An Age-Appropriate Guide for Teaching Children About Eternity

Written by Dr. Joannie DeBrito, Family Support Specialist

The Gospel of Jesus Christ is the most important message we can share with our families. We desire that our grandchildren come to know, love, and serve Jesus.

Without knowing Jesus as their Savior Lord, we know our grandchildren will not receive eternal life. Therefore, we are burdened to share the gospel story accurately and persuasively out of our great love and care for them.

Why Teaching the Gospel Requires Wisdom and Discernment

Teaching children about Jesus may begin from the day they are born. This blog will provide suggestions for teaching about eternity at each stage of development.

I think that a word of caution is important here, though. While the beliefs of the Christian faith (including the concept of eternity) are important to the development of a person’s faith in Jesus Christ, every person must come to faith through a personal decision and transformation of his or her heart.

Christian education should encourage engagement with Scripture, the development of critical thinking skills, and exploration of why faith in Jesus is something to seriously consider. We must avoid indoctrination, however, which emphasizes what a person must think, uncritical thinking, compliance, blind acceptance of dogmatic beliefs, and rigidity in behavior.

An abiding faith in Jesus is seen in the fruit of a person’s life as discussed in Galatians 5:22-23, while forced adherence to religious practices often produces people who are unkind, judgmental, self-righteous, and proud – all traits that are the opposite of the character traits of Jesus Christ.

Therefore, all efforts to disciple your grandchildren should be bathed in prayer for humility as you guide them and a sincere request to be used as a vehicle for God the Father, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit’s transformation of your grandchild’s heart. Please consider the following suggestions with this caution in mind.

Teaching the Gospel to Infants, Toddlers, and Preschoolers

Early Language Development and Faith Foundations

Before children begin to talk, they have receptive language skills and can understand a small number of words, gestures, and the tone of others’ voices. Praying for them, singing hymns, and exposing them to picture books with pages they can interact with while also gesturing and communicating in a calm tone of voice are just some of the ways to provide the first exposure to the concept of eternity.

You build trust with your grandchildren when you engage with and lovingly care for them as babies, and this makes them more apt to listen to you as they grow.

One-year-old children learn language when siblings or adults point to things and provide one word to name them. They can understand words such as “Me”,” Mommy”, “Daddy”, “Dog”, “Milk”, and the single names of family members. So, if you are showing a year-old grandchild a picture of Jesus and say his name, your little one should be able to understand that you are identifying the name of the person in the picture.

By two years of age, children understand two-word commands, especially when accompanied by a gesture that communicates the words, such as “Come here”, “Hug sister,” “Don’t touch,” and “Let’s pray.” This young child will typically be able to put his or her hands together while older family members pray around the dinner table, hum along with the music of a favorite hymn, or point and say, “Get book”.

As children grow to be three- and four-year-olds, they can make connections between two objects or concepts and have conversations back and forth with siblings and adults by using four- and five-word sentences related to concrete subjects.

So, the picture of Jesus that was identified with the one-year-old child can now be shown in Heaven, and that connects Jesus with the idea that He now lives in Heaven. Some preschool children may be able to talk about some abstract concepts and say things such as “Daddy, I am sad,” but for the most part, they are more likely to comment on things they can see, hear, feel, taste, and touch.

As a grandparent, you could ask a four-year-old what he or she would want to say to, or do with, Jesus in Heaven. This is also a time when children begin to love to express themselves via acting, so they might enjoy pretending that they are talking with Jesus in Heaven.

Sharing the Gospel with Children Ages 5–7

Using Children’s Bibles and Scripture Memory

This is a great time to introduce children to a good children’s Bible. You can read stories with them about Jesus preparing a place for those who believe in Him.

Now, the concept of “forever” is hard enough for us to understand. Young children should not be expected to understand it, but it is okay to expose them to this concept at a young age. They are also developing the ability to memorize short phrases, so find verses that are 5-7 words long that mention eternity, encourage them to memorize them, and provide a reward of more time with you if they can remember the verse after a few days.

Focus on the Family’s Clubhouse Jr. Magazine (for kids ages 3-7) has many great activities to teach young children about the story of Jesus and the promise of eternal life for those who give their lives to Him and believe in him. A subscription could be a great gift for a grandchild.

As children begin to naturally question the reality of Santa Claus at this age, Christmastime can be a great time to talk about the original St. Nikolas and his practices of giving gifts that are consistent with the amazing gift of eternal life that Christ gave us. You can begin to emphasize Christmas as a time to celebrate the birth of Christ and His gift of eternal life, rather than a time to be focused on a mythical figure.

Helping 8–12-Year-Olds Understand Faith and Moral Choices

As children continue to develop through the middle childhood years and progress toward adolescence, they experience steady physical growth, increases in their abilities to think logically, experience more abstract thinking, function more independently, consider morality, and manage their emotions better than previously. Over these years, they may also begin to create some distance between them and their parents and grandparents as they lean more into their peers.

