The principle of "revealing Santa Clause."

When I was an intern in youth ministry, I was working with a group of middle school students and teaching on the idea of grace. I had started with this brilliant (or so I thought) illustration about Santa Clause. I basically said that we give Santa Clause alot of grace. I mean, we let him come into our house, eat our cookies, track on our carpet and then he leaves. Sometimes he leaves the right gifts and other times he does not...but we give him grace.

I then said something that I regret saying but learned a principle for student ministry for years to come. I said, "You all know Santa Clause is a myth right?" Ugh. Wrong thing to say. You don't say things that kids are taught from an early age to believe without their parents telling them first. It really just illustrated to me this idea that parents really need to be the primary spiritual providers of their children in a lot of different ways. Parents need to be involved in telling their kids about sensitive issues. I learned this principle the hard way. One of the boys in the front broke down and started crying.. "WHAT?!!!" He asked...

For those of you who want to know the answer...Santa Clause may or may not be real...but the principle is true. Parents need to be the primary spiritual provider of their student. THat much I know. :)

By the way, God has given me the tremendous privilege of partnering with parents to disciple kids. How cool.

pc.