My Car Won't Run! It Must Need New Paint!

Or I could address the real problem. My car may deserve to have its paint job touched up, but a new coat of paint is not going to help it run. Since my car has a specific purpose, which is providing transportation not decoration, I would be better off spending my time and money identifying and fixing the issues that keeps it from running.

"Our Sunday School is losing ground. We must need a new curriculum." Or you could address the real problem. Too many churches would rather focus on stuff that is visible, tangible, and seems easily remedied, than to do the hard work---train the volunteers, educate the parents, fund the mission. Contacting families who are finding other things to do on Sunday morning, building relationships with parents so that your spiritual encouragement does not fall on deaf ears, convincing church council members that Sunday School is worth allocating budgeted funds for. These are not easy tasks. They will require patient effort over a period of weeks, months, and years to accomplish.

But the mission of your Sunday School, to share the Gospel with the children and adults of your church and community, is truly worth the effort. And how much more beneficial it will be in the long run if you focus on finding and fixing the real issues behind low Sunday School attendance.

Unless, of course, your curriculum truly is the problem---the real reason (not the excuse) that families are not attending. If your curriculum fails to teach God's Word of both Law and Gospel, if it ignores the Sacraments God has provided for our spiritual nurture, if it seeks to entertain rather than instruct, perhaps it is time for a new coat of paint.

God bless you as you teach His children His Word!

How Is Your Sunday School Investment Like Buying a New Car?

There is at least one congregation out there that, over the past several years, has invested in a Sunday School curriculum that was published on CDs. Each quarter, for each level, for the length of time it took to cover the "scope and sequence" of this curriculum, the congregation invested several hundred dollars. Once they had purchased the entire set, however, their price dropped dramatically. The apparent cost of the material went to nearly zero (not counting local copying costs, but most congregations seem to count such copies as free).

Then the congregation decided to look at another curriculum, one published by my employer, Concordia Publishing House. A very obvious problem arose; they would have to go back to the days when they were paying several hundred dollars per level per quarter to purchase the new material. It looked like they would go from $99 a quarter to $1500 a quarter. I have been bugged by the price differential and struggled with how it could make sense.

This analogy came to me.

I can buy a car, finance over four years, and then pay upkeep and maintenance until it falls completely apart. I probably feel that I’m saving money for a few years when I’m not making payments. But I don’t get anything new and all the freshness that I get from the car after the first year is what I create by cleaning, waxing, and detailing the car. And eventually, I have to buy a new car. Then taking on the payments again stings a bit.

Or I can lease a car at about the same monthly payment and, after two or three years, turn it in for a new car. Or I can buy a car, finance it for three years, and, when it is paid for, buy another new car and continue the car payments at a level amount from year to year. In either case, I have to maintain level payments, but the car is newer and fresher over the long term.*

Which is better, the first scenario or the second? Perhaps neither, but they are very different. The congregation with the CD-based curriculum strikes me as that first scenario; they invested for a few years and then have taken the savings instead of getting something new. Buying Growing in Christ or Cross Explorations is a bit more like that second scenario; the investment is level year to year, more or less, and the product is continually freshened up by the editors.

There are reasons why a congregation might choose to make an ongoing investment in excellent Sunday School material. I'd say that you really do get what you pay for, but I'm paid by a publisher. Each congregation will make its own choice.

God bless you as you teach His children His Word.
 

Tom

*By the way, I buy my cars that first way, and it’s time to replace my aging cars. I know that taking on the payments again is going to pinch the budget. Oh, well. The new cars will be worth it.