Obadiah and the Dragons

And welcome back to Clear Class. I'm your host, Tim Dukeman, here with Pastor Dave, our producer, Martin, and Timothy Deaton. And so, last time we talked about some of the pitfalls that churches fall into with how it relates, how we do membership, church membership for children. And so, today we want to talk about how to actually do it correctly and what our view of what biblical teaching is. To start out, Pastor Dave, what's the first step for a child at Clear Note to become, move towards membership? Well, so our church is unique. If you attend our church or you've been around for a while listening, you know that we allow freedom of conscience to parents on the timing and mode of baptism, meaning that we have, not just in our congregation, but in our leadership.

both paedo-baptists and credo-baptists. So, we have kids who are baptized as infants and then ones who aren't. And what that means is that when children come into membership, as we're talking about it today, what we're really talking about is when they're allowed to take the Lord's Supper. What has to be true for them to be able to take the Lord's Supper? And whether the child is baptized as an infant or not, they're not allowed to take the Lord's Supper. When we practice the When we observe the Lord's Supper at church, one of the things that I say after I fence the table is that if you have children who have not yet been admitted to the Lord's table, bring them forward with you. And after you partake, we've got elders and deacons on either side of the sanctuary who would love to pray with you and for your children. And so that's what the children who are not yet communicant, what we do with them during the Lord's Supper. But how does a kid...

come into membership, full membership, communicant membership of the church. Well, whether they've been baptized or not, really the first thing that happens is that they express some interest in membership, typically to their parents, sometimes to a Sunday school teacher, or to someone else, a small group or whatever. But they say, well, I believe in Jesus, or I want to take communion, or why can't I take communion? what do I have to do to get baptized? Or I want to be baptized. And it's often, you know, after there's a baptism, it's not uncommon for there to be a question like that because they've seen something that you don't see every week at church. And then I talk to their parents and we do our best to help parents understand how to answer that question and work through it with them. Sort of the unwritten rule is that we want the first assessment or judgment or is with the parents. Do the parents think that this is a good idea or not? If your four-year-old comes and says, I want to get baptized because they went up and played in the baptismal pool after the last baptism. I'm like, well, I want to do that. There's probably more of a conversation of what baptism is and what's required and that type of thing. Sometimes you say, well, you already are baptized, honey.

because they were baptized as a baby, or they weren't. You say, yeah, this four-year-old's not going to, they're not going to be able to articulate their faith. They have no idea what actually is going on, the substance of what's going on in here just looked fun or cool or whatever. But the kid comes to their parents and they say, I want to take communion or I want to be baptized and take communion. And what ultimately that's, if that's to, If we're to pursue that, it's going to – what we're looking at or looking for is a profession of faith. Meaning what does – and we'll talk a little bit more about that here in a little bit. But what does the – what is this child's understanding and experience of the gospel? One, do they understand it? And two, do they believe it for themselves? Historically, faith – we're looking for faith. And historically, faith has had three attributes or three aspects.

Knowledge, assent, and trust. Knowledge is, do you know the facts of the gospel? Do you know who Jesus is? Do you know who God is? Do you know that you're a sinner? Do you know that you need salvation? Do you know these basic knowledge points? They're just things you can teach kids through catechisms, through Sunday schools, through family worship. You teach kids the knowledge. They have it. Assent is, do you believe that these things are true? And those two things alone are both objective, because they can say, yes, I do believe those things are true. If you say, do you believe that Jesus rose from the dead on the third day? They can either say, yes, I believe that's true, or, no, I don't know about that. The third thing, so both those two things are subjective. They're just yes or no. We can test for them. The third thing is assent. And assent is a subjective judgment, meaning… And do the parents or do the interviewers have some confidence that the child's hope is in those things? It's one thing to know the facts about Jesus, and another thing to say, I believe those things are true. And the third thing is to say, and I'm entrusting my soul into those things being true, that my hope of salvation is over there.

