News / Education
Reverberations after rediscovering Sunday school
More than 1,000 ministers meet to learn about 'Discover Triad'
Hatfield, minister of education from First Baptist Church in Kissimmee, Fla., said Carol Kern’s adult Sunday school class doubled in the year following her solo trip to the 2007 Sunday school conference sponsored by LifeWay Christian Resources of the Southern Baptist Convention.
“She told us about [Sunday School Week] with such passion, people signed up a year in advance,” Hatfield said. “Now there are 19 of us up here. I can feel that same excitement; that same fever. All of them have it this year.”
The July 11-14 conference brought nearly 1,000 ministers of education, pastors and Sunday school teachers together in North Carolina’s Blue Ridge Mountains for an intense series of workshops entitled “reDiscover Sunday School.”
The conference focused on three interrelated aspects of Sunday school: Scripture, stories and shepherding. “Discover Triad” is part of the 3D Sunday School strategy series developed by LifeWay Sunday School Director David Francis.
Keynote speaker Tom McCoy, pastor of Thompson Station (Tenn.) Church, had an unsettling question for the crowd on hand:
“If everybody in the church led the same amount of people to Christ that you lead to Christ, how often would your baptistery be used?” McCoy asked.
“I’ve heard it said that in the next 30 years, 50 percent of Southern Baptist churches will be boarded up and closed,” McCoy said. “What if it’s only 20 percent? Folks – that’s bad!”
Sunday school, he said, is a great way to grow the church and is where the church can model the leadership of Christ.
McCoy said Thompson Station Church’s 130 Sunday school classes all started from one class – taught by McCoy’s wife when there were just 50 people attending the church. “Now, it’s 1,700. I know what a challenge it is to build classes,” he said.
“But it really doesn’t matter what I know. It’s WHO I know. If you’ll take what you know and let God put His anointing on it, it’s an incredible victory you’ll win,” McCoy said.
“When God takes you from the safety of your adult class and puts you into the dangerous shark tank of eighth grade boys, He’s gonna protect you,” he cracked, referring to excuses people make to avoid teaching Sunday school.
“The church exists for those who are not yet part of it,” he challenged. “Some of you don’t believe it. ‘Oh no, the church exists for me and my friends to get together and have a great time.’ No, you can do that at Kiwanis.”
Bruce Raley, LifeWay’s director of leadership ministry, training and events, said if Sunday school classes ultimately want to impact their environment, culture and community, they must struggle with this question: “What really is our purpose?”
“To be a church that’s missional, we have to have Sunday school classes that are also missional,” said Raley.
Raley said people inside the church often are focused internally and don’t have a good perspective of people outside the church.
“I wonder if we have taken ourselves out of the world,” he rhetorically asked.
Regardless of the answers, the foundation of reaching people anywhere is the Gospel, Raley said.
“People need the Word of God. They need it in the pulpit and they need it in Sunday school,” he said, adding that many Sunday school classes have strayed from solid teaching of the Bible. “We need to go back to teaching the Bible in Sunday school.”
To that end, LifeWay Adult Ministry Specialist David Apple challenged conference-goers to teach “life-changing, life-giving words” in their lessons.
“(The apostle) Paul said the Gospel is the very power of God,” Apple said, explaining how the Greek word for power – dynamis – is the root of the word dynamite. “That means we have with us the very power of God. And we can teach with the very same power to the very same kinds of people with the very same kinds of results as did Jesus,” Apple said.
While Scripture and shepherding are essential, Francis said stories that intersect with God’s are equally important – and not just the ones teachers tell.
“This will really blow people away: if you don’t say, ‘that reminds me of,’ but instead say, ‘hmm, tell me more,’” said Francis. “Sunday school isn’t just about getting together and eating donuts. We pride ourselves on being the best talker. We should be the best listener.”
Imogene Cromer, who has taught all ages of Sunday school for 50 years at New Prospect Baptist Church in Anderson, S.C., is a longtime attendee of Sunday School Week at Ridgecrest. She said she learns a fresh lesson each time she attends.
“I have re-learned this week [that] while there’s not anything more important than the Bible, somebody could be sitting there hurting, and sometimes we need to slow down,” said Cromer, who said her nature is to finish the lesson.
“I know we’re here to learn lots of tools, but I also come for the spiritual enrichment,” Cromer said. “I go home a different person. Not only are we physically on a mountaintop, we’re spiritually on a mountaintop.”
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