Confirmation

A vital confirmation service begins long before that Sunday in late spring.
Paul Anderson

Confirmation class has been defined as “that time of the week when the pastor questions his call to ministry.”

I remember my father, a pastor, grumbling that “these kids want to attend catechism class about as much as they want to sit in school.” I never appreciated my father’s feelings until I became a pastor and, sitting in the middle of a confirmation classroom, began to consider seriously my aptitude for selling insurance. Not that the time was a complete loss. I learned a great deal — that the epistles are the wives of the apostles, for example, or that Martin Luther King is Martin Luther’s brother.

Frustrations like these led folks at Trinity Lutheran to retool our entire confirmation process, from the first parents’ orientation meeting to the close of the confirmation service. After overseeing the new program for twelve years, I’m still amazed how a few key principles transform what could be a downer into a delight.

Get ’em Early

We’re all agreed that a vital confirmation experience begins long before that Sunday in late spring when the nervous confirmands stand before the congregation. That’s why we start early with years of classroom instruction. But at Trinity we found we weren’t starting early enough.

Most teenagers are convinced that confirmation is a bad idea. The only way a pastor has half a chance is to reach kids before they become teenagers and hear from their peers, “Aw, confirmation is a bummer.”

So we go after kids in the fourth grade. The children proceed through three years of instruction during fourth, fifth, and sixth grades and then have a year of transition and service in their seventh-grade year, with confirmation that spring.

Too early? You should see how eager these fourth graders are. They tug on your arm in August and announce, “I get to start confirmation this year.” For them confirmation means honor, not boredom.

Last fall my son Andrew started the confirmation process. Andrew and I went to the orientation meeting and sat with the other fourth graders and parents. The lay people who led our program passed out the workbooks the youngsters would be using during the year and walked them through a few sample assignments. As I already knew, a good degree of each lesson was mechanical: underlining key statements in the biblical text, marking symbols to show contrasts, identifying the passage’s main idea. My son looked it all over, then blurted out, “Hey, this is going to be fun!”

Fourth graders’ hearts are usually still tender toward the gospel. They have had fewer years of indoctrination in a worldly system of thought that resists spiritual penetration. They are less influenced by peers, who in a few years might try telling them that religion is nowhere. And they are equipped to handle the spiritual concepts we teach. We’ve found we tend to underestimate their abilities rather than overestimate them. They are more ready to grapple with truth then we are to challenge them with it.

Beyond Teaching to Training

While teaching informs, training forms. Our best teaching means little if we don’t train children to live what they learn. We want them to not only know Bible truths but to live Bible lives. So we spend as much time on application as we do on information.

In one unit, the students wrote a play on the miracles of Jesus and then presented it in a convalescent home. For a lesson on prejudice, students interviewed the local newspaper editor about where prejudice is at work in our community and asked our church president about prejudice in our church. Following a lesson on service, classes have washed windows for church members and sometimes have cleaned my office.

Training also means we establish a relationship with students. At Trinity, students and teachers meet for dinner before class. Talking about the lesson during dinner is off-limits. We talk about what went on in school, skateboarding, fun times they’ve had lately.

Having said that, however, we know we can’t violate sound educational principles and hope to succeed. Our confirmation teachers go through a four-session course to refine teaching skills. We try to pair each beginning teacher with a seasoned one. This gives the less-experienced person a valuable apprenticeship, lightens the workload of each person, and keeps the class going even when one teacher can’t make it. With two teachers in the classroom, we’ve had fewer problems keeping classes quiet and orderly.

In the classroom, teachers use lecture sparingly and try to incorporate drama, games, word exercises, songs, and other more innovative approaches. In one unit, for example, a student put the life of Abraham into a rhyming story. For a lesson on heaven, a class threw a “Heavenly Festival,” including a time of worship and angel food cake for refreshments. Our goal is not to entertain, but what we teach is so important that we want to teach it as winsomely as we can.

Keep Them Involved

We, like many churches, have struggled with how to integrate students into the youth group and the life of the church following their years of instruction. Some families have inherited the understanding that the confirmation service ends the child’s obligation to the church.

Because we don’t want to usher children out of the church with confirmation, we inserted a year of transition and service after the children complete their studies and before they are confirmed. During this year we encourage the kids to be involved regularly in worship and youth group activities, and we try to involve them in service. We’ve had these young people baby-sit for new members’ classes, clean the building, and set up tables and movie projectors for church events.

We want confirmation to serve as the launching pad for service in the congregation. Before last spring’s confirmation service, one young man told me he couldn’t wait for confirmation because he wanted to be doing more in the congregation.

