Christopher Chelpka

Covenant Kids

Your child is already a precious member of the church. He (or, she, as the case may be) has already been marked by baptism as belonging to God and is considered by your elders to be one of Christ’s sheep under their care. But as a church we rightly long to see him, and all the other children, profess the faith as their own and show the fruits of faith in their life, giving all praise to God for his glorious grace! We also desire that in that professed and lived-out faith, they would join with us and other “professors” around the Lord’s Table so that the faith that they have been given by God would also be nourished by God as he has intended. So it is more than fitting for parents to ask: “When can my child take communion?” It is not just a question about communion; it’s a question about observable growth in grace.¹

Looking for the Fruit of Faith

So when can a baptized child of the church begin to take communion? I’ve already begun to give an answer, but let me be a more specific. Your child can take communion when they have assured the session, so far as it is possible, that they have a credible profession of personal faith. To ascertain this, the session will work and talk with your child to determine three things: (1) if he possesses the doctrinal knowledge requisite for saving faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, (2) if he is relying on the merits of Christ alone for their salvation, and (3) if he is determined by the grace of God to lead a Christian life.² In seeking to know these things the session is not looking for a fully mature faith. We admit to the table and membership of the church even adults who lack the marks of maturity and yet are clearly believers. These requirements, therefore, are not the requirements for a fully mature faith. Instead they are the requirements for a faith that is observable enough and consistent enough in its knowledge, expression, and fruits to be considered credible.

Obviously, this is not something that can be determined by a theology exam or a catechism recital, but only by prayer, loving observation, and conversation with your child, as he or she opens up their heart and life to others in general and to their elders in particular. There is no specific upper or lower age requirement, but many children seem to be ready somewhere between 10-16.

If you think your child may be ready, or close to ready, or possibly ready it is best to seek counsel from your elders. Tell them what kinds of things you are hearing and seeing and ask if it might be wise to enroll them in a new communicant’s course. After talking with you and your child, sometimes the session may determine it would be best to wait, continuing to pray with, teach, and encourage your child until a future time. Or it may be decided to enroll them in the course, which will be used to get to know them better and prepare them to understand the vows they will use to profess their faith before the church.³ After this course, it may be decided to that more time should be given for the God to work and make the child’s faith more clear, or it may be decided to proceed to bring them before the congregation.

So as parents how do you know if your child might be ready? Prayerfully consider questions like these:

• Why does my child want to enter into this changed relationship with the visible church?
• Does my child know how great his sins and misery are?
• Does my child understand the deceitfulness and dangers of sin?
• Does my child know how he is delivered from all his sins and misery?
• Does my child believe he is personally delivered from his sins and misery?
• Does my child demonstrate love, devotion, and thankfulness to God for his deliverance?
• Does my child demonstrate a personal commitment to serve Christ’s kingdom and bear witness to the gospel?
• Does my child demonstrate a willingness to recognize sin, confess and repent of it, and strive toward obedience by faith?
• Does my child demonstrate a personal eagerness to commune with God through his means of grace: the Word, the sacraments, and prayer? What does he know about these things?
• Does my child demonstrate a personal desire to obtain the promised fruit of the Spirit that flows from faith? Is my child characterized by those fruits: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, and self-control? Would others agree with this assessment (siblings, other relatives, classmates, fellow church members)?

Brining Them to Jesus

Whether your child is ready now to take communion or not, there are several things you can do that will please the Lord and bless your child.

First, be proactive and certainly don’t hinder them. As Paul said, “Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord” (Eph 6:4). This isn’t some kind of future advice for when your kids are older, this is for right now. If we wait for something to happen, or worse hinder them in their progress in faith, then we are failing to fulfill our job as prayers, exemplars, and encouragers of and for our children. As Jesus said in Mark 10:13-16, he desires to bless even the youngest of children (Mark 10:13-16), “do not hinder them.” So let’s bring them, right now, to Jesus. They need him and his salvation as much as we do.

You can bring them to Jesus by way of prayer. Matthew Henry, the prolific seventeenth-century Presbyterian minister, suggests several possibilities in his book on prayer.⁴ Pray that they would remember their Creator in the days of their youth (Eccl 12:1); that from the womb Christ would be formed in their hearts (Gal 4:19). Pray that they may be kept from the vanity to which the young are often subject and be restrained from walking according to the ways of the heart and the desire of the eyes for which things God brings judgment (Eccl 11:9). Pray that God would make them self-controlled (Titus 2:6), and that the word of God would abide in them that they may be strong and overcome the evil one (1 John 2:14). Pray that they would hold fast to the pattern of sound words (2 Tim 1:13) and continue in what they have learned (2 Tim 3:14).

