Many people in this day and age expect churches to be full service discipleship centers. From the moment a child is signed into Sunday morning childcare until the time they graduate from high school, an expectation of church discipleship exists.
Some parents may never have a meaningful prayer time or discussion of spiritual things with their children, yet still expect fully formed followers of Christ at age 18. Why? Because the children and their student pastor are supposed to be having these discussions. The parents feed the kids and make sure they are educated. The church leaders are responsible for discipleship.
This seems to be a common line of thinking even if unspoken.
To be sure, the Bible does teach believers to help guide one another in walking with God. The process of teaching prayer, Bible study, evangelism, fasting, and other spiritual disciplines to believers is usually called discipleship. The word derives from the word for learner.
Whose responsibility, then, is the discipleship of children? Primarily it is the responsibility of the parents.
Think about that early Jewish Scripture, Deuteronomy 6:7, which reads, “Repeat [these words] to your children. Talk about them when you sit in your house and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up.”
Ephesians 5 makes it clear that parents are to raise their children in the “nurture and teaching of the Lord” (v. 18). Nowhere is this responsibility delegated to any other spiritual leader. This is not to say pastors, elders, or teachers have no role, but the primary responsibility of spiritual guidance in a child’s life belongs to the parents.
