Raising children is awesome and aggravating, ominous and overwhelming, frantic and fulfilling (and that's all before the teen years). Thanks be to God for books that help us Christians raise children according to the promises we make at baptism.
One valuable teaching instrument is Martin E. Marty's
Baptism: A User's Guide (Exploring Christian Faith) (Augsburg, $14.99, 2008). With his signature combination of wit, accessibility, and far-reaching knowledge and erudition, Marty provides a nourishing introduction to the ancient and profound sacrament. With a dash of delight, he warns of the dangers of baptism. Baptism brings people into a new identity demanding risks in serving the neighbor and God. The book takes readers by the hand to reconsider the profundity and far-stretching significance of baptism, a sacrament that many Christians trivialize or even forget about shortly after the pictures are taken. Marty draws from the Confessions — especially the Small Catechism — to irrigate his reflections. He also provides questions for study and discussion. For pastors and laypeople who wish to rediscover baptism, Marty's book is invaluable.
The Bible is essential reading for the Christian raising baptized children, and
The Gospel of Grace: Tools for Building a Positive Understanding of the Bible by Mark Wickstrom (Beaver's Pond Press, $13.95, 2008) serves as a helpful and amicable assistant, especially as a companion for those engaged in the Book of Faith Initiative. Wickstrom suggests that there are two main biblical hermeneutics. One is strictly literalist and contends that, if we readers discover that one part of the Bible is false, then all of it is. One falsehood causes a domino effect that leads to the exposure of the entire Bible as false. The other hermeneutic is selectivist, meaning that the reader interprets only some passages literally. The key image for this hermeneutic is that of a house that has as its framework the gospel of grace. In other words, for Wickstrom grace is essential to determining what passages in the Bible he interprets literally.
All throughout the book he draws from this house conceit. He contends that we Christians can approach the Bible as architects constructing our scriptural hermeneutic. For Wickstrom, the gospel of grace is the framework, while other passages may be more like rooms, having certain continuity but being that which we can remodel or repaint according to changing cultural norms. Still other biblical teachings may be like an old, ugly lamp, unappealing and no longer serving a purpose.
Wickstrom is careful not to force his conclusions about various ethical issues upon the reader, although it is clear that he believes that one needs to reinterpret biblical prohibitions in light of the framework of grace. For instance, he believes that, according to this hermeneutic, practicing homosexuality is permissible for us Christians.
While one may disagree with Wickstrom's contention that we Christians can basically disregard certain passages, and while one may disagree with his conclusions about which passages contain timeless truths, nevertheless
The Gospel of Grace does a concise and intelligent job of helping Christians understand better the different biblical hermeneutics. The book would provide salutary discussion for an advanced Bible study or for clergy and seminarians. The greatest strength of the book is the house conceit, a vivid image that can help biblical literalists understand the selectivist hermeneutic. It is indeed instructive to have such a book as we Christians scrutinize Scripture and then teach it to our children.
A third book that can aid in teaching us Christians about how to raise children as the baptized is Barbara Brown Taylor's
An Altar in the World: A Geography of Faith (HarperOne, $24.99, 2009). With her usual poignant and wise eloquence, the world-renowned preacher and writer tutors readers in being attentive to God's presence and activity in the world, and not just in worship and other officially religious venues. Each of the 12 chapters focuses on a different practice of discerning God in the mundane. She avers that God comes to us humans in the physical, even the fleshly. She stresses cultivating a more acute awareness of surroundings, of the miracles, large and tiny, which flutter and buzz around us. She encourages practices such as deliberately getting lost so as to discover new things, not worrying as much about destination and time. She reminds us of the holy value of saying no to others as part of keeping the Sabbath, and the spiritually therapeutic benefits of experiencing pain. To enrich and strengthen her lessons, Taylor draws from Scripture. For instance, she meditates on Jacob dreaming of the angels ascending and descending. Just as he awakens and declares that he is in a holy place, so are we humans to recognize the holiness around us, now flickering, now blazing, now smoldering.
While the core principles of
An Altar in the World are old, Taylor's enviable, graceful, and sensual style makes them new. This book will revive laypeople and, especially, pastors to appreciate with greater, holier attentiveness God and the world, and then to assist children in doing likewise.
Along similar lines is Eugene H. Peterson's
Tell It Slant: A Conversation on the Language of Jesus in His Stories and Prayers (Wm. B. Eerdmans, $24, 2008). Just as Taylor gives the reader lessons on experiencing God in flesh and everyday activity, the renowned Peterson (best known for his fascinating and stimulating paraphrase of the Bible,
The Message) guides the reader toward the holiness of everyday speech. Peterson contends that Jesus often speaks obliquely — or, in other words, a slant. (The book's title is from an Emily Dickinson poem that exhorts the reader to reveal truth indirectly.)
In the first part of the book, the author scrutinizes the travel narrative stretching from Luke 9–19 and the stories Jesus tells during this journey. These stories are not sermons but are indeed short stories, parables, and full of concrete, earthy, quotidian language. The book's second part meditates on Jesus' prayers, including Matthew's version of the Lord's Prayer, the High Priestly Prayer in John 17, Jesus' prayer in Gethsemene, and his prayers from the cross. As usual, Peterson is thoughtful, insightful, and poetic. His wisdom teaches the reader new ways to approach old stories and prayers, but the more important lesson is learning to embrace words with greater sensitivity and sacred selectivity.
We adults often do not embrace with adequate seriousness and complexity the issues of children. These resources can expand our sophistication and sensitivity as we teach children — and they us — what it means to live as the baptized.
David von Schlichten is pastor of St. James Lutheran Church, Youngstown, Pennsylvania, and the book review editor of Lutheran Partners
magazine.