As you pray for them, you can also teach them how to pray these things for themselves and for others. This is another way to bring them to Jesus: take them by means of instruction. Teach them to pray; teach them to worship. Bringing them to worship so that they might hear the Word of God read, sung, prayed, preached, and administered in the sacraments. Take advantage of opportunities of Christian education and fellowship offered in the church. And at home find time each day together to read the Bible, sing hymns, and hide God’s word in their hearts by memorizing Scripture and catechism questions.

Finally, bring them to Jesus by means of a godly example. Show them what it means to love and trust Jesus. Live lives of integrity, marked by spiritual priorities. Talk often about the gospel, Christ’s majesty, his love for sinners, his power to save, the greatness of his promises, the trustworthiness of his word, his willingness to receive sinners.

These are the things you promised to do in the questions you were asked at their baptism, the fourth being this: “Do you promise to endeavor, by all the means that God has appointed, to bring [name of child] up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, encouraging (him/her) to appropriate for (himself/herself) the blessings and fulfill the obligations of the covenant?” At times, this holy effort may be wearisome, and may seem to produce little fruit. But trust in God. You will be a better parent and more fully display the gospel to your kids if you bring them to Jesus not on the basis of your works, but on the basis of his promises. Without him we can do nothing (John 15:5), but he is the one who strengthens us to do all his holy will (Phil 4:13) and even uses in the blessing of those whom he has called and marked as his own (2 Tim 1:5, 3:15).

Verses for a Prayer of Invocation

“Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” (Psalm 119:105)

“Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer.” (Psalm 19:14)

Blessing, Praising, and Prayer for Insight

• Ephesians 1:1–23
• In Christ Alone, TPH 265

God Delivers us from Death to Life

• Ephesians 2:1–22
• Not What My Hands Have Done, TPH 435

Paul’s Mission and Prayer for the Church

• Ephesians 3:1–21
• Love Divine, All Loves Excelling, TPH 265

The Church in Image and Action

• Ephesians 4:1–5:2
• The Church’s One Foundation, TPH 404

New Saints in a Sinful World

• Ephesians 5:3–21
• O Light That Knew No Dawn, TPH 221

Exhortations for Christian Households

• Ephesians 5:22–6:9
• Oh, Blest the House, TPH 548

Prepared for Battle and Conclusion

• Ephesians 6:10–24
• Soldiers of Christ, Arise, TPH 540

Verse for Closing Prayer

“so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God” (Eph 3:17-19)

Notes:

• The verses given for the prayers are not to be read, although there’d be nothing wrong with that. They are there to help you shape and direct your prayer. Matthew Henry provides a good example of how this can be done. Read his prayers and notice how he weaves together verses from the Bible to express his heart to God.
• TPH = Trinity Psalter-Hymnal. You can look for more or different hymns, even in other hymnals, using hymnary.org.
• The passages should be read with the text with the goal of communicating the meaning of the text, though without additional comment. So, no sermon, just good reading. Daniel I. Block calls this “expository reading” in his book, For the Glory of God: Recovering a Biblical Theology of Worship, 191. Block says: “Expository reading means reading the Scriptures so that their literary qualities are appreciated, their message understood, and their transformative power experienced.”

Visit christopherchelpka.com/simple-liturgies/ for more simple liturgies like this one.

As I understand it, Diakonia Studies: Critical Issues in Ministry is a kind of updating and commentary and clarifying and restating of Collins’s earlier work on this subject. If you want to figure out this book, carefully read the introduction.

And wow, I can see now why Collins’s works come up so much in the recent secondary literature on deacons. He does a ton of primary source work that leads to unconventional conclusions. And if he’s right, that many of us are operating on a misunderstanding the diakonia word-group, then this is a really big deal.

I wish I could write a full-review, but I really need to just get on with appropriating his work. I’ll just say that while there are conclusions in this book I disagree with and arguments that I find week, most of his major points seem right and help answer some common and thorny questions surrounding the office of deacon, among other things. And I’m so thankful for the amount of work he’s done on this topic, both inside and outside the Scriptures. Lots to think about. I’m really glad I read this.

