Series: Featured

Family & Relationships Parenting

Tips for Teaching the Bible at Home

“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up” (Deuteronomy 6:4-7). By Dan Burton When you sit at home. Our family sits together for dinner at least five times a week. This doesn”t just happen . .

March 1, 2014

Baptism Theology & Bible

Five Questions to Ask if Your Child Wants to Be Baptized

By Brian Jennings 1. Has your child studied intently? Encouraging your child to study on her own (along with learning in special classes or church settings) is a great step. You should be studying too, but allow her the responsibility to study some on her own. 2. Does your child feel guilt from sin and love of God? Motives matter. A child may want to be baptized because he saw a friend receive attention, he desires to please his parents, or maybe he really just wants to take Communion. Obviously, these are not the best motives. My experience teaches me

February 28, 2014

Church & Ministry Youth & Children's Ministry

Making the Most of Opportunities

By Teresa Welch Educators call them teachable moments. They can happen more frequently than you might imagine. And they give us the greatest chance to help children see and remember Bible truths. A group of 40 elementary children had just settled into chairs when Nathan raised his hand. I should have known by the twinkle in his eye that Nathan was up to something, but I called on him anyway. “Miss Teresa,” he began, “if Adam and Eve were naked in the Garden of Eden and Heaven is supposed to be like the Garden of Eden” (you can see

February 27, 2014

Church & Ministry Youth & Children's Ministry

What I”ve Learned About Teens and the Bible

By Curtis Booher What will it take to turn the tide of biblical illiteracy among young people? I contend it will require us to listen more than we talk. We should listen well to young people from every point of the illiteracy to literacy continuum. I have tried to listen to the students sitting in my Bible survey classes, and this is what I”ve heard: Model a Love for Scripture It”s not that students can”t read the Bible; they can. But really, why would they want to? When was the last time they saw their parents read the

February 24, 2014

Teach Your Students to Be Students of the Bible

By Paul Potter Imagine the anxiety of traveling to a distant land. Everything is different from the way it was back home. The people you encounter have plenty to say to you, but they are speaking a language you have never heard. The language isn”t the only thing you don”t understand. Almost nothing is familiar to you. The architecture, clothing, foods, and customs are all strange and intimidating. This is the experience of many millions today, but they haven”t traveled to the other side of the world. They have come to the pages of the Bible. Like tour guides, Christian

February 22, 2014

Church & Ministry Small Groups

The Perfect Gift for a Small Group Leader

By Andrew Mason I was working hard at my desk earlier this week when I heard one of my small group members walk into the main church office and ask whether I was in. Those moments always increase my heart rate because I don”t want to ignore people, but I”m always afraid of being derailed for 45 minutes or so when I”m already running out of time to get my work done for the day. I erred on the side of friendliness (plus my door was open and he could see me sitting there). He walked in and handed me

February 21, 2014

Sir Richard and the Dragons

By Daniel Schantz I used to think there was one, well-guarded secret to good teaching, and if I could just figure out what it was, I could become a Socrates. Now, after a lifetime of teaching, I can see that good communication is more about the practice of a few basic principles of leadership. Take my Sunday school teacher, for example. His college students call him “Mister K,” and he is as gentle as Mister Rogers, smarter than Mister Chips, and more fun than Mister Magoo. Most people just call him “Dick,” but I call him “Sir Richard,” because,

February 20, 2014

The Big Little Book

By Daniel Schantz This compact Bible commentary from Standard Publishing has been helping teachers since the days of President Eisenhower. I had no idea how big Sunday school was until I read Robert Lynn”s book, The Big Little School. Turns out, some very big names were once Sunday school teachers, including Francis Scott Key and General Robert E. Lee. Several U.S. presidents were Sunday school teachers: James Garfield, Benjamin Harrison, Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, and Jimmy Carter. Numerous business tycoons were teachers, including John D. Rocke- feller (Standard Oil), William Colgate (toothpaste), James Kraft (cheese), and H.J. Heinz (ketchup).

February 17, 2014

HIS Story

By Matt Myers Chandler Christian Church set out to help people know Jesus like never before. Going through The Story in 2011 was a life-changing experience for our church. People who had always struggled to read anything, much less the Bible, were not only reading Scripture but sharing it with people they knew. Simply putting God”s Word into story format enabled people to overcome that “Bible intimidation factor.” Not only that, it also allowed them to finally see for themselves how the whole Bible points toward Jesus. Since The Story had such a great result, our lead pastor, Roger Storms,

February 16, 2014

“˜Garden to City”

By Jed Mullenix Harbor of Hope Christian Church considered the Bible as four movements, like acts in a play. “Garden to City” emerged from the desire to bring our community into a personal encounter with the greatest story ever told, the Bible. I assume I am like most other pastors in that my heart is not simply for the local church to become familiar with the narrative of the Bible, but for the people I love and lead to encounter the Author of the narrative. The story begins in a garden and ends in a city. It is a garden

February 15, 2014

Puzzle Solved!

