| Along with Susan Hunt's Big Truths for Little Kids, this is my favorite book lately to give to parents whose kids have just been baptized. The illustrations and packaging are attractive and inviting,and the teaching is solid. My 4 yera old loves it. It really shows the meaning and value behind the church calendar and symbols, in a lucid manner. It seems to me that while Catholics overemphasize these things (and sometimes are tempted to confuse the symbols with the reality itself), 21st century Evangelicals have overcorrected -- throwing the calendar and symbols and ritual out all together. Its like the Catholics seem to confuse the sign with the destination, and we contemporary evangelicals (more Anabaptist now than Reformational) throw away the sign all together making it harder to get to the destination. Boling's work is a loving labor of 'sign-building!' C.S. Lewis said that the danger for Catholics at their worst is to become like every other religion (superstituous folk religion; syncretism), but the danger for Protestants at our worst is to become like no religion at all! Contemporary evangelcialism -- throwing away or relegating the sacraments to meer memorials, building chucrhes without symbols or even crosses, stripping away all of the church calendar except Christmas and Easter (rescued there, only by Hallmark!), dispensing with all vetsments and mystery in worship -- is becoming Lewis' nightmare. And utterly rootless to boot. And I think of Bunyan's allegory of there being 5 gates into Man-Soul: Eye-Gate, Ear-Gate, Nose-Gate, Mouth-Gate, Touch-Gate. We evangelicals (liek Bunyan's Puritans) often close every gate except Ear-Gate in worship. In good Reformational fashion, eveanglecila Presbyterian Boling tries to open up Eye-Gate for us, with a rich, beautifully illustrated glossary of Christian symbols in the back. Anyway, my [children]loves the book, and now can tell us why Lent reminds us to repent, why Advent gets us ready for Christmas, and that when he sees the Alpha Omega it means God is with us from the beginning end. |
| When my first grade daughter began to express real/serious interest in taking communion, I knew I had to get on the stick and think about what to do. (In the Presbyterian church baptised children may take communion.) My thinking was I was OK with her taking communion, if she could convince me that she understood that it was not a "snack" and really understood at least the idea tbat communion is a rememberance of Jesus. I started looking about for books to assist me (and her) in talking about the subject. This book is really oriented to assisting kids in understanding a typical Presbyterian (traditional)Sunday service. Each page or two explains a different element of worhsip, for example the creed, Lord's Prayer, Gloria, hymns and sermon. The sacraments of baptism and communion are covered in the same brief fashion. The illustrations are apppealing and the explanations of each part of a typical worhship service were simple and engaging. The language is right for reading to a 1st grader. Some second or third graders could probably read it (mostly)unaided. I see this as a very good book for parents to use with their kids in talking about the different parts of worship and their meaning. The brief discussion of communion was very helpful in talking with my daughter. This book is focused on "traditional" worship styles. Families who attend "contemporary" services might not find it as useful. While the book is written by a Presbyterian author as an aid to Presbyterian families, I suspect that members of other protestant churches would also find it useful. I can highly recommend this book to parents of young school age children. |
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