Remember when you were a child and you would promise your friends something – maybe it was that you would invite them to your sleepover birthday party, be on their team at recess, trade them a certain baseball/hockey/Pokemon card, etc. If there was ever a shadow of doubt that you would come through on your promise, you would be require to ‘Pinky-Swear’ on your promise – something that if you broke, would bring shame and condemnation to you on the school yard.
This Sunday, eight families are making a promise to their church congregation. While for some reason we don’t make adults pinky-promise things in our society (why is that?), what they are doing is effectively just that! They are standing up in front of the congregation to promise that they will intentionally parent their children to follow after Jesus!
This is no small promise! Parenting a child is a lot of hard work – even just getting them to bed at night can become an all-consuming mission of your day! As Bill Cosby demonstrates, getting your child to do simple tasks requires a lot of hard work and repetition – parenting them to follow after Jesus requires EVEN MORE work!
Luckily, these parents aren’t doing it all on their own! They have invited other couples into their life to intentionally speak into their families and support them in coming through with their promise. These people, we have called them, Spiritual Parents, and they will also make a promise to pray for and support these families so their children may follow after Jesus.
This gets me excited! Our church is continually working hard to mentor and disciple each other for the glory of the Father and the advancement of the Kingdom of God! If you are part of Portage Alliance Church, you are part of these parent’s story. Together we can help more parents make good on their promise this week.
