I was sitting in traffic yesterday afternoon, the radio burbling away and the usual list of things to do flowing in, and out, of my mind when someone read this poem …
When I was a child sat an exam
The test was so simple
There was no way I could fail.
Q1. Describe the taste of the moon.
It tastes like Creation I wrote,
It has the flavour of starlight.
Q2. What colour is love?
Love is the colour of the water
a man lost in the desert finds, I wrote.
Q3. Why do snowflakes melt?
I wrote, they melt because they fall
Onto the warm tongue of God.
There were other questions.
They were as simple.
I described the grief of Adam when he was expelled form Eden.
I wrote down the exact weight of an elephant’s dream.
Yet today, many years later,
For my living I sweep the streets
Or clean out the toilets of the fat hotels.
Why? Because I constantly failed my exams.
Why? Well let me set a test.
Q1. How large is a child’s imagination?
Q2. How shallow is the soul of the Minister for Exams?
I was so glad the traffic was at a standstill because so was I.
This poem stopped me in my tracks reminding me of the hundreds, maybe thousands of children I have encountered over the years since I first stepped in to ‘Sunday School’ leading aged Twelve, that’s if you can call gathering up the children from around the village to hear a bible story and colour a picture ‘Sunday School’.
Engaging children’s imaginations enabling them to enter the Bible, discover for themselves the touching places , and glimpses of God in their lives and the lives of the worshipping community around them, is what I have always longed for from my different ministries.
Sometimes that does mean lying on our backs and watching the clouds, but it also means providing a tool kit which will sustain them; Bible verses and stories, worship songs, a prayer life the things of faith they can lean into at any time and in any situation.
It also means we need to place children at the centre of our worshipping communities, as David Csinos quotes ‘being a Christian involves becoming a Christian’
Encouraging, making space, for children, young people and families to participate in church life doesn’t often look like 10.00 on Sunday morning, it looks like a whole myriad of things, a series of stepping stones which lead them into relationship with Jesus.
I know, I hear you. It is hard work, if there was a perfect formula I would have shared it with you years ago.
Relationship building is slow, building trust can be slower still, but please keep doing it ‘for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these’.
Poem The Minister for Exams by Brian Patten. Dave Csinos quoted in Children’s Ministry That Fits p61.
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