried about.” The resurrection is not doctrine to be memorised; it is news to be lived inside of, every single day.
- Model authentic faith — including your doubts and your repentance. When you say, “I don’t know the answer to that, but let’s find out together,” you are teaching your child that faith is honest. When you say, “I was wrong, and I’ve asked God to forgive me,” you are showing them that grace is real. Your lived, imperfect, repentant faith is the most powerful apologetics tool your child will ever encounter.
- Use the rhythms of the day as your classroom. Bedtime prayers, mealtimes, car journeys, and walks are not interruptions to discipleship — they are the method God prescribed. One question at dinner (“What did you see today that reminded you God is real?”) can do more than a year of abstract instruction.
Encouragement for Parents
You do not need to have every answer polished and ready. You need to be faithful in the small moments — the dribs and drabs of ordinary life where the Shema was always meant to live. God is not asking you to produce a child with unshakeable certainty before they turn thirteen. He is asking you to walk with them, talk with them, and keep pointing them to Jesus — the one who is more than capable of holding onto them even when their questions feel bigger than your answers.
The goal was never to raise children who believe because you told them to. It is to raise children who have met Jesus in the kitchen, on the walk to school, and at the breakfast table — children who know why they believe because faith has never been a separate compartment of life, but the very air your family breathes together. Start today. The conversation is already within reach.
Family Prayer
Lord Jesus, thank You that You are not distant or difficult to find. Give us eyes to see You in the ordinary moments of our days, and give us courage to speak Your name freely in our home. Help us to be parents who are honest about our own need for You, so that our children may see real faith and want it for themselves. Draw our children close to You — before the hard questions come, and even more so when they do. We trust them into Your hands. Amen.