We’ve been encouraged over the past year by the passionate commitment of teachers and parents to building the faith of the next generations.
One of our Truth78 partners, who leads the ministry to children in her church, told us about three of her teachers who have served in the midst of significant adversity. She spoke of one who persisted in teaching Faithful to All His Promises before and after a heart transplant. Another, a busy mom raising four young children by herself while her husband was deployed overseas, faithfully and sacrificially gave herself to teaching A Sure Foundation. The third was a young dad awaiting a kidney transplant, who rushed to church every Sunday after dialysis treatment to share with children the glory of God’s attributes from The ABCs of God. These, she said, were among a significant number of other suffering saints laboring together to faithfully share the whole counsel of God to the next generation.
Few things encourage us more than hearing of such remarkable zeal for sharing the truth of God’s Word in homes and Sunday schools across the country, and in a growing number of countries around the world. Even though we have never met most of these faithful servants in person, we enjoy a precious kinship with them as true partners because:
Truth78 is zealous for the discipleship of the next generations.
These 10 words represent our recent effort to capture the essence of Truth78’s mission in a brief and memorable phrase. There are multiple convictions driving this zeal, which we plan to fully explain in a new resource coming next spring. In the meantime, I want to offer you this snapshot:
Truth78 is zealous because God is zealous for the discipleship of the next generations. We take our name from Psalm 78:1-8, where the psalmist reminds us that the Lord revealed Himself, His ways, and His deeds to His people. Then He commanded them to teach (“disciple”) their children “that the next generation might know them, the children yet unborn, and arise and tell them to their children, so that they should set their hope in God and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments.” Throughout Scripture, we see God’s zeal for passing His truth on to the next generations with clear instructions and commands to His people. Our zeal is rooted in God’s zeal, and our desire is to obey Him.
Truth78 is zealous for young people to be well-prepared for a world that is becoming increasingly hostile to the truth of God’s Word. This should not surprise us. Jesus warns His disciples in Luke 21:17, “You will be hated by all for my name's sake,” and in verse 16 He promises, “some of you they will put to death.” In John 15:19, Jesus explains why: “If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.” Almost to His last breath, Jesus was thoughtfully and purposefully preparing His disciples for a world that would hate them. Our zeal for the discipleship of the next generations grows out of an earnest desire for children who face, or will face, these challenges to be just as thoughtfully and purposefully prepared.
Truth78 is zealous because of our passion for young people to continue walking in the truth after they leave home. We are concerned by an increasing trend over the past two decades of children growing up with Christian parents and actively participating in the church while young, but then no longer attending church when they are older. And worse, many of these young people forsake the Christian faith altogether. We have also observed a decline in biblical literacy among children in Christian families, who leave home with a deficient knowledge and understanding of the truth that can sustain them.
All too often we hear of a son, daughter, loved one, or someone else who has turned from the faith of their fathers and mothers, thus abandoning the truth that brings light out of darkness and life from everlasting death. Churches often lack sufficient resources to instruct their children in that truth so they have a firm and biblical place to stand, and so that they will be able to “make a defense to anyone who asks [them] for a reason for the hope that is in [them]” (1 Peter 3:15) and “set their hope in God” (Psalm 78:7). Our zeal is driven by a desire to support the Church with resources for the faithful discipleship of the next generations.
Truth78 is zealous because of the everlasting impact that a thoughtful, intentional, systematic, and comprehensive plan for discipleship can have on the next generations. Data from a 2018/2019 Pew Research study shows the rapid secularization and “reshaping of America religiously” that is happening “right before our eyes.” Commenting on this study in a recent podcast, Dr. Albert Mohler of Southern Seminary concluded, “Our responsibility, regardless of the survey data, is to teach and preach and tell and take the saving gospel of Jesus Christ. This new report…should make us even more determined to be faithful in our evangelism, starting right at home.” Indeed, Truth78 is more determined than ever to do all we can to encourage, inspire, support, and resource the Church and Christian parents locally and internationally to teach the whole counsel of God.
Those who have been shown the “path of life” and then walk on that path are free to experience the “fullness of joy” in God’s presence and eternal pleasure at His right hand (Psalm 16:11). The desire of our hearts is that the next generations will flourish in faith, so that we who labor for their faith in our homes and churches will be able to say with the Apostle John that we have “no greater joy than to hear that [our] children are walking in the truth” (3 John 1:4). The aim of zeal is joy—our joy and the joy of the next generations—in the eternal glory of God through Jesus Christ.
I hope this message resonates with you, and that zeal is indeed stirring in your heart as you read how God is at work in the ministry of Truth78. I'm sincerely thankful to those of you who have joined us in this mission and brought such encouragement to our team. For those of you who are new to this partnership opportunity, I pray you will consider the abilities and resources that God has given you and how you might invest them alongside us in this effort to zealously pursue the discipleship of the next generations.
Would you support Truth78 in declaring the glorious deeds of the Lord to the next generation?
Truth78 is a vision-oriented ministry for the next generations—that they may know, honor, and treasure God, setting their hope in Christ alone, so that they will live as faithful disciples for the glory of God.
Your support helps Truth78 share this vision for the next generation with pastors, parents, and other influencers and then provide the resources and training to faithfully pursue that vision. Additionally, your support makes it possible to provide children with God-centered resources in their own language and equip churches, schools, and families of limited means.
See ways to give here.
