BY BERTIL WIKLANDER

LONG TIME AGO, WHEN GOD'S people had lost all hope in their future, God spoke comforting words to them through the prophet Isaiah. One of the things he said was: "All your children shall be taught by the Lord, and great shall be the peace of your children" (Isa. 54:13, NKJV).

We don't count the children in our official membership statistics, but they are obviously important to us. And they have enormous value in God's eyes.

Isaiah's text raises three questions for us to consider:

1. What do we teach the children?

2. What do we anticipate to be the outcome?

3. How do we teach them in order to achieve the outcome we seek?

Notice what the text says: "All your children shall be taught by the Lord." Notice also that the outcome of His teaching is neither pieces of knowledge nor a certain behavior. The outcome is something much more: great peace.

What do we teach our children?
We tend to answer by outlining the knowledge we wish them to obtain. But are we sure we are giving them God's peace? And if we are not sure, is it because we don't know it ourselves?

How easy it is for parents, teachers, and workers for children to confuse the peace of children with their freedom. Sometimes we are influenced by the school of thought that advocates "free upbringing" and says: Let the children grow up in a natural way, without obedience to external rules and the inhibitions it will create in their minds, and they will automatically become harmonious and have peace. This view applies Freudian psychology to the upbringing of children, possibly with a pinch of liberalism from the French Enlightenment thinker Jean-Jacques Rousseau. It happens to be well suited to a society in which both parents work full-time and have no time to raise their children.

Freedom has often been compared to flying. Human beings have tried to free themselves from the limitation of being created without wings. We have gazed up at the birds and attempted to imitate them in order to fly.

One of the first known attempts to fly was made by an English Benedictine monk by the name of Eilmer of Malmesbury. About 1,000 years ago he fastened wings to his hands and feet and jumped from a tower into the wind. He managed to fly more than 250 yards, but his landing was less successful. Sources from 1120 tell us: "Frightened by the violence of the wind, and the turmoil within the air, and meantime being conscious of the haste with which he did fly, he was hurled to the ground, sorely breaking his legs, and he was thus untimely made lame."

There were many flying men during the Middle Ages. Certainly they had curiosity, vision, and courage. But that was not sufficient to ensure success in their enterprise.

The problem was their limited knowledge. Not until the end of the nineteenth century did humans begin to master the art of gliding or surfing on the winds, and out of that came new knowledge concerning the laws of aerodynamics.

My illustration teaches us something about life. How do we make a success out of life? How can we experience life with a sense of freedom and authenticity? It is not enough to have curiosity, dreams, and courage. It is not enough to be merely gifted, to take an interest, to have imagination, to work hard, or to have creativity and power to act. To succeed, one must be equipped with an adequate knowledge of life, of who I am and why I am here. This also applies to what we teach our children. Ellen G. White wrote: "In a knowledge of God all true knowledge and real development have their source. Wherever we turn, in the physical, the mental, or the spiritual realm; in whatever we behold, apart from the blight of sin, this knowledge is revealed. Whatever line of investigation we pursue, with a sincere purpose to arrive at truth, we are brought in touch with the unseen, mighty Intelligence that is working in and through all. The mind of man is brought into communion with the mind of God, the finite with the infinite. The effect of such communion on body and mind and soul is beyond estimate" (Education, p. 14; italics supplied).

This is an admonition to go for the knowledge that grows from communion with God, bringing our weak minds in touch with the mind of God and incorporating our lives with the ongoing dynamic process of change that is at work in God's sphere of activity. Its goal is our freedom. It enables us to fly--and fills us with peace because we were created for this purpose.

Knowledge of God grants freedom because God stretches the capacity of our minds beyond anything we can think or imagine. He is the totality of things, time, and space; He is eternal and has no limits. And it is impossible to know God without being captured and driven by his Holy Spirit. The apostle Paul said that it is God's Spirit that "searches all things, even the deep things of God" (1 Cor. 2:10, NIV).

Concerning freedom, Jesus said: "If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free" (John 8:31, NIV). Studies of this passage reveal that Jesus is referring to God when he speaks of "truth." Children's lives are formed by their knowledge of God.

Our ultimate objective must be more than giving children a great time, as if our goal was to entertain them. Our goal must be to make disciples of Christ: for them to understand and know God, who sets us free. That will make our children free. It will enable them to fly in the spiritual heavens.

Sometimes what we offer our children in church is a distorted image of God that cripples them rather than makes them free; paralyzes rather than helps them to fly; fills them with anger, guilt, and fear rather than peace.

I can remember my childhood in the church. Devoted and pious men and women taught me how to behave. Uncle Arthur's Bedtime Stories tried to do the same work. To strengthen their argument, they taught me the knowledge of the Great Judge--the God who was always watching me to see if I did anything wrong. We were taught to sing songs that went something like: Be careful, little child, what you do, because our Father up above looks down upon you. The song had several verses, and every verse introduced a part of me about which I had to be careful: eyes, mouth, ears, hands, feet. The meaning of life was to behave well, and God was the Chief of Police.