By Monty Cooper Bridges Christian Church tapped the talents of many members for its through-the-Bible study. I am not the type of guy who enjoys “endless hours of fun” putting together 1,000-piece jigsaw puzzles. I really don”t have the patience. It is hard for me to see how all of the pieces on the table fit together. If we are honest, this is how many people feel about the Bible. The Bible is like a large jigsaw puzzle, a bunch of stories with bits and pieces of history that just don”t seem to fit. We miss the fact that it

February 14, 2014

“˜Let Us Tell You Our Story’

By Shelley Leith Christian church leaders share what happened when they committed to this plan for showing readers how the Bible fits together. What is the most biblically illiterate city in America? For one of the largest churches in the country, Christ”s Church of the Valley in Peoria, Arizona, the answer was a wake-up call. Executive pastor Ashley Wooldridge explains: “Here at CCV, we have a very keen and sobering understanding that we live in a completely biblically illiterate age. This especially came home to us when a recent Barna study ranked Phoenix as almost the most biblically illiterate city

February 13, 2014

Southeast Christian Church Tells ‘The Story’

By Brent Adams When one of the largest megachurches in America wanted to celebrate its 50th anniversary, leaders decided there was no better way than to point people to the message of the Bible.Â In summer 2011, the elders and staff at Southeast Christian Church in Louisville, Kentucky, started planning for the church”s 50th anniversary celebration, to be held the following year. They wanted to come up with something that would deflect attention away from the rapidly growing congregation and focus, instead, on the God who has blessed the church since its humble beginnings in the basement of a tiny

February 12, 2014

Christian Standard Updates News & Updates

Need Some Advice?

Almost everybody loves to GIVE advice, but whether or not we TAKE advice may depend on who”s giving it! Here at CHRISTIAN STANDARD, we”re wondering, Whose advice would help you most in your Christian life and Christian service? We”re planning a whole issue around this theme. “The Best (and Worst!) Advice I Ever Received.” Our question to you: Whom should we ask? We”ll recruit several dozen Christian leaders to tell us the advice they received and how it turned out for them. Who should be on our list? Please send an e-mail today to tell us. It should simply say,

February 10, 2014

Church & Ministry Church Leadership Ministry Training & Education

Fix It!

By Teresa Welch “What”s wrong with education in the church today?” As a professor and practitioner of Christian education, I have posed this question in workshops and classrooms and received no shortage of replies. Inexperienced teachers. Antiquated methods. Lack of organization. Bland curricular materials. The question often riles up the room. There”s something cathartic in complaining about how the church bungles education. At some point, however, I end the conversation. I look straight at the group, and I share three simple words: “Then fix it.” You have probably heard complaints about the lack of biblical literacy in today”s congregations.

February 9, 2014

Free Digital Resources for Bible Study

Compiled by Gregory Linton BibleGateway.com Find and compare passages of the Bible based on keywords, phrases, or Scripture reference. Bible Gateway also provides an app that includes more than 90 different translations in more than 70 languages and offers reading plans, audio versions, note taking, and highlighting. It is available on iPad, iPhone, Android phones, and Kindle Fire. BibleStudyTools.com “The largest free online Bible website for verse search and in-depth studies.” Search capabilities in 39 different versions of the Bible as well as access to commentaries, dictionaries, encyclopedias, concordances, historical books, and Greek and Hebrew interlinears and lexicons.

February 8, 2014

From Meager to Eager

By T.R. Robertson When people say they wish they could watch more football, or they wish they could spend more time on the Internet, most of them will actually find a way to do just that. But when the people in your church say they wish they knew the Bible better, will they actually set out to do it? For many, the answer is probably not. But why not? One reason some don”t work at learning the Bible might be they don”t really understand the benefits of being more biblically literate. Sure, they”ll agree it”s important. But in fact, they”re

February 7, 2014

How to Teach the Bible

By Terry O’Casey Biblical illiteracy is as great a problem inside the church as out. But preachers””and preaching””can make aÂ difference. An unchurched neighbor heard me preach about David and Goliath. Afterwards, she said, “Great talk. No stem, no seeds, no sticks, just good stuff!” Baffled, I thanked her and turned to an elder who was doing a miserable job of suppressing laughter. My elder translated, “She was complimenting you by saying your sermon was like the best marijuana.” Ah, the joy of being culturally illiterate! What is our world coming to? A recent British newspaper lamented our lack of biblical

February 6, 2014