That's the third aspect of faith. And so what you're looking for in a child is, do they have faith? And the thing you're really trying to sort out is, is there hope in Jesus? Or do they just know facts about him? So it seems that there is some hope that the child has. And that hope would be commensurate with their age. An 8-year-old, a 12-year-old is going to have a different experience of... that hope and their own need of salvation. It's going to be really different than a 25-year-old, like an adult, or a 40-year-old. They're young. They're mature. We're not looking for an 8-year-old to be able to express their knowledge and understanding of the Westminster Confession of Faith. But we are trying to figure out, do you know if you're a sinner, and do you know you need Jesus, and do you know what to do with it, with why Jesus had to come? Anyway, if a child seems to have those things going on,

Then at our church, they would go through a quarter-long, either 12- or 13-week-long membership class with other children. Not adults, just children. And that's taught during the Sunday school hour. So there would be a dozen 45-minute lessons where we work through a short catechism that's 22. I believe it's 21 or 22 questions that we use. And that catechism... is based on and was translated from the catechism that Calvin used with the children in his church. And so it wasn't French, obviously, now it's in English, but it's really basic. It's who God is, who you are, why you need salvation, what is the church, and your part in it. Those are basically the three heads, four heads that the catechism covers. It's not the Westminster Shorter catechism that's 200 questions and all this stuff. We like those things. Those things are helpful. We might teach those things in other Sunday school classes. But when it comes to membership, a lot of the broader theological content is set aside and we're saying, we need to train you and talk to you about who God is and who you are and why you need to be saved and what the church is. So, the kids will go through that class. It's taught by one of our elders, largely. Like I said, it's a three-month long class. They go through that. And then at the end of it, if they've done well in the class and

are still interested, everyone's saying, yeah, we think this should be moving towards membership, then they'd be interviewed by two elders to examine them with regard to their faith and their hope in Jesus. This is the interview where the legend of Obadiah was spawned from. It's terrible, scary. Pressurized interview where the elders come in and are really intense and mean to the kids. Do they have like the hanging light where they shine it in their face? Yeah, they shine a light in their face. Where is the rebel base? No, all of that is tongue in cheek. What we've found is interviews, adult or children, are really sweet things you get to do as a pastor and elder.

But it's also true that the person being interviewed, whether they're an adult or a child, are often very nervous and worried and intimidated. And that's true of kids. I mean, you know, Obadiah doesn't help. But there's a meeting with two of the elders. Sometimes it's on a Sunday after church. Sometimes the elders come to the kids' house. It just depends on what scheduling-wise works. And that interview might last. 20 or 30 minutes. It's not a long, it's not meant to be a long, exhaustive examination. Are they longer or shorter than an adult interview? They're supposed to be about the same. Adult interviews may go a little longer. Part of my thinking about the length of the interview with kids is, one, they're intimidated. And the longer you go doesn't help them. And some of what you're looking for with kids is, Do they have the knowledge and are they able to articulate the things that are necessary for them to come to the Lord's table? Those are the things they tend to lack. If they've expressed some desire, you know, assent is not the thing that's as hard to judge in a child. It's do they know this stuff? Right. And if they know it, then does their assent, is it based upon?

all of this stuff, or are they just like, well, I just want to? We've had some really funny things said in membership interviews by children. One time, one of the first kids' interviews I did, I remember asking, it's like, so what does it mean to be a Christian? And the boy, I don't remember, he was young. I don't remember how old he was. He perked up, eyes bright, and he said, it means you sing in church. And I said, yeah, that's good. That's really good. Yeah, it's true. What else does it mean? He was like, I don't know. It means you sing in church. And you're sitting there and you're like, okay, so what I got was this little clip of what, like this kid didn't used to sing in church apparently, and his dad said, we're Christians, and because we're Christians, we sing in church. And that became the definition of what a Christian was in this young boy's mind. That's a good answer, but it is not the whole answer. And when we asked more questions, at that time, there wasn't

There wasn't more of a substantive understanding than that. And so we didn't recommend him for membership at the time. We talked to him, talked to his dad about what had gone on. We reassured him. We loved on him and said, we want you to work on these things. Dad, you need to know. Kid, you need to know. And then funny, another funny story is we came back to that same boy a year, I don't know how much longer later, at least a year. We come back, he answered very well. Then we came to talking about the Lord's Supper. And I said to him, well, why do you want to take the Lord's Supper? And he, again, got very excited and smiled because he's like, I know the answer to this question. I have an answer, and it's my answer. And his answer to the question, why do you want to take the Lord's Supper, was because it tastes good. Which is like...

We didn't have wine at the time. I don't think we'd ever get that answer if they actually. And the young kids of our church at that time, we found out, we put a stop to. We were renting space at the time as a church. And so everyone helped clean up. Well, the little kids of the church, they're putting away chairs and winding up cords. Well, a few of them, the boys, they'd help clean up communion apparently. And what they would do is they would go in the bathroom and have communion. All these young little kids, they'd stand up and fence the table and say the things and hand it out. I was just like, how does this kid know that communion tastes good? Apparently he's had it before. Well, he's having it in the bathroom. So we had to put a stop to that as a church. Like, I think we've got some confusing things going on here. Things you don't realize happen in the life of a church. Uncommunicated kids having communion services in the bathroom after the worship service so they can find out that it tastes good and that's why they'd like to take it.