This kind of teaching built up a pretty strict conscience, but gave me no peace. It enslaved me and deprived me of my freedom and dignity. It reluctantly let me fly, but only with numerous instructions in my head, some of which I did not understand. Because of the fear planted in me--the fear of not being good enough--flying often ended in failure. I was taught that God was the one who made life harder than it was in itself. I didn't always learn to see God as my friend and helper to deal with the challenges of life. I was not taught by the Lord, but by weak human beings who struggled to acquire a legalistically perfect behavior. To them, lifestyle had become more important than life.

The outcome was that I did not experience that the church was a good place for me to be. I was fortunate to have a home where I was loved unconditionally. And God was patient with me. But the church did not always give me what God had promised: great peace.

Teach them to love and trust God; to have a relationship with Him; that He is the Father who is always waiting for them to return, and it doesn't matter if they made themselves unclean by looking after the pigs. No matter what shape they are in, when they return to Him He is the God who waits for them and embraces them. But we cannot teach what we haven't experienced ourselves.

What do we anticipate to be the outcome of our teaching?
The answer is given by the text: an experience of great peace by knowing God. But what is it, really?

Shalom, "peace," is a thoroughly positive biblical word. It means "ease, prosperity, success, intactness, wholeness, well-being, state of health, kindness, salvation." It is fellowship and cooperation between the Creator and the entire creation. But the Bible also teaches that God's peace must continually be defended against destructive forces. Therefore, God is always at work. In an ongoing struggle He seeks to restore His peace in our lives.

We cannot understand this unless we adopt the dynamic view of life that the Bible teaches. Life is a sphere in which God is ultimately in power, wanting to create order out of chaos, peace out of conflicts, harmony out of discord. After the formation of God's world, His creative activity continues. From the moment He no longer maintains the order of creation it will immediately fall down and return to chaos and darkness.

Bearing this dynamic view of creation in mind, every morning becomes a new overwhelming evidence that God still, in His grace, keeps the world in His hand. Yes, even the simple fact that we are able to stand up from our beds and go out to perform our daily duties is an evidence that the Creator wants us to live and perform our tasks. All that is positive flows from the God of life. But nothing is taken for granted. Having daily bread on your table is a source of deep joy and humble gratitude because it is a sign of God's peace that prevails over darkness. Teach children this dynamic view of life, and you will give them tools to live. It will enable them to appreciate God's peace when anything good is coming to them and to struggle against evil and darkness.

Today God's peace is the missing link. Who needs to be reminded of the ongoing human conflicts taking the lives of thousands of people? Or the destruction of the plant and animal worlds? But worst of all today is the threat to our inner, personal lives. Children are deprived of their inner vitality by an increasingly rapid pace of life and a constant bombardment of demands, activities, impressions, news, and entertainment. The instrument of the soul is delicate and loses its ability to understand and accommodate deeper, fundamental life experiences. Our minds have no time to work on impressions and experiences through "afterthoughts" or quiet reflection. Hardly anything of value remains in our memories and personalities. The danger is that our inner life becomes shallow and we lose the capacity to get in touch with God's mind. If this continues, God's peace can neither take root within us, nor can we transfer it to others.

It is an alarming signal that suicides among children are growing all over Europe. In Sweden some years ago two children committed suicide every week. In Denmark, suicide caused 10 percent of all deaths among boys between 10 and 19 years of age. Why? The lack of good relations with their parents, and the lack of clear ethical principles based on the peace of God. Many children feel superfluous, that they are not needed, because they grow up with parents who have no time for them. Many of these children seek consolation in drugs and alcohol. The next step is death.

We must lead our children into a life of service as coworkers with the Creator and to be sustainers of other human beings. Because our children are ours, there is also a danger that we will care only for our own children and not others' children. We become inward-looking and we teach our children to be inward-looking, so the whole church becomes inward-looking.

The most important but forgotten doctrine in the church is that lost people matter to God and therefore to us! How vital it is in our work for children to plant in them a fundamental compassion and love for other people. Think of what they might become in God's mission to a lost world! We are to be instruments for God's peace in the world. We oppose the destructive forces at work around us. This is the true meaning of being a disciple of Jesus. "Love each other as I have loved you."

How do we teach our children the knowledge of God and His peace?
Notice what the text says: "All your children will be taught by the Lord." Someone has to be the Lord to our children--to reveal to them who God is in Jesus Christ. This is done by servants of Jesus, who serve Him and serve our children as Jesus would. Children learn by observing their adult examples.

I have wonderful examples of Christian servants from my childhood. I remember an unmarried middle-aged woman who spent all her time, all her Saturday evenings, all her Sundays, instilling in us children and youth a love for the church. She arranged for us to play games in church and stood there by our side and looked very happy when we enjoyed ourselves. She did everything to make us feel part of the church family. She was a great example of Christian service. No story, no reading, no theory, could take the place of her living example.

The church can never give our children peace unless we help people discover their spiritual gifts for working with the children, train them, and develop them. If you have a gift for what you do, you will share your happiness with others, and the children will experience peace. If you do it as a sacrifice, you will complain, and the children will think it is their fault. Let us make it a high priority to identify and train servants for teaching our children!

Jesus gave us an example of the true spirit of Christian service. He entered the suffering world and carried all human weakness and needs. He identified with sinners, He suffered with them and for them, in order to bring healing to their body and soul. This is how we can let the Lord teach the children great peace.

Our future as a church depends on this work.

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Bertil Wiklander is president of the Trans-European Division of the Seventh-day Adventist Church.