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iQuestions Faculty, Dr. Tim Kimmel 
 
 
Question: 
 
We raised our kids in church and sent them to a Christian school. Now 
that they're teenagers they want nothing to do with Christianity. What 
should we do? 
 
Answer: 
 
There’s an easy trap, when it comes to Christian parenting, to fall into. 
And that is to think that if we create an environment that exposes our 
kids to church, and we read the Bible, and we put them in a Christian 
school, and we have what we call a Christian home, that they are just 
going to embrace all this stuff, and they are going to go on into life 
and go through their teenage years just fine. 
 
Well, we have got to be careful that we don’t misunderstand what it 
takes to really build a heart for God into children. Because, it’s not so 
much what you put in their head, it’s what ends up in their heart that 
makes a difference. 
 
And I’ve noticed that there are three tragic problems with kids that are 
brought up in Christian homes. And I want to list them, but before I 
do, I want to qualify something. I’m not saying you don’t want to raise 
your kids in a Christian environment. That’s the best environment they 
could be in. But understand that there are some tradeoffs, and if we’re 
not careful, and we don’t know what we’re doing, and we’re not savvy 
on this, we could find our kids falling away from God. 
 
One thing I’ve observed is that many kids brought up in Christian 
homes oftentimes don’t think that God is as real as He is. And that’s 
because God has been part of the climate of their home for so long 
 
 
that He’s kind of like a cliché, He’s taken for granted. It’s like the 
wallpaper that surrounds us in our bathroom. You know, most people 
could not just draw out the wallpaper that was in the bathroom as a 
kid, and they saw it every day. So, they don’t think that God is as real 
as He is.  
 
Secondly, they don’t think that sin is as bad as it is. That’s because we 
worked overtime to make sure that they are not exposed to a lot of 
sin, and so it can be almost like wet paint for them. They are either 
naïve about it and they are easily drawn in to it, or they are enticed by 
it. 
 
So, they don’t think that God is as real as He is. They don’t think that 
sin is as bad as it is, and the third thing is, they don’t think. 
 
See, one of the problems of being raised in a Christian home is that we 
parents have a bad habit of doing all the thinking for the kids. We give 
them the answers to the questions they haven’t even had to wrestle 
with. 
 
And that’s why, when I think of raising kids, there are two things that I 
think really help move the environment of a Christian life from the 
head to the heart.  
 
And the first thing is, you raise your kids in a way that they are 
exposed to a lost world. Now, I’m not saying to throw them to the 
wolves, but if you raise them in a cordon off, hermetically sealed 
spiritual environment, that’s a great way for them to find out that sin 
isn’t as bad as it is, or that God isn’t as real as He is.  
 
So, you want to let them see you live on the battlefield, and as they 
get older, let them move into the battlefield themselves, and stand for 
God where they have to appropriate their faith. 
 
 
 
But there is a second thing, and that is, you need to get your kids 
serving others. You need to get them serving others, right out of the 
box. Because a lot of kids live in a Christian environment, but they 
never get squeezed. They never have to take any of this stuff and do 
anything with it.  
 
You put your kids out there in the frontlines, and then you get them 
serving others, when they are focused upwards and outwards from day 
one, you know what? Your kids are going to be fine. They are going to 
stick with it, because it’s going to be down in their heart. It’s going to 
be theirs. 
 
 
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