Thursday, October 22, 2015

Goin' to Sunday School

I stood on the sidewalk looking down the street at the old red pickup backing out of the driveway that Sunday morning. I knew they were going to Sunday School. I was about five years old and I wasn’t going to get to go.

After having gone to country churches since they were teenagers my mother and daddy weren’t accustomed to the big town church. I remember slowly walking back into the house with my head down and tears running down my cheeks. Mother didn’t have to ask what was wrong because this wasn’t the first Sunday morning I had looked longingly at my friend driving away with her parents headed to the big, red brick First Baptist Church down the street from the post office.

A few weeks later after my Saturday night bath in the big galvanized washtub, Mother told me we were going to Sunday School the next morning at the same big, red brick church down the street from the post office where my friend went. I was so excited I hardly slept that night. My friend had told me what they did in Sunday School and I could hardly wait to see it for myself. I loved the flannel board lady who told a bible story using paper figures. I loved the little, folded paper booklet we were given as we left the room. It had a picture of Jesus and a little lamb on the front and a bible story in the middle when it was opened.

It wasn’t long before my mother and daddy were singing in the choir and I was setting with my friend while they sang. I loved listening to them and watching the piano player plunk out the songs that eventually became familiar. And, I loved that when we left the preacher always shook my hand and told me to come back.

A few years later, I was saved and then baptized in that big, red brick church’s baptistery. And, a several years after that, I was married in that big, red brick church down the street from the post office. Both of our daughters were saved and then baptized and married in that big, red brick church down the street from the post office.

Parents, listen to your children when they ask to go to church. Go to church with them. It will make all the difference in the world in their lives and in your life.

Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.” Matthew 9:14 NIV

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