A Book Children Can Grasp

For years, Jennifer Lyle has been teaching three- and four-year-olds the Bible in Sunday School. Jennifer says those are strategic years in a child's life, and parents and teachers alike need to make sure we are redeeming this important time. That child is going to, Lord willing, we hope and plan and anticipate, going to grow to be an adult. And God's plans for that child are not unformed at age three.

And age three is a part of God's plans for that child, so that's a responsibility. I get 100 minutes a week with them for 52 weeks in a year. That's a lot of time.

I want to spend it wisely. This is Family Life Today. Our hosts are Dave and Ann Wilson.

I'm Bob Lapine. As a parent, are you making the most of these years with your kids, making sure to pour a solid foundation on which their lives can be built? We're going to talk more about that with Jennifer Lyle today. Stay with us.

And welcome to Family Life Today. Thanks for joining us. So, just a few minutes ago, I got the opportunity to introduce you guys to my friend, Jennifer. Yes, we did.

And we already like her. We had lunch together. Thank you.

Jennifer Lyle's joining us on Family Life Today. And I have to tell you, you don't think of many people who have been to seminary as being called as missionaries to three-year-olds. But that's really kind of your story, isn't it?

That is a great way to sum it up. I've never thought of that before. And it's interesting because I don't know if you knew this, but my seminary training and degree is actually in missions.

Really? Yeah, I went to seminary anticipating and planning to go overseas as a missionary because I had just spent time overseas doing missions. And the Lord just redirected that. And yeah, I never expected that teaching little kiddos was going to be the place that is the most home for me. And I've taught all ages, but preschool in particular and three-year-olds is my favorite.

If you would ever meet a missionary to three-year-olds, this would be the world. Isn't that the truth? Oh, yeah. It just fits you. I love it. That makes my heart feel like it does.

But I want to explain, too. Jennifer is brilliant. She has a brilliant mind. You can tell that you're a great teacher. You're passionate. These kids, you are a gift to them.

Oh, that's really kind. I mean, I'm not sure they would agree when I'm trying to get their bottoms to stay on the carpet and listen. And we're not going to have toy time if we don't finish story time. The reason that Jennifer is here is because we want her to help us know how we, as grown-ups, whether it's as parents or grandparents or people who are teaching the three-year-olds in Sunday school at our church, how we can move beyond just teaching really simple things. Because kids at age three, this is your conviction, they can learn more than we believe they can learn. Absolutely. I believe, having taught women, having taught teenagers, having taught the ages from two to ten, three-year-olds are distinctly the age I have found that can best understand both the things that are certain about God while also being able to reconcile and sit with the mysterious aspects of God in a way that truly helps them to have a broader, more firm foundation for what they're both going to experience in life, and then what they're going to continue to learn about God's Word.

I have never heard that. And I'm just thinking of a mom who is going, No, wait a sec. I've got a three-year-old at home. I can't teach them how to clean up their room. And you're saying they can understand the mysteries of God? Yeah.

At the end of the year, I teach on the Trinity for two weeks. To three-year-olds. And they get it. Mm-hmm.

I mean, as much as you can get it. Part of what I teach them is that there are some things about God that we can know for absolutely certain, and God has allowed us to understand completely, and those things are revealed in His Word, but that there are also things that we learn from His Word that because we are a little like God, which is how I talk about being created in the image of God, but not fully God, that we can understand those a little bit, but not fully. And that's part of what helps us to want to hold on to God as He holds on to us in those mysteries. But they can know that there's one God who has three persons in Him, and we can't have three persons in us, but God's different.

He can. So one God who has three persons, and all the persons are always God all the time, always have been, and always will be. And we talk about, you know, there's the Father and the distinct aspect of Creator, and then Jesus the Son as Savior, and then the Holy Spirit as Helper. So they get that as well, and I draw little icons, and so yeah. Yeah, when I started reading your book, that's like page one or two. It's very early, and I was thinking, how does a three-year-old get this? I'm not sure I completely understand it, and you're saying they really can grasp it.

They absolutely can. Way to go. Let me say the book is called The Promises of God Storybook Bible. You took all of the years you've been teaching, and has it been three, four, and five-year-olds, or mostly three-year-olds? Really, this approach to the text of the promises of God, and really the Trinity, and a lot of, there's a thread of the heart, and the heart being disconnected from God through sin, and then being reconnected, and hard hearts versus soft hearts.

