Churches Take Action

“Mom, I just don’t believe all that stuff anymore.”

It’s straight out of a Christian parent’s nightmare. Yet sadly, two-thirds of young adults who were active in church as teens appear to share this view. They no longer attend church, pray, or read their Bibles regularly. Alarmed by these facts—repeatedly confirmed in surveys such as that of America’s Research Group (Already Gone, 2009)—thousands of churches are taking action. One popular option is the new Answers Bible Curriculum (ABC), a full-featured Sunday school curriculum produced by Answers in Genesis specifically to help combat this trend. The final year of this three-year program, which focuses on the life of Christ and the book of Acts, releases this fall.

The synchronized, family-integrated approach sets ABC apart. All seven age levels, from preschool to adult, study the same themes and verses at the same time, and children’s take-home sheets encourage families to keep discussing the material. A family devotional book, available for each quarter, is a great tool to help parents take their families deeper.

Solid apologetics content is woven throughout the curriculum. For example, in The Messiah Arrives, Lesson 3 shows students why we can trust the historical accuracy of the four Gospels and explains the variations among their accounts. Families learn that although the authors of the Gospels were inspired by the Holy Spirit, they did not meet to discuss how they would record the same events. God used the writers’ different perspectives to record slightly different details, making the full record even richer. The whole family can study passages skeptics claim are contradictory, and then discover they do not contradict each other but reflect each author’s perspective.

Each take-home sheet has age-appropriate questions and answers, such as: “Suppose you heard a friend say that everyone believes in different gods and different truths, so it doesn’t matter who is right. What could you say?” The answer: “Truth is truth. . . . If you believe you can fly, you’ll still fall when you jump off a building. And you won’t go to heaven just because you believe you will.” The lesson goes on to explain the one way to know God—Jesus Christ. ABC takes a chronological approach. This logical way of studying Scripture is easier to remember and emphasizes God’s plan of salvation throughout, beginning in Genesis.

ABC is not a “dated” curriculum, so it can be started—or paused—at any time. Years 1 and 2 bring the Bible to life by highlighting the Old Testament historical record, plus prophecies and “pictures,” such as sacrificial lambs and the imagery and symbolism of Passover. With the release of year 3, the curriculum moves on to the New Testament, including in-depth study of the life, death, and Resurrection of Jesus and the spread of the church afterward.

Answers Bible Curriculum, designed to be repeated every three years as young people grow, is a powerful weapon in the church’s arsenal. It excites youth about the wonders and certainty of God’s Word and its promises of a Savior, while giving adults solid, apologetics-infused grounding for their own defense of the faith.