Verses for an Invocation Prayer:

“Who is like you, O LORD, among the gods? Who is like you, majestic in holiness, awesome in glorious deeds, doing wonders?” (Ex. 15:11 ESV)

“O LORD, who shall sojourn in your tent? Who shall dwell on your holy hill? He who walks blamelessly and does what is right and speaks truth in his heart;” (Psalm 15:1–2 ESV)

“For Christ has entered, not into holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true things, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf” (Heb. 9:24 ESV)

“ If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.” (Col 3:1-4 ESV)

Creed: Westminster Confession of Faith 2.2 (TPH, 921)

Hymn: Now unto the LORD, All You Sons of the Mighty (TPH, 29A)

Expository Reading: Isaiah 6

Hymn: A Shoot Will Spring from Jesse’s Stump (TPH, 302)

Lord’s Prayer: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil. For yours is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever. Amen.”

Hymn: Holy, Holy, Holy! (TPH, 230)

Expository Reading: Hebrews 9, Revelation 4-5

Hymn: By the Sea of Crystal (TPH, 473)

Verses for Prayer Asking for God’s Blessing:

“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him.” (Eph 1:3–4 ESV)

But you, beloved, building yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying in the Holy Spirit (Jude 1:20 ESV)

Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy, to the only God, our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion, and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen. (Jude 20, 24–25 ESV)

Hymn: Doxology (TPH 567)

Notes:

• The verses given for the prayers are not to be read, although there’d be nothing wrong with that. They are there to help you shape and direct your prayer. Matthew Henry provides a good example of how this can be done. Read his prayers and notice how he weaves together verses from the Bible to express his heart to God.
• TPH = Trinity Psalter-Hymnal. You can look for more or different hymns, even in other hymnals, using hymnary.org.
• In “expository reading,” one reads the text with the goal of communicating the meaning of the text, though without additional comment. So, no sermon, just good reading. I learned this term from Daniel I. Block in his book, For the Glory of God: Recovering a Biblical Theology of Worship, 191. Block says: “Expository reading means reading the Scriptures so that their literary qualities are appreciated, their message understood, and their transformative power experienced.”

Visit christopherchelpka.com/simple-liturgies/ for more simple liturgies like this one.

For me, the most helpful point Patrick Lencioni makes in Death by Meeting is what he calls “Meeting Stew.”

The single biggest structural problem facing leaders of meetings is the tendency to throw every type of issue that needs to be discussed into the same meeting, like a bad stew with too many random ingredients.

This kind of meeting frustrates people because those who attend will have different and even conflicting goals. Some will want the soup to be fancy, others will want something plain and soothing, still others are hoping for a dessert. But this kind of mishmash gives no one what they want and lets everybody down.

So what you need, Lencioni writes, is “different meetings for different purposes.” There are four types.

1. The daily, 5 minute check-in. Focuses on connecting priorities to daily actions.
2. The weekly, 45-90 minute tactical meeting. Each member does quick reporting on top priorities, reviewing progress, and deciding tactical issues to meet short-term objectives.
3. The monthly, 2-4 hours strategic meeting. The team gets to debate, discuss, and analyze fundamental issues that were previously put in the “parking lot”.
4. The quarterly, 1–2 day off-site review. The team completes a comprehensive strategy review, a team review, a personnel review, and a competitive and industry review.

Lencioni discusses the particular challenges to each of these meetings. He also recognizes that some organizations may struggle to follow this advice because of their circumstances. This is true for the various service teams at Covenant, including the session, whose members worship together weekly, but live far enough apart that make frequent meetings throughout each month impossible.

There are a few possible solutions in my opinion:

• choose fewer objectives and/or do them more slowly; aim for sustainability over speed
• have certain “easy” meetings via video/voice calls;
• have longer meetings, combining, say, types two and three, but break these longer meetings up into distinct parts

And while I’m having fun applying a business book to the church, I’ll say Lencioni’s advice is good for families too. Having daily and even more frequent check-ins is essential for my wife and me, as are long, uninterrupted times for discussing big decisions. We haven’t yet implemented the quarterly, off-site review but that sounds fantastic!

Read: Lencioni, Patrick. Death by Meeting: A Leadership Fable About Solving the Most Painful Problem in Business. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass A Wiley Imprint, 2004.

Let’s do a little theology.

In the Nicene Creed we call God, “Father.”

According to Scripture, there are several true ways we can understand the name “Father” as it applies to God. Each reflects something important about God and about ourselves in relationship with him.