That's a strong theme. All of that really came out of teaching three- and four-year-olds. And even the Trinity teaching and how I teach it, I've stumbled on this and learned on it. I didn't walk out of seminary and into this classroom, and I made lots of mistakes. It really came from the questions kids would ask me. And the Trinity conversation came from a child, actually to whom the book is dedicated in part, who was a week after his fourth birthday.

And I teach the Old Testament throughout that year, but we had taken a break in December to teach four weeks on Advent. And I had just taught the first week, and we were finished teaching, and he looked up at this picture I have on my wall, which is a drawing of Adam and Eve in the garden. And he said, Ms. Jennifer, Jesus is God. And I said, yes.

And you know, I'm like getting snack time ready. And he said, God created Adam and Eve. And I said, yes. And he said, but Jesus wasn't born yet. Jesus is God.

There's only one God. And I remember I was trying to wedge out the goldfish container, and I paused and I thought, I think a four-year-old just asked me about the pre-incarnate existence of Jesus. What do I say? I don't remember what I said exactly to him that day. I remember the mystery language I came up with. But he kept asking questions for weeks and weeks. And it was really through that one child that I landed on how to kind of reconcile the Trinity conversation. And one week his dad came running in after he picked him up, and I was cleaning up the class.

And he said, I need you to explain it to me the way you just explained it to him, because he's talking to me about it, and I don't know how to talk about it that way. So, the kids really taught me this. And then now, because I've been teaching so long, the book's not really written to three-year-olds, although that is sort of the introductory age to it. But I have ten-year-olds in our church now who I taught at three. And so, I also wrote it with the idea that for a child who's older, that this becomes a bridge resource that they could even read on their own that goes into them then reading God's Word. So, because of that, I also feel really passionately about not just telling the stories, but really giving more of a sense of the overview of the types of teaching that is in the Bible, because that's where we need to get them.

And let me just say, the book is full color all the way through, beautiful illustrations. This is the book you'd sit down with your kids and read, or as you said, when they're older, they could read, and they will be captivated by the beauty of the book and by the stories that they're having. And one of the great things I discovered, I'm guessing this was part of your purpose, is as a parent, now a grandparent, it was, how do I teach these stories to kids? Really, I mean, it probably is the way you've taught them for years, right?

Is that part of your purpose? Yeah, I really wrote it with the primary vision in my mind of family devotional times, of a family with multiple-aged children and them sitting together, whether at breakfast table or at bedtime and being able to read a story, while the kids are fidgeting, just like when I'm teaching, they don't just sit there like little obedient children, they're eager to hear the stories, but read the story and then be able to ask questions. So I wrote it very much trying to hit the voice that a parent reading it would just be having a conversation with their child or children, or recognizing, you know, as an aunt, I love kids, I like to help friends with kids, I have them, kids love to have books read to them.

You know, here's a selection of stories. So if you're a grandparent, if you're an aunt, uncle, just love kids. But there are also, since it's come out, a lot of churches are using it in Sunday school classes or using it for if there's like a Sunday night service with kids that's off their curriculum.

So it's been fun to see how the different uses. And I think a lot of parents are thinking like, oh yeah, I'll start reading the Bible or my kids, I'll help them when they get into elementary school age. But this is, you're saying three year olds. What happened in your life that put this passion on your heart? Because this is like your passion loses out. How did this come about? Were you raised in the church?

What happened? Yeah, no, actually it's interesting because when I agreed to teach the three year old class at my church, I thought, I think this is going to be too young for me because I like to teach substantively. And then I realized the first year like, oh wait, these kids are developmentally really ready to understand and interpret things as individuals, you know, and they can be taught. And I also realized in my church, this was the first age where they were being taught the Bible every week.

And I just love that idea of being able to set the foundation. Because it's not just babysitting down in church while the parents are sitting in big church. You are teaching them.

Yeah, I teach about 25 minutes. I mean granted, seven minutes of that is me asking them to stop, keep your bodies, crisscross applesauce, all that. But I, in hindsight, I did not grow up in the church and age three for me was a pretty tumultuous time. And I've had other relationships and children in my life for whom that was the case as well.