He did not have more of an answer than that as to the death and burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ and victory over the grave. He didn't know that stuff yet. And so, we talked with him. We reassured him, this does not mean you're not a Christian, but there are things that coming to the Lord's table require of us and we need you to grow in those things. So, there's an interview. We're looking for... really basic understandings of a couple of things. The first is, do you understand why Jesus had to come to earth? Why he had to die? And kids will often say, to save us so that we can go to heaven. Those are almost always the first thing a kid will say. Good answer. Good start of an answer. Why did Jesus have to die? Because of sin. We're trying to tease out, okay, I mean, we're not expecting kids to start talking to us in theological terms about double imputation and forensic righteousness and all these types of big theological words. But we are looking to see if they understand that concept. That sin is the result. That sin causes death. And sin is offensive to God. And that's why God judges and sends people to hell. And that Jesus came to die in our place so that we...

So that the death we deserve would be performed by him and that we would in turn receive the life that he had in him because he obeyed where we didn't. So we're looking for a child's ability to articulate something like that about the death and that it satisfied God's wrath. And then we'll often ask him about the resurrection. Do you understand the significance of his resurrection? And I often ask the kids, what would happen if Jesus had died all like we just said? but then he stayed dead. What would that mean for us? And if you're, you know, you might be thinking, well, in first Corinthians, it says, Paul said that, you know, if Jesus was raised from the dead, then we above all men are most to be pitied for we are still in our sins. Now, if a kid quoted that back to me verbatim, I'd be like, you've been studying your Bible. Good job. But I'm looking for that understanding of like, we'd still be in our sins. Like his death apart, separated from his resurrection doesn't save us.

We're still in our sins. We above all men are most to be pitied. We've believed in vain. We've suffered in vain, all this stuff that he says in 1 Corinthians. We're looking for them to have some understanding and that death couldn't hold him. He conquered it. He's raised from the dead and is in heaven. And now he's repairing a place for us. And it's really glorious. He's the winner. And we get to be the winners through faith in him. That's the kind of stuff you're looking for the kids to be able to say. So there's that aspect of, do you understand the gospel, the death and the resurrection of Jesus Christ? The other part of the interview is we're looking for an understanding of what happens when we take communion. Because it's not just a thing we do. There's more to it than that. And so here's where you get into their capacity for self-examination. Yeah, that's one of the things of like, you know, so what, and we may ask them, so what happens or what are we doing when we take communion? What are we doing?

And if they're listening, every week as I fence the table, I read from 1 Corinthians, there's a couple of elements that I want to make sure that they have a concept of. One is we proclaim the Lord's death. Do this in remembrance of me. Those two things. Do you know what it means to proclaim his death? What are we supposed to remember? We just want some sort of answer about. Those things that we are actively doing something. We are proclaiming his death and we are remembering it until he comes again. We're looking forward to, there's a longing for his return. And also an ability to examine ourselves. Do you have sins? And so we'll ask them like, what sins do you struggle with? Do you know what sin is? And they'll say, yeah. And what sins do you struggle with? And most of the time with little kids, it has to do with anger and them fighting with their siblings or not wanting to do their chores.

If you're dealing with younger kids, pre-teen children, that's their concept of sin. That's as big as their world is. And so, they'll talk to us about that and say, okay, well, what do you do when you sin? If you're going to come to the Lord's table, what do you need to do if you've sinned before you come to the Lord's table? We don't ask trick questions in interviews. We're just asking for... I confess my sins and I repent and I ask for forgiveness, both from God and the people that we sin against. That's what we do when we come to the Lord and say, well, that's what we're examining ourselves. Have I offended God or someone else? And is it just laying out there where I've done nothing with it because I didn't want to or I wasn't able to at the time or whatever? Do you have that self-critical capacity to see yourself as a sinner?

who's done something objectively wrong, whatever the context in which it happened, can you see yourself as having done right or wrong and then dealt with it according to the gospel? Those are the things that we're looking for in our membership interviews. And that's why I say that they should take 20, maybe 30 minutes with kids. One of my kids was interviewed recently and he looked at the elders and he said, You've asked me the same question like four or five times in different ways. And so I must be failing and not getting the answer. I don't know the answer. I just don't know the answer or something like that. And so he was acknowledging. The child was acknowledging. What the elders were looking for was like, do you understand this question? And it's like, no. And as they talk more, he's like, my dad was talking to me about that in the car. And I don't remember what he said. Yeah.

