ily worship, mothers help with catechizing, and older siblings help to teach younger ones. The recently approved Directory of Private and Family Worship gives helpful direction for this. Your session may also provide other opportunities for you to be involved as a layperson in teaching and discipleship in the local church. For example, teaching Sunday school or catechism and being active in Bible studies and small groups. Such gatherings give occasion to talk, discuss, learn, and practice the language of the gospel. At Covenanters, we have recently begun a Sunday school program, and it has been a joy to see those taking on the task of teachers. They know the importance of such education and are stepping up. Outside of formal contexts, education means taking an active interest in the lives of young believers, both in age and maturity, to help them understand and apply biblical teaching. In Titus 2, Paul gives instructions for how a matur- ing church ought to function with more mature believers getting involved in “teaching what is good” (one Greek word in v.3) to those who are younger. This is not just the work of your elders, though it must always be done with defer- ence to them.


Of course, to be able to educate anyone, you must be knowledgeable of gos-


pel truth. In Deuteronomy 5, the Ten Commandments were retaught to the Isra- elites as they were on the cusp of entering the Promised Land. After reminding them of these foundational words of God’s covenant relationship with them, Moses instructed in Deuteronomy 6:6-9, “These words which I command you today shall be in your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.” They needed to know the language of salvation and faith in their hearts to pass it down to the next generation. Teaching a recent communicant membership class, I was reminded again of how unfamiliar some of the theological languages we use can be, even for long- time members in faithful but non-presbyterian churches. What is a covenant? What is a non-communicant member, and what does it mean for them to “own their baptism”?


The biblical and historical language of the faith is important, but we must ed- ucate in the church with helpful, simple explanations. Language doesn’t need to be reinvented or dumbed down, but does need consistent and persistent ex- plaining. For a great help in this, we can use the “pattern of sound words” (2 Tim 1:13), which have been given to us in the Westminster Standards, where  education whether they are used in the pulpit, taught to your family through catechism and family worship, or meditated upon in your private devotions. - cated, you will be better missionaries, repeating this cycle of advancing the gos- pel. In it all, God is at work. For “neither he who plants is anything, nor he who waters, but God who gives the increase” (1 Cor 3:7). Thanks be to God, who gives the increase and is pleased to use us along the way!


Martin Dendekker is Pastor of Covenanters ARP Church, Cambridge, Nova Scotia, Canada, and 2021-2022 Moderator of the Canadian Presbytery.


July/August 2022


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