And my memories start at age three. And I do think that the Lord knew the way in which that passion could be developed in me that would be redemptive on so many levels. And it helps me to see the children as individuals created in the image of God. It's sort of a running joke at my church that I don't know any adults because I know the faces of the parents who show up. And some of the children and families I'm close to. But most of the time I'm like, what's their kid?

And that's how I can place them. And I think we tend to just see children as an extension of their parents. And I'm always mindful of the fact that I'm a partner, a much lower level partner in the context of that family. But that that child is going to, Lord willing and most, you know, we hope and plan and anticipate going to grow to be an adult. And God's plans for that child are not unformed at age three.

And age three is a part of God's plans for that child. So that's a responsibility. I get 100 minutes a week with them for 52 weeks in a year. That's a lot of time.

I want to spend it wisely. You know, it's interesting as you were talking, I thought of 2 Corinthians 1. And I don't know exactly what you meant about when you were three, but you're now a teacher of three year olds. So, you know, I know we're all familiar with this, but Paul writes, Bless be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in our affliction so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort which we ourselves are comforted by God. And I just preached on this, like our pain leads us to our purpose, which leads us to our people.

Oh, that's great. And again, I'm hearing your story. I'm like, there it is again.

It's like something happened that was painful, affliction he calls it. It ends up leading you to a purpose in your own life. And again, we want to avoid that. But if we embrace it, it ends up like, wow, this is going to be partly my purpose. And then you end up, your people being three year olds and others as well. But, you know, our marriage is in trouble. We write a book about vertical marriage. And so we find that our, and Mike came from a broken home at three, at four or five years old. And now a broken home kid is helping build homes.

So talk about that a little bit. What is it that took you on this journey to where you are? My most vivid memory that is early is of being in a magnolia tree. I was at my grandparents' house and it went all the way down to the ground. And I would go inside of the tree to the branches before the leaves. And there was a way I was so little I could just sit in the tree.

And I would sit in the tree for hours and hours and hours. My mom left whenever I was very, very, very young before then. And I lived with my dad, but we were kind of bouncing around. And I spent a lot of time with my grandparents. I didn't have a lot of supervision and oversight.

Most of my memories are me alone, kind of outside playing, kicking around dirt. But honestly, it was just the confusion of, okay, I'm a person. And there's grownups, but I don't really know where I fit. And I don't know how to understand what's happening. And I don't know what to do with myself. What am I supposed to be doing right now in this moment? And it sounds crazy, and it's not like I had that organized thinking. And I'm sure I was also doing silly kid stuff. But the passion now is for me to introduce children at that age, because I know you can be thinking those things, right?

Because I was. To help them to understand they have a place. They have a place in God's created order. They have a place in God calling a people to be His.

They have a place to reconcile the fact that they're sinners. Those were things that now with the biblical worldview, I can look back and say, God gave me this weird, very young, big problems of life, irreconcilable processing. And I didn't figure that stuff out to any degree. I'm still figuring it out.

But I didn't start until I was 21. And one of the things I love is I'll teach almost every week something to these three-year-olds, and I ask them questions at the end. Not every three-year-old is ready for as much of this as four, or whatever.

It's a scale. But they will know stuff at the end of every week that I did not learn, sometimes until I was in seminary, because I went to seminary just a couple of years after I was saved. And I tell them that all the time, and they love it. They think that's just fantastic. So to me, they're not alone. God has a plan.

God made them. And I'm honest about there are going to be things that happen in your life that are going to be so hard. And you're going to sin in ways that you can't imagine. And your mom and your dad are.

And I do. And we talk about how our pastor does. But all of that is within the scope of God's plan. And I want them to know that they're not sitting on branches that are going to break, but that they're sitting on truth. And that that truth is for them. It's not just for the grown-ups.

It is as much for them as it is for the pastor. I think that's so encouraging for parents and a good reminder that these years matter. Because as moms, I know that I can feel so frantic, I can feel so frazzled. I wonder, do these years really matter? Because I'm in the survival state. And yet, as you were talking, I was thinking about my three-, four-, and five-year-old self. And it was hard. And I had deep thoughts abuse, sexual abuse had taken place by then. I can remember being in my bed wondering, what's wrong with me?