First, we can call God “Father” as the creator of the world and the world to come. The Triune God is our maker. He makes us in his image and puts us into a covenant with him. Luke calls Adam, “the son of God” in Luke 3:38. In this sense, we can therefore call all three persons of the Trinity “Father” as Isaiah does in Isaiah 9:6 when he prophesies about Jesus:

For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Second, we can call God “Father” when we refer to the first person of the Trinity. In this way, he is called “Father” in relation to the Son, the second person of the Trinity. This occurs many places in Scripture. Here is one from John 6:40 where Jesus says:

For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.

Finally, Christians alone can call God the Father “Father” as those who have been adopted through the Son into sonship and thus unto an eternal inheritance. Ephesians 1:3–5, 11:

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will… In him we have obtained an inheritance.

The necessity of focusing may be more difficult in the digital age, but it is not a new problem.

Writing in 1827, Samuel Miller, the presbtyerian minister and Princeton professor, wrote some points on the necessary habits of a good minister. One of them was “the habit of close and fixed attention in study.” Lacking this habit is the most “fatal defect in a student,” he wrote. Without it, one “will never look deeply into any thing; will never accomplish any thing which deserves the name of investigation.”

So if you lack the ability to focus, you should “try to attain it,” Miller says. And don’t give up if you struggle.

Try again and again. It is richly worth all the agony of effort that you can possibly make for its acquirement. Make incessant efforts, then, until you succeed, to summon your powers to concentrated action; to shut out, at pleasure, all extraneous objects; to go from step to step without interruption; and to keep fast hold of the thread which you first seize until you trace it to the end. From the moment you open a book, or take your pen in hand, give undivided attention to what you are about, until you close the one, or lay down the other.

Why work so hard to learn to focus? Because having such a skill will produce great results. Miller points to none less than Isaac Newton as proof, which he explains more in a letter that he wrote to his sons.

We are told of Sir Isaac Newton, that when questioned respecting the peculiar powers of his own mind, he said, that if he had any talent which distinguished him from the common mass of thinking men, it was the power of slowly and patiently examining a subject; holding it up before his mind from day to day, until he could look at it in all its relations, and see something of the principles by which it was governed. His estimate was probably a correct one. His most remarkable, and certainly his most valuable, talent consisted, not in daring, towering flights of imagination, or in strong creative powers; but in slow, plodding investigation; in looking at a series of facts, from day to day, until he began to trace their connection; to spell out their consequences; and ultimately to form as system as firm as it was beautiful."

I love this description of what focus and meditation on an idea involves. Clearly, Miller spoke from experience and the lessons he learned from those who came before him.

So while we may have new kinds of challenges, staying focused is an old probelm. It’s a skill every student must learn if he or she is “to accomplish any thing which deserves the name of investigation.”

For more context and lots more advice on studying and many other things read: Miller, Samuel. Letters on Clerical Manners and Habits. New York: G & C Carvill, 1827, 251–252.

And thanks to James M. Garretson for his book, An Able and Faithful Ministry: Samuel Miller and the Pastoral Office from which I first learned of these passages in Miller’s writing. See chapter twenty of his book for a summary of Miller’s views on “clerical manners and habits.”

William Plumer (1802–1880) was a southern Presbyterian minister and professor. He held various positions within the church to help men prepare for the gospel ministry. And in conjunction with one of those roles, he wrote this essay on how one might determine whether he is called to the work.

Plumer explains that there is some difficulty in determining this, and that one’s conviction of God’s call may strengthen or weaken, even after becoming a minister. Nevertheless, there are points we can draw from both Scripture and common sense than can help with discernment.

He sets the tone in the preface when he encourages his readers to not even read the essay unless they are willing to consider the question of their calling with a humble, reverent, and deliberative spirit.

After this, he distinguishes between the general and special call of the believer to Christian ministry. And then writes breifly on each of the various and necessary evidences for a call. These include:

• earnest desire,
• sense of personal weakness but also confidence in God’s grace,
• a high view of the office, the consent of the church and the authorities in the church,
• a wise discernment of various providences,
• the essential qualifications for the office: “piety, prudence, knowledge, and the power of communicating knowledge in an appropriate manner,”
• and conviction of duty.

In the last few pages, Plumer concludes with a list of reasons why some men resist a call and why some men pursue a call without warrant. This list can help those considering the call to calibrate their consciences. It can also help sessions and presbyteries shepherd the men under their care.

Read: Plumer, William S. Scripture Doctrine of a Call to the Work of the Gospel Ministry. Philadelphia: Russell and Martien, 1832.