These are kids' answers, you know? And he's got stuff that he needs to work on still. And there's no harm in it. I think that one of the things in the interview with regard to the pressure that kids feel, and one of the things that parents and churches don't want the kids to go through is this pressure but also this sense of, I passed or I failed. Either I'm a Christian or I'm a failure. And when I've talked with my kids about it, I said, hey, I was asking the younger kids, you know, the little kids, like, do you know as much about the Bible as your older brother? They're like, no. I was like, okay, does your older brother know as much about the Bible as your mom? No. Do any of you know as much about the Bible as me? No. I said, okay, well, why is this a difference? And why do I know more than all of you guys about the Bible? Because I went to years of intensive Bible training. Like, it was...

worked into me. We spent years studying it. You're not there yet, kids. You're not there yet. That's okay. And so an interview is not a, you are a Christian or you are a failure. It's not that. It's an assessment at a given point in time of where you're at and your understanding of the gospel that we want you, that we expect and hope for you to be able to profess your faith in at some point. Like, we're not sitting here going, well, we don't know what's going to happen with the children of the church. I mean, we don't know finally and ultimately and completely what will happen with anyone definitively forever. But we do know whether people can express their faith and where they're at in that moment or at that time. And so we're asking the kids these questions just to see where they're at. And if their answers are weak in some area, then we encourage, depending on how weak their answer is, we may encourage them.

They may teach a little bit, or we may say, we want you to go, we're going to talk to you some more about this, or we're going to talk to your parents and they can help explain these things to you over time. It's just a data point of where you're at at this point. We don't want kids not being recommended for membership a lot, but I don't see it as there being anything broken or wrong if a child has a talk with some of the elders. They see where he's at and they say, okay, well, this is the threshold for participation in the Lord's Supper. We're not quite there yet. You're not a failure. We're not saying you're not a Christian. I actually said to one kid one time when we wanted him to work on some things. I said, I want you to be assured that us saying that we don't think you're ready to come to the Lord's table yet is not us saying we don't believe you're a Christian, actually. Because we see in Scripture that people long before they could articulate their faith believed.

And so those things are not so married together in our minds that if we say no, what we're actually saying is, you're going to go to hell if you die right now. That's not what we're saying. What we're saying is, we don't think you're there yet in terms of your understanding. We want to work with you some more. And we do work with them. And we've done that with adults as well. We had a young man we interviewed years ago. And all of us thought he's a Christian. By his life and his... The way he lived, he lives as a Christian. So far as we can tell, this man's a Christian. But his ability to articulate the gospel and what he believed, given the way he had grown up, he grew up in some fairly difficult circumstances, his ability to articulate his faith was weak. So we say, well, you can't. You just don't. Go figure it out on your own. No. We said, listen, what we're going to do is we want to set up discipleship meetings with one of the elders for the next, you know.

however long, four weeks, eight weeks, whatever it is. And we want you to work through these things with him. And then we're going to reassess. Because we don't think you're not a Christian. We just think we want you to be able to understand and articulate these things. And we think that's going to be a comfort and a benefit to you. We're not trying to be mean to you. We're not trying to lord our authority over you. We're just trying to make sure that you actually understand what you believe. And so the same is true with the children. It also gives a context for developing intergenerational relationships on a spiritual basis other than simply relationships with their parents. So I've appreciated it because it means my son, when he had his membership interview, and he's a member of the church now, he takes communion, and he has relationships with men in the church that aren't just mediated through me.

He has people he can go to if, you know, he's 10 years old. That's not really happening right now. But he's built the foundation already for when he's 13, 14, and 15, and I can't be his everything. Like, I can't answer every single question he's got. I'm not going to be able to help him with everything. And as he grows older, he really needs those relationships in his life for spiritual stability and growth. Yeah. And so, one of the things that... I talked earlier about all the pressure that can be felt by the child. There's also pressure that parents can feel. And many times it's the parents who can put pressure on the kids. And so one of the things that we do is when we interview the kids, the parents are not allowed in the room. And that's for the kid's sake and for the elder's sake. Because the last thing we need is a mom or a dad feeding the kid answers and trying to manipulate the whole thing because he has to pass.