Why are these things happening to me? That was very much me as well. And I think there's a lot of little kids that have these deep thoughts. And I can remember even, I didn't go to church much growing up. And I remember my brother used to tease me to tell me that I was adopted. He was convincing me that I was adopted, teasing me so horribly.

And he would bring proof like, haven't you ever wondered why your hair was blonde and all of us have brown hair? And so I remember saying to my mom, was I adopted? It was interesting too, because she said, Ann, you weren't adopted. She said, now you were an accident and you were a total surprise, which some people are like, that wasn't nice. But then she said one thing, she said, but I think God must have a reason why you're here.

And He must have something special for you. Now, I didn't go to church, but I remember that planted deep into my soul, wondering, does God have something for me? And I'm thinking back to our kids, Dave, like our kids understood the gospel, they understood sin, they understood why Jesus came. They really understood sin.

Because we pointed it out. But two of them gave their lives to Jesus as three-year-olds, and they can remember it. Oh, that's amazing. And so I think for parents, this is a great reminder to read God's Word. These are seeds we're planting into their hearts and souls.

It makes a difference. So even to take a few minutes a night and ask those questions like, what do you feel like God has for you? And then tell them God has something great to read the Bible. And I have to ask you right on the heels of that, because a lot of parents are here, they've got two-year-olds or three-year-olds who have prayed a prayer, and mom and dad walk away and go, so did something really happen there or not? And you watch their behavior over the next couple of years and go, I don't think anything happened.

That's a good point. So help us process a three-year-old who says, when I grow up, I want to be a dinosaur and I want to trust Jesus, you know? That's fantastic, because I've had that conversation pretty much. Yeah, well, first of all, my approach with everything for three-year-olds is pretty much the same approach I've had teaching adults, right?

So we all know people who have had a moment and have made a profession, and then you're like, okay, wait, what happened with the discipleship? So we can never know with someone else. I will say, you know, I'm not a parent, right? So I'm not having those bedtime conversations and that kind of thing. From a teaching standpoint, I avoid the focus being on kind of the traditional gospel narrative of the four spiritual laws or things like that. And I think there is a context for that.

I've used that a lot teaching overseas, for instance. But with children, I'm pretty hardcore on the heart. This is about the heart. And from a, you know, theologically conservative standpoint, I think there was a phase in the church, I don't know really when it was, when we kind of got scared about talking about the heart, like we're getting too emotional, that kind of thing. Scripture talks so much about the nature of the heart relative to a relationship with God. And so I use, when I teach and throughout the book, this construct of a soft heart and a hard heart. So when I talk about the gospel, I really don't, they don't know the word gospel, they don't know the word Trinity, they don't, I teach the Old Testament, they leave my class and I've never heard the word Israelite, okay? Because I say God's people.

It's honestly just about language. But with the soft heart and the hard heart, I taught from the first day where we talk about creation, that God made Adam and he made Eve, he made them to be a little bit like him, and he gave them hearts that were connected to his. And that meant they could hear him, just like you can hear me. It meant they loved him and they wanted to obey him. And then we talk about the snake, we talk about how, you know, he deceived how Eve had heard God, she did know what God had said, but yet she saw and she wanted and she took. And I mean, I reiterate this all year through every single story, you'll see it in the scripture if you look, that as she took that fruit and as Adam took that fruit, their hearts changed and their hearts became hard.

They could not hear God the same, they could not love God the same, they could not obey God the same. And that is the start of what we see unfold in scripture. And then transitioning them to understanding, but wait, God made a way, he made a way for our hard hearts to become soft again. And, you know, I even talk about the sacrificial system, people think I'm crazy. But, you know, we talk about how there were two ways, and the one way was for a time, but it didn't work. And they kept having to sacrifice more and more and more and more and more, because what I know, and I reiterate to them, is that to me, I hope, is planting the seed against legalism, right? That they're going to recognize, wait, at some point in their future, I'm hoping it's going to come back up, but that the only true and whole way for our hearts to be connected back to God is by us understanding how desperately we need Jesus, and that we were made to have hearts that were connected to God, and nothing in our lives will ever be tolerable or have the way it was supposed to be without that.

And Jesus is the way. I have to wonder, as you're explaining that for three-year-olds? That was for adults.

Are you kidding me? That wasn't just for three-year-olds. And if you didn't know how to convey that to your child, there it is.