But to be honest, we have yet to structure a truly effective program for this transition year. We’re convinced the idea is a good one; we just need more stick-to-itiveness to make it work fully.

Work with the Parents

Martin Luther wrote the Small Catechism to help parents teach their children the key points of Christian doctrine. We do not want to supercede parents in this primary role, but assist them.

At the orientation meeting, we ask parents to work with their children on the lessons, which come on both Wednesday nights and during Sunday school. Some families have chosen to use the lessons for their family devotions. The program is rigorous, and parents usually breathe a deep sigh of relief when the three years are over, but they feel good being part of a job well done. One couple, whose three young-adult boys still talk about their confirmation experience, smiled as they told me, “We huffed and puffed our way through catechism.”

Parents have also been drawn into the interview process preceding the formal confirmation service. Until a few years ago, the pastor was the only one to interview the student to determine whether he or she was ready to be confirmed. But who knows the child better than his or her parents?

Once I interviewed a young person prior to confirmation and afterward told him I had some concerns about his readiness. Later his parents, who had another son in the program, came to see me. “If you had said this about our other son,” they said, “we would agree. But we know our boys, and this one is more ready than the other. He’s quiet and not as articulate, but he has a genuine faith.”

So now parents interview their children first and then give me a brief written report that I may use as material in my own interview with the child the following month. I write a letter to the parents and suggest questions they may want to use in their personal conference with the child. The questions range widely but focus on the child’s growing commitment to Christ. For example, one question I often suggest is, “When have you felt closest to God?”

Many parents have told me this conversation is one of the most meaningful they’ve had with their children. They also tell me it’s not easy. One strong supporter of our program admitted, “That was hard work.”

Finally, parents are involved in the confirmation service itself. I invite them to come forward and participate in the prayers that accompany the laying on of hands. Then the parents and confirmands form the first table for Communion.

Add the Personal Touch

The day before Confirmation Sunday, I meet with the parents and the children. I have two goals for this time. I want to prepare them to feel as comfortable as possible during the service and understand what’s happening. I also want this time to add a personal touch, to seal my pastoral contact with them.

I usually review “Why confirmation?” and explain this is not an end but a beginning, parallel to Jesus beginning his ministry after his confirmation at the Jordan. I explain what the youth are confirming — their faith in Jesus Christ, that they will live in the covenant of their baptism. I encourage them to expect that the Holy Spirit will do some confirming as well. As we pray in the service, “Father in heaven, for Jesus’ sake, stir up in your child the gift of your Holy Spirit; confirm his faith, guide his life, empower him in his serving, give him patience in suffering, and bring him to everlasting life.”

Then I walk the children and parents through the service so they know what’s coming. Afterward, I invite all the kids to my house for lunch. I take time to talk with each one. During my conversation, I refresh my memory about their interests, hobbies, family situations. The next day, when the confirmands come forward during the service, I use this information to introduce each one personally: “This is Ryan Hoffman. Ryan really enjoys skateboarding. Ryan feels God may be calling him to be a missionary. Let’s pray for him in that regard.” Then I have each child share a portion of Scripture that has been especially meaningful to him or her. This also allows the congregation to get to know the young person better.

Another personal touch comes when we invite the parents forward to join in the prayers that accompany the laying on of hands. It’s so moving to hear parents pray for their children. Sometimes parents will say a few words to their son or daughter during this time. I recall one father saying to his daughter, “You have been such a fine, obedient girl. We really love you and believe God has a special plan for you.” Last year one child’s grandmother came forward to pray for her grandson. We were all deeply touched by her prayer.

I’ve found that these personal touches in the prayers, Scriptures, and prophetic words are what people remember most.

Weighing the Trade-offs

Our approach to confirmation has come with a price. For this church, building a strong confirmation program meant gathering a crew of adults to be teachers, cooks for the weekly supper, administrators, table hostesses, and so on. The price was the loss of our strong choir. When we began our new program, the choir dropped out of existence. We’ve had choirs since, but not with the same level of involvement.

We had to weigh the trade-offs. We feel the gains in our situation outweigh the losses. The team-teaching approach means we have trained dozens of teachers in the process of training our youth. The biblical literacy of our congregation has risen considerably. Relationships between young people and adults remain vital. In fact, young people tell me their favorite activity is our annual family retreat.

The students have more confidence reading the Scriptures; they are not intimidated by obscure minor prophets. They have discovered the Bible speaks to their lives and helps them live more wisely. And they have built long-lasting friendships with the other children in the program.

Confirmation may cause some of us to question our calling, but with the right approach, I’ve found it actually confirms mine.