This book is about the crucially important role of parents in raising godly children with a view to multigenerational faithfulness. Voddie Baucham (quoting a 2001 study from the Southern Baptist Convention Executive Committee) notes that “between 70 and 88 percent of Christian teens are leaving the church by their second year in college.” This immediately grabbed my attention because a similar trend was reported 15 years ago when I was in high school. If it was happening back then, I imagine the ascendancy of post-modernism has only increased this disturbing trend. For example, George Barna noted in 2003 that 85% of “born again teens” do not believe in the existence of absolute truth.
In the opening chapter, Baucham asks: “What if our sons and daughters are merely going through the motions as they walk through life as goats among the sheep or tares among the wheat?” What a frightful thought! Yet in spite of this possibility, Baucham laments that “most pastoral search committees never even bother to meet a man’s wife and children, let alone observe him at home or question those close enough to know how he teaches the Word to his family, leads them in family worship, disciplines, instructs, and encourages his children or wife.”
Eighteen years ago, having barely turned twenty, Voddie married his wife Bridget. The two share unideal family backgrounds: over the past two generations on both sides of their family, there have been twenty-five marriages and twenty-two divorces (their marriage being one of the three that has not ended in divorce). Voddie explains that he and Bridget have three commitments: First, staying together and thriving as a couple. Second, investing in their children with a view to multigenerational faithfulness. And third, doing whatever they can to reproduce the first two commitments in the lives of others.
As a young father, I am eager to be equipped by Pastor Baucham to raise children into young adults with an internalized Christian worldview that promotes multigenerational faithfulness — an uphill battle, given our post-Christian, anti-family society. Having read the first chapter, I know this book will be a must-read for me this summer.
The blurbs:
“Voddie Baucham has written an insightful and convicting book challenging parents to prioritize the spiritual development of their children. Only read this book if the salvation and sanctification of your children is of the utmost importance to you.”
–Tony Evans
Pastor, Oak Cliff Bible Fellowship (Dallas, TX)
“Every Christian parent ought to read Family Driven Faith. I’ve never encountered a book on family life that compressed so much biblical teaching, provocative thinking, sound theology, and practical help into one volume.”
–Don Whitney
Professor of Spiritual Formation, Southern Baptist Theological Seminary (Louisville, KY)
“Sending young people out into the world without a biblical worldview is like sending an athlete onto the field without a playbook, says Voddie Baucham. Yet few Christian parents even hold a biblical worldview to pass along to their children. Family Driven Faith gives parents winning principles to disciple children who will grow into spiritually mature adults capable of influencing all spheres of society.”
–Nancy R. Pearcey, Author of Total Truth
Update: I posted a lengthy review for a similar book, reThink – Decide for Yourself: Is Student Ministry Working?
