In the first few weeks of school, many parents will mark their calendars, “Curriculum Night.” They will gather in their children’s classrooms on a Tuesday evening to find out what their children will be learning this year. They will sit in their student’s desk, and they will hear about the upcoming math lessons or history tests. But there is more to curriculum than content!
A curriculum of faith is more than memorizing facts, names, or dates. It is learning to listen and to share, to serve and to pray, to love your neighbor and to worship with joy. It is the curriculum of the love of God! It is learning to give thanks, to express lament, to show kindness, and to seek peace. It is loving God in the same way God has loved us as well as loving our neighbor with all that is within us.
As the school year begins, the weekly schedule of the church resumes, which offers many opportunities for study, reflection, and discovery. We gather for the Round Table and Connecting Faith and Family. We reflect on scripture on Thursday evenings. Our children learn in Children’s Choir and Bible Encounter. Our youth gather on Sunday Night and our college students on Tuesday Evenings. It is all a part of the curriculum of faith!
We learn with and from one another! We learn to laugh, mourn, and
discover together. When we open the pages of scripture or reflect on a chapter of a book, God joins us! We are thankful for the curriculum of faith.
One of the primary ways the disciples and others referred to Jesus was as a Teacher. The word disciple means student. We learn as the disciples did—together on the way! We enter this fall looking forward to the journey, as we participate in the curriculum of the love of God.
-Tripp Martin