Faith of Our Parents: I’m confused about something. In attempting to encourage a younger believer, I noticed that this young man kept mentioning the faith of his parents – admiring that faith, even seeming jealous of it. But as I have some acquaintance with his parents, I found myself thinking, What? Although both parents are nice and kind people, and the mother occasionally attends a small church, I’m fairly certain the father makes no profession whatsoever.
I suppose all of us would like to think that our parents somehow were true Christians. The opposite thought would be horrible, and perhaps almost impossible for us to consider. So I sometimes wonder whether we quietly downgrade the Christian faith in order to accommodate those we love. I cannot speak from personal experience. There was no religion in our home, and unlike most American families, we did not even own a Bible. My mother, who recently died, had little thought of God beyond a certain religious sentiment. But perhaps that absence has caused me to think more carefully about what the faith of believing parents should actually look like. If I had been raised by a believing father or mother, the one great distinction I would have hoped to see would be this: that they did not make themselves the foundation of my faith, but continually directed me to the Scriptures.
That is what stands out to me in Paul’s words to Timothy. He could speak warmly of “the unfeigned faith” which dwelt first in his grandmother Lois and his mother Eunice. Yet when Paul described Timothy’s upbringing, he did not simply tell him to admire the faith of his family. He reminded him that “from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.” II Timothy 3:15. That seems to me to be the real beauty of their influence. Lois and Eunice did not merely leave Timothy with memories of their own devotion. They placed the Scriptures before him. They did not ask him merely to admire their faith or inherit their religious convictions. They directed him beyond themselves to the Word of God.
There is a great difference between being raised around religion and being directed to the Scriptures. A child may grow up with church attendance, prayers before meals, religious expressions, and fond memories of believing parents, yet still never be taught that every belief, tradition, impression, and experience must be brought beneath the authority of God’s written Word. That is the glory of Scripture. It does not leave man occupied with himself. It does not place our hope in ancestry, upbringing, experience, sincerity, or human wisdom. From beginning to end, it bears witness to Christ.
“All scripture is given by inspiration of God.” That settles its authority. The voice of Scripture is the voice of God. It does not become true because we believe it, nor authoritative because a church approves it. It comes to us bearing the authority of the One who spoke it. “And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.” Luke 24:27. That is where the Scriptures lead us. Not finally to our parents, our traditions, our religious upbringing, or even to ourselves, but to Christ. Their authority rests in God who inspired them, and their glory is that through them God has made known His Son. What greater inheritance could believing parents leave than this: not children who merely remember their faith, but children who were directed beyond them to the Holy Scriptures, and through those Scriptures to Christ? MPJ