Given these dynamic changes, grandparents can help their grandchildren learn more about the abstract principle of eternity by teaching them about confession, repentance, and asking for forgiveness. 8-12-year-olds will begin to be faced with lots of choices that challenge those principles and make them honestly wonder if it makes sense to follow Jesus.

Building Critical Thinking Through Conversation

While parents need to be the first to help their children learn to make wise and moral decisions, grandparents can support them in that process. Conversation cards, such as Legacy Coalition’s Let’s Talk Cards, pose questions related to a variety of topics and can be used to help growing children develop critical thinking skills and seriously consider the joys, benefits, and consequences of faith in Jesus Christ.

This is also a great time to listen to Adventures in Odyssey, Focus on the Family’s long-running audio drama programs, with your grandchildren. The programs present engaging stories with lively characters that find children struggling with the normal ups and downs of life, relationship issues, grief, loss, and a lot of very challenging situations. Solutions are found as the characters explore Scripture and learn how Jesus would have responded to each dilemma.

Finally, as your 8- to 12-year-old grandchildren begin to participate in more team activities with their peers, your presence will be appreciated, whether in person or delayed as you watch the video of a game or event online together. The fact that you care about what they are doing builds trust with your grandchildren, an important foundation to conversations you will have with them as they begin to wrestle with the many challenges to their faith and the principles of the faith, including eternity, that they will encounter in their teenage years.

Discipling Teenagers in a Challenging Culture

Up until the teenage years, children were protected from some of the realities of the world that they didn’t have the ability to understand. They have progressed to have an increased ability to regulate their emotions.

Given their larger size, increased physical strength, agility, and problem-solving skills, teenagers are better equipped than younger children to do most things on their own but still need plenty of support from older adults. This is the time when grandparents can draw on the foundation of the previous discipling they have done and be there to help them make sense out of an ever-changing world, as well as a culture that presents them with plenty of reasons to question what they have learned about Jesus and the promise of eternal life.

They are developing their identity, and there are many people competing for them to embrace a specific lifestyle that will define them.

Walking with Teens Through Doubt, Pain, and Growth

So, discipleship of teens involves opening many opportunities for them to talk through what they are experiencing and discuss the things that bring them joy and anticipation, as well as frustration and confusion.

This is also a time when they will often begin experiencing the pain of loss as they cope with the death of older family members or friends. It’s completely normal for a teen to wonder more than ever before what happens when someone dies and then, to think about “what will happen when I die”?

As grandparents, this opens another opportunity to talk about eternity through faith in Jesus Christ. When teens are grieving the loss of a loved one, consideration of eternity makes much more sense than when they learned about it as an abstract concept at a younger age.

Grandparents, I encourage you to be willing to sit with your grandchildren as they grieve (in person or virtually), sometimes for the first time. You don’t have to worry about what to say. Your presence alone communicates that you care about and love them, and that you are genuinely concerned about their future.

Loving Grandchildren Through Wandering Seasons

Don’t be concerned when comments or questions indicate that a grandchild may be moving away from their faith and exploring other perspectives. This is a normal part of teen and young adult development. If you are willing to hear where they are coming from, they will be more open to hearing you share your faith and beliefs, including your belief in eternity.

You might explore what Scripture has to say about your grandchild’s tough questions, pray with him or her for wisdom, and look at how Jesus responded when faced with experiences that did not have simple answers.

Most importantly, you must acknowledge that just as there are many joys and wonderful experiences available to us in a lifetime, pain, sorrow, and confusion are also a part of each and every person’s life. Therefore, teaching teens a plan for seeking the Lord when unexpected (and sometimes painful and disturbing) things happen in their lives can help them recognize how a personal relationship with Jesus Christ can provide supernatural comfort and healing that is not available in the secular world. You can also provide a message of hope that every painful circumstance will be redeemed in an eternal home that is free from pain and suffering.

You must be prepared for your grandchildren to walk away from their faith at times and not reject them when they do. The steadfast prayers and intentional, nonjudgmental contact of many grandparents during these wandering times have been instrumental in bringing many prodigal grandchildren back to their families and their faith. If not, remember that we are called by Jesus to love first, above all.

Leaving a Legacy of Faith for Future Generations

Finally, it’s just a fact that we are (hopefully) closer to death than our grandchildren. With this in mind, we can face our final days with peace, knowing that we will be stepping into an eternal world with Jesus and with no pain.

I can still hear my aging grandmother talking about death and saying, “I’ll be waiting for you and will welcome you with open arms.”

While I confess that I sometimes fear the way I will die, I don’t fear dying because I know, with certainty, that I will have an eternal home with Jesus. I have already started talking about that with my grandchildren. Have you?