And so we just say, we're going to talk to the kids, just buy them, you know, we'll be in an open place, like, but we're going to sit down and we're going to talk to them and just, we're going to have a conversation with them. And we've not, I've seen parents in the past and other churches be upset about that, wanting to be in the, in the feeling like almost like their authority was being subverted. And I think then what's happened is that the parent doesn't understand that it's not their authority that's being subverted. It's just that they're not the only authority in their kid's life. And increasingly, to Martin's point, as your kids get older, your authority as a parent diminishes. And yet the authority of the church in their life remains. And you want your kids, as they come to faith and as they come to a greater understanding of the gospel and what's going on, you want their affections being transferred from the parents.

to the people who will keep watch over their souls is those who give an account. And so that membership interview is an occasion where that's able to happen, where that starts. And so we'll sit down, we'll talk with the kids, like I said, 20, 30 minutes, and the parents aren't there. And then what'll happen is we'll dismiss the child and say, you know, go on out and play. We're going to talk for a little bit, a few elders, because you're obviously both listening and both asking questions, but you're not talking about what you think about at all. So then the elders will talk for, a little while, a few minutes, about what they think. And what they're talking about is whether or not they want to recommend, whether they think it's time to recommend the child for membership. And then they'll, you know, whatever their decision is, yes, we're going to recommend you, or no, we're not going to recommend you yet, but we think these are things you need to work on. Whatever the decision is, they'll, we'll have the kids come back, the parents come back, you know, come into the room and explain to them, here's what happened, here's what's going on, and here's what we're going to do.

So, if you have a... A parent who's listening to this and they think their kid might be getting close to membership, what would be your encouragement to a parent in that situation? Well, this whole podcast is us saying how we do it at our church. Other churches do these things differently. And so I would say you should go talk to the pastor. Here, one of the things that we want is we want the kid to come talk and say, hey. I'm interested. But oftentimes the parents have come to us ahead of time and said, so what we don't want are the parents pushing the kid. Hey, I think my kid's ready. So you need to do all this stuff. We actually want the kid to say, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm interested. And so we would like the child to come and express their interest. But as a parent, obviously you're the one who lives with your kids. You know your kids the best. And so if you think they're getting to that point, I'd have conversations with them. I mean, the stuff we've just talked about in terms of

why Jesus died, why Jesus had to come to earth, what is resurrection, what's going on in communion. If you think your kid's getting ready, these are conversations you should be having with your child. You should be talking to them about these things. Do they understand that? Catechisms are a great resource in being able to have a question and answer format of how to talk about these things and what scriptures, if it's one that's... got the scriptures with it. The one we use in our membership class has all the scriptures listed underneath each question and answer. And there are follow-up questions. That's why the catechism we have, you know, they'll say, there'll be the catechism question, there'll be the catechism answer, there'll be the scriptures that are used, and there'll be some other questions that you could use devotionally at night and, you know, family devotions to help your kids process through that. So, maybe I'll ask this a little differently. How do you, as a parent, navigate

Like, when the kid is actually converted. So, in lots of Baptist circles, like, the objective is to get the kid to pray the sinner's prayer, right? Sure. And so, I don't get the impression that you're a big fan of the sinner's prayer in general. I don't know the sinner's prayer. Oh, okay. But that doesn't seem to be the marker, right? Yeah. That's not the point where, like, a line or threshold has been set. bridge or cross or whatever. Um, so how would you encourage parents to think about like at what point their kid is actually a Christian? I mean, a tree is known by its fruit. That's what I tell a parent. A tree is known by its fruit and there's no, if what you want is a guarantee that you don't need to be concerned about this anymore, I don't have it for you. He who perseveres to the end, he shall be saved. Good trees don't produce bad fruit. Bad trees don't produce good fruit. So you,

The idea that coming into church membership is like, we made it over the finish line. There's no more concern. I don't think it's helpful. We try to encourage parents, I mean, from the time they're expecting when they're pregnant, that they need to trust God with their children. They don't have any idea what that means. At that point, you need to trust God with your pregnancy for a healthy baby, for your baby to be born. and not pass away. I mean, like from the very early stages, you have to trust God with your children. And then when they're born and then when they, when they fall down, you know, and skin their knee or they learn to crawl upstairs and they slide back down and they get on a bike. And like, there's so many things where danger, physical danger, and then spiritual danger come. You have to trust God with both of those things with your kids all the while they live. When they're grownups, parents don't stop worrying about their kids.

