“This book is a must-read for parents, pastors, and congregations who need help with what it takes to intentionally partner with God’s Spirit to create in children and their families a discipleship that lasts a lifetime. Keeping Kids Christian offers a robust corrective to the viral dechurching of twenty-somethings walking out of the sanctuary and never returning.”
-Robbie Castleman, author of Parenting in the Pew and Story-Shaped Worship
Announcing Keeping Kids Christian: Recovering a Biblical Vision for Lifelong Discipleship. I’m excited about my first book, which is being published by Baker Books, and you find it for pre-order for 40% off with free shipping at BakerBookHouse.Com.
The aim of the book is to provide the church with tools to help end the mass departure of our children from the faith. The rate of deconversions, dechurching, and the rise of the Nones has been significant, and my hope is that Keeping Kids Christians will speak to both the theological and practical aspects of preserving our children in a sincere and living faith.
While I wrote the book from a self-consciously Reformed perspective, it is intended and crafted to be useful to Christians of all denominational traditions. It marries the best of my theological heritage with both the best insights from the most recent sociological research on faith retention and practical experience as a minister and dad. It comes out February 24th; pre-order it today!
Future posts and updates about the book can be found at this link.
Here’s what some people are saying about it:
“Every pastor longs to help the children of the church remain faithful to the call of the gospel. In Keeping Kids Christian, Shaffer provides a historically aware, theologically rich, and practically wise guide for thoughtful shepherding and parenting of our covenant children. It is written for pastors, but parents would learn much from his counsel as well.”
-Dr. Scott Redd, Lead Pastor, Briarwood Presbyterian Church – Birmingham, Alabama; Former President and Stephen B. Elmer Professor of Old Testament, Reformed Theological Seminary, in Washington, D.C.
“Cameron Shaffer is an experienced pastor who, in this book, tackles one of the most pressing issues facing the evangelical church today, namely, how we can encourage our children to persevere in their faith as they enter their adult years. Whether or not one agrees with his theological description of covenant children, his advice to parents, pastors, and parishioners is of great value as we face this crucial challenge.”
-Rev. Sandy Willson, Pastor Emeritus, Second Presbyterian Church – Memphis, Tennessee; Former Interim President and Council Member Emeritus, The Gospel Coalition
“Cameron Shaffer has written a generously diagnostic, biblically sound, and consistently edifying book that is as timely as it is helpful. We have needed an accessible, reliable guide to passing the Faith down to the next generation(s) that is neither reactionary to problematic modern church practices nor blindly devoted to the better, older ways, and now we have it. Shaffer refreshingly—and rightly!—commends the old-new way of longstanding but recently forgotten Reformed conviction: the centrality of a healthy congregational, pastoral, and parental ecosystem for how God’s garden grows. Pastors, teachers, other church leaders, moms, dads, grandparents, single Christians, older children—it is hard to imagine who doesn’t need this book. I fully expect that those who read it will immediately want to share it, as I do, and that pastors and churches who heed even a little of the solid wisdom found here will be better for it.”
-Dr. Mark Garcia, President, Greystone Theological Institute; Associate Professor of Systematic Theology, Westminster Theological Seminary
“I wish I had this book when I started a new church plant some thirty years ago. We asked – ‘What will we do with the children?’ We got some of it right, but we would have gotten more of it right if Rev. Cameron Shaffer’s book had been there to guide us.
With depth and breadth of biblical and theological insights, Cameron Shaffer helps navigate our current moment. Children and young people are growing up and separating themselves from the churches they have known in increasing numbers. What is the problem?
The topic can be seen as a crisis, but Rev. Shaffer brings grace and hope to a discussion that can easily turn to ‘fix-it’ solutions rather than a reframing that asks what is the nature of faith and how do we layer that faith as a community. Lifelong discipleship matters and it takes a community to make a difference. This book is a wonderful starting point for anyone who is concerned about all generations of faith.”
-Rev. Jul Medenblik, President of Calvin Theological Seminary – Grand Rapids,
Michigan
