#2 - What makes us spiritually smart?

#2. Just knowing a lot of facts doesn’t mean you’re smart.

This is the second in a series of posts discussing some educational ideas that we know are true but we gloss over them when we teach kids, specifically in light of Children’s Ministry in the church. This one hit home to me pretty hard. I grew up in a Christian home and I was the typical know-it-all. Whether at church or at school, I had a knack for trivia. I used any test or quiz as an opportunity to show off. At church, my friend and I were always competing against each other. We could name the 12 disciples, 12 tribes, 10 commandments, Books of the Bible and regurgitate most every Bible Story including the minor details.

Throughout grade school and Junior High (what we called Middle School), I lived in this realm of collecting trivia. When I got to High school, the Bible studies that we did in the youth group changed. They were not about the stories as much as about life lessons. For example, more time was spent in the epistles than the stories in the Gospels. Eventually, it dawned on me that trivia is not the end goal of Christianity. By that time, it was clear that others got that sooner than I and they were much further along in their spiritual walk than I was. I was finding myself being confused by the questions that were asked where they were providing insight with their answers. I had missed a large piece of the puzzle.

Why did I miss it? There are a couple reasons that I think translate to kids today. First, it was easier. Facts and tidbits of information were easy for me to remember. The analytical side of me took over and convinced me that this was most important. It was easy to see if I was right or not; it was objective and that appealed to my logical side. Second, I was good at it. As a junior higher, I was trying to fit in and I found something I was good at. My value came from being the “smartest person” in the room. Boy, did I have my treasure in an empty pursuit there.

The referenced article states that learning too many facts and focusing on the detail too much can actually hurt the student when it comes to using thinking skills. I fully agree. When the High School Bible Studies asked thinking questions, I was too busy trying to find “the correct answer”. Instead, it was enough to just start thinking about the subject.

So what does this mean to our ministries? Similar to the previous post, we need to make sure we are teaching the “why” behind the stories and verses and not just the “what”. We need to tie the lessons to the real life of our audience. One tool I have found very helpful is to ask them what they are struggling with. If we are dealing with temptation, throw it out to them and see what they say. I have been surprised many times with how deep and honest they can be with their answers.

Secondly, we need to be aware of what we value and reward. Bible drills are good and review questions are important. However, are we rewarding those behaviors more than thinking skills and applying the lesson to their lives? Of course we are because the objective is much easier to quantify than the subjective. The problem is that the subjective thinking areas are the ones we need to make sure the kids spend some time processing. I am not opposed to rewards but we need to make sure we are teaching the important lessons.

As in every discipline, just having the knowledge is not enough. In music, knowing theory is good but putting it to work when performing is better. A doctor can know what is wrong with a patient but a good doctor takes the next step and knows how to treat the problem. The same is true in the Christian walk. We need to make sure we are teaching how to use the lessons we learn in the Bible in our day to day lives (James 1:23-25).