When their kids have kids, they don't stop worrying about their, oh, he's okay now. So I would not think in terms, I realize that's, it is what people want. I think it's actually why paedo-communion and sort of the Baptist celebrations of baptisms are so, can be a big deal. I think it's just cathartic and it's like, oh, now it's all, now all the tension's relieved. He prayed the prayer. He went forward at the altar. He got saved. And the Bible doesn't talk that way. And so I would be encouraging the parents. And I'd say, but you can have good hope in two things. One, like a tree is known by its fruit. If you see good things in your children, you should attribute that good stuff to God's mercy and to his promise to be a God to you and to your children. Whether you're Paedo-Baptist or Credo-Baptist, like he has promised to be a God to our children.

And historically, most Christians come from Christian homes. Unless we're in missions and going to start a new place, the church is, generally speaking, populated by people whose parents were Christians. So, I think there's good hope there. And if your kid is, the longer they persevere in the faith, especially when they suffer or things are hard for them, you see them bearing good fruit, I think you should take real comfort in that type of stuff. I don't think it's you can't have any comfort. but I don't think that, oh, my kid was baptized. So, or the elders approved him. So now I don't need to worry because we're making, we're again, remember, we're not saying pass or fail. We're saying we're making an assessment at a time that there's a credible profession. It's believable. The thing you're saying is believable. It lines up with the way you're living your life. That could change. You could get cancer and all of a sudden go downhill. You could develop an addiction and things can really change. And the fact that you, at some point,

we're doing well doesn't mean that none of that matters now. That's true of adults. That's true of our kids. So, do you think there's, I think the objection some people listening to this might have is that we're really making too much out of this, that we're making it too hard. We're erecting too many barriers. We're not letting the little children come to Jesus with this rather involved membership process. And how would you respond to that? Well, when I was talking to my kids about it before I, brought all this up. I said, you know, in Calvin's Geneva, what they would do with the kids of the church, the catechumens is what they called them, they'd have Sunday morning worship, which was not a short service, and the kids would all come back in the afternoon. I don't know what the young age was, but my guess is probably six, seven-year-old kids, but maybe younger, I'm not sure, that they would be brought back to the church in the afternoon for a catechism service. And those kids were

There was preaching, there was teaching pertaining to the catechism, basically the one we use, as well as the Lord's Prayer and the Ten Commandments. And that kids who were going to be made, were going to come to the Lord's Supper would have had to have been conversant in not just the questions and answers of the catechism or being able to recite the Ten Commandments and the Lord's Supper. They would have to be conversant about each phrase in the Lord's Supper or each phrase in the Lord's Prayer, what it means. And the Ten Commandments. What does this commandment forbid? What does this commandment require? They would need to be able to answer all of those questions, and they need to be able to do it in front of everybody. And that's what they would have required before kids came. Now, I was going to ask my kids, how old do you think the kids were that were coming to the Lord's table? Like, how long do you think it took? But before I could, one of my sons, he said, that's a lot. And I said, it is. It is a lot. And I said, but honey, that's just the beginning.

The fact that you would be able to understand these really basic truths about God and you and the Lord's Prayer and the Ten Commandments, this is really the foundation of our understanding as Christians. It should grow. Adults should be able to do those things and talk about those things and more. And so, if we just go, well, this is just too much work and say, well, those kids in Geneva were coming to the Lord's table. Between the ages of 8 and 12. More likely 10. There were some outliers that were young at 8. But those kids within a few years of having that instruction every week, they were able to do it and to understand it. And so it's not like we're saying this is, you have to go get a master's degree to come to the Lord's Supper.

I don't think it's too much. I don't think it's that. I mean, it depends on what over the long haul you expect people to do. If it's like, what do I have to do to get inside so that I can be inside, inside being to heaven, in heaven? Like, if we're just trying to figure out what the minimum threshold is, well then, yeah, I suppose this is a lot, so to speak. But if the idea in the great broader context is we're going to be growing in our knowledge and our understanding and our obedience to God for our whole lives, then I don't think it's a whole lot.

No, that makes sense. Anything to add at this point? Okay. Well, thanks for tuning in, and tune back in next time for more of ClearCast. And we are on West 10th Street in Indianapolis. We'd love to have you come visit. And until next time, this is ClearCast signing off. Thanks so much for listening to ClearCast. We're going to be taking a short break, and we'll be back after that with more content.