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So here's my plea to those who proclaim the Word to the newly potty-trained: lead, don't plead; respect their intelligence; feed their imaginations, not their egos; focus on the story they're called into by birth and baptism; give them their first keys to the kingdom by revealing the extraordinary in the ordinary; awaken their curiosity about the world and the one who made it (since curiosity is a form of love). Then maybe, when they go home, they'll head for the garden rather than the video games, and when bedtime comes, they'll want to hear more about Peter leaping out of the boat and walking on the water. They know, after all, perhaps better than we who forget, that anything is possible.

Copyright © 2001 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.

A ready-to-download Bible Study on this article is available at ChristianBibleStudies.com. These unique Bible studies use articles from current issues of Christianity Today to prompt thought-provoking discussions in adult Sunday school classes or small groups.

Previous McEntyre columns for Christianity Today include:

Resisting "Relevancy" | The church suffers when pastors confuse anecdotes with parables. (June 28, 2001)

My House, God's House | Hospitality is not merely good manners but a ministry of healing. (May 9, 2001)

Rx for Moral Fussbudgets | Good guilt entails more than repentance for merely personal sins. (Mar. 19, 2001)

Community, Not Commodity | Let us acknowledge, and even mourn, what we lose when worship meets media. (Jan. 16, 2001)

Nice Is Not the Point | Sometimes love is sharp, hard-edged, confusing, and seemingly unfair. (Nov. 29, 2000)

The Fullness of Time | I'd like life to be a series of pauses like a poem, rather than a fast-paced, page-turner airport novel. (Oct. 12, 2000)

'I've Been Through Things' | Meditating on "Honor your father and your mother." (Sept. 6, 2000)

Silence Is to Dwell In | An hour of quiet is a rare gift, hard to come by in an ordinary week, even for those who seek it. (Aug. 10, 2000)

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August 6 2001, Vol. 45, No. 10