The Long-Term View

God plays the long game. He has plans within plans. He had our salvation planned out before the foundation of the world. As soon as Adam and Eve fell, he began telling us about it. He worked events out over the course of centuries, having Jesus born into a world perfectly shaped so that he would be put to death merely for claiming to be who he is.

We, on the other hand, are terrible at making long-term plans. My weekly meal plan doesn’t even usually survive intact. There’s a place in Mary’s Magnificat that is both a beautiful promise and a warning. It tells us that we need to get better at planning.

After learning that she would give birth to the Christ, Mary visited her relative Elizabeth who welcomed her by immediately recognizing that she carried the Savior. Mary responded,

“My soul glorifies the Lord
   and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
for he has been mindful
   of the humble state of his servant.
From now on all generations will call me blessed,
   for the Mighty One has done great things for me—
   holy is his name.
His mercy extends to those who fear him,
   from generation to generation.” (Luke 1:46-50)

The song continues, but I want to look at that last line. It recalls many passages from the Hebrew scriptures, but the idea first appears in the Ten Commandments, where God said he shows “love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments” (Ex 20:6).

God is pleased for his love to flow from one generation to the next, on and on and on. But only “to those who fear him”. That is the necessary condition for his promise.

I, like many in my country, have a family tradition of faith. As I said before, my father and his father and his father, at least, were believers. But I also know my grandfather didn’t come to Christ until well into adulthood. I am sadly the only one of my father’s four children who seems to be following Jesus. Of my father’s grandchildren, my kids are the only ones likely to continue that tradition.

My children are (some of) my great-grandfather’s “grandchildren’s grandchildren.” But I can’t say they came to faith because we have a strong tradition of discipleship. I was raised in the philosophy of “you take your kids to church every Sunday and let things happen naturally.” After you believed and were baptized, the extent of discipleship was ... continuing to go to church. I cannot recall ever being told of the importance of personal Bible reading, much less Bible study, either at church or at home. Maybe they thought this was obvious; maybe they thought it was unimportant. I don’t know.

I tried to be more intentional about such things than my parents or their parents, but I know I could have done much better. All I can see that I can do to repair that is to gently advise my children on how to do better than I did with their children and hope those children follow what they were taught.

So how do I improve the odds that my grandchildren’s grandchildren hear the gospel and, upon believing, are discipled in the faith? Let’s say they do become believers. What kind of church will they find? Will they find a church that is all about entertainment and “somehow” still struggling to seem relevant? Or will they find a church that trains disciples to train disciples?

They will likely only find the latter if we create it, if we stop what we’ve been doing and do better.

Let’s start worrying less about attracting people and more about what we’re doing with the people we’ve got. Let’s teach people to weather the storms of this world. Let’s build them up in the faith once for all delivered to the saints. And let’s prepare them to do the same.

If we want someone to be able to disciple our grandchildren’s grandchildren, we need to start that pattern now. So let’s create a church that will teach our descendants to follow Jesus.


Image via Pixabay