Then get the book and do it. Are there folks listening right now who are going, I've never understood it that way? And if you look at your own life today and say, I think I still have a hard heart.

I may have had that moment where I was moved and I prayed something, but my heart's still hard. I'm asking you, Pastor Dave. You're sitting down with that guy.

What do you say to him? Let's see, Bob. You're a pastor as well. I know you've shared this many, many times. I would say just what Jennifer said. This is your moment to say, I am going to make a decision that's going to change my life.

It's amazing to think it could happen at three years old, and it does. It could be your day right now. And it's as simple as saying, Jesus, I believe, and I surrender my life and my heart to you. Transform my heart, because I can't. I've tried. I can't.

You can. I give you my life. I give you my heart.

And I love the words. Change me. I repent.

I turn. That's actually the one really kind of distinct grown-up theological term I actually teach, is because I think it's different than, you know, they're used to kind of saying, I'm sorry, Mom, for this, and that kind of thing. Because there's a differentiation between how we respond to God and how we respond to parents. We can be sorry for things, but the question is, are we turning from those things? Exactly.

Exactly. I would hope that anybody listening who's going, you know, I have had a hard heart, and I want a soft heart, and I want to turn from old ways to new ways. You can go to our website at FamilyLifeToday.com. There's a link there that says Two Ways to Live, and it maps out for you two strategies. And I'll just suggest to you the way you've chosen to live has brought you to the place where you are today.

And if that's a dead end, if that's not a good place, if you look at your life today and say, this is not what life is supposed to be, go explore the other way to live. Go to FamilyLifeToday.com, click the link that says Two Ways to Live, read through that and consider what your life would look like if you were living your life with Jesus' agenda in place rather than your agenda in place. Again, our website is FamilyLifeToday.com. On the website, you will find a link to the book that Jennifer Lyle has written for us as parents to read to kids. It's called The Promises of God Storybook Bible, The Story of God's Unstoppable Love. You can order a copy of this wonderful new tool for parents or for grandparents. Go to FamilyLifeToday.com to get your copy. Again, it's The Promises of God Storybook Bible, beautifully illustrated, beautifully written. Order online at FamilyLifeToday.com or call to order 800-358-6329.

That's 800 F as in family, L as in life, and then the word today. Now, I want to add a quick word of thanks to those of you who over the last few weeks have gone online or called us here at Family Life and made a donation. We've been mentioning that there's a matching gift opportunity that's available to us during the month of May. Every donation we're receiving this month is being matched dollar for dollar out of a matching gift fund. The total amount of that fund is $345,000. That's a big number. You've been helping us meet that if you've gone online to make a donation or if you've called us.

We still have a ways to go to get to that total, and we just have a few days left. So we want to ask you, if you're a regular Family Life Today listener, would you consider making a donation today knowing that that donation will be matched dollar for dollar? If you can do that, we'd love to say thank you by sending you a copy of a new book from Barbara Rainey called My Heart Ever His, a wonderful new book, a book of prayers that Barbara has written. It's a beautiful book, and it's our gift to you when you donate to support the ongoing ministry of family life today. Let me also ask you to consider becoming a monthly supporter, what we call a legacy partner. If you'll agree to make a monthly donation in support of this ministry so that we can provide practical biblical help and hope to marriages and families all around the world every day, in addition to a copy of Barbara's book, we'll send you as a legacy partner a certificate so you and your spouse can attend a weekend to remember marriage getaway as our guest.

You can donate or sign up to become a legacy partner online at familylifetoday.com or call 1-800-FL-TODAY to donate or become a legacy partner. Thanks in advance for your support. On behalf of the hundreds of thousands of folks who benefit from this ministry every day, we are grateful for the partnership. Now, tomorrow we want to talk more practically about how, as parents, we can make the most of these years with our kids, or, as grandparents, how we can intersect with our grandkids and read them stories like the stories in the Promises of God Storybook Bible. We'll talk more with Jennifer Lyle tomorrow. Hope you can be with us for that. I want to thank our engineer today, Keith Lynch, along with our entire broadcast production team. On behalf of our hosts, Dave and Anne Wilson, I'm Bob Lapine. We'll see you back next time for another edition of Family Life Today. Family Life Today is a production of Family Life of Little Rock, Arkansas, a crew ministry. Help for today. Hope for tomorrow.