Faith and Family Fun Fridays: Passing the Torch!

For the word of God is alive and powerful. It is sharper than the sharpest two-edged sword, cutting between soul and spirit, between joint marrow. It exposes our innermost thoughts and desires. -Hebrews 4:12

Are you ready for some family fun? We’d love to have you join us as we seek to fan the flames of faith and let the Word of Christ to have the run of our house!

Sometimes our family’s faith activities are the result of careful planning. Other times, they are just the result of spontaneous God-moments. 


Last night, after watching a bit of the opening Olympic ceremony in London, we headed to the backyard for a family bonfire. 


As is ritual for our crazy clan, the kids began challenging one another to foot races around the house. 


I decided to seize the moment and host our own family torch relay. 


I quickly threw together a homemade torch made out of a piece of red tissue paper, a small cardboard seed planter, a short wooden dowel and a bunch of duct tape 🙂


Then I returned to the back yard and invited the kids to participate in our very own torch carrying event. The first runner began in “Greece”(our backyard) and the last runner ended in “London.” 


Each child raced the torch around the house and then passed it off to another who was waiting to be the next torch bearer.



Of course, my competitors demanded that we time their relay, so Rob kept stats and the kids spent the rest of the night trying to beat their best times. Olympic spirit, indeed!


As I tucked Joshua in bed, he asked me this precious question as he was drifting off to sleep: “Mommy, does Jesus carry a torch, too?”


And so a marvelous teaching moment was born- one I repeated for all my children at breakfast this morning. 


“Actually,” I told my littlest boy, “Jesus has given each one of us a torch to carry.  Did you know that you are Christ’s torch-bearer?”


Josh rubbed his sleepy eyes and sat up at attention.


I shared with him the words of John the Baptist…  

 John said,  “I’m baptizing you here in the river. (But) the main character in this drama, to whom I’m a mere stagehand, will ignite the kingdom life, a fire, the Holy Spirit within you, changing you from the inside out. He’s going to clean house—make a clean sweep of your lives. He’ll place everything true in its proper place before God; everything false he’ll put out with the trash to be burned.”-Luke 3:16-17, The Message


I explained how the Holy Spirit is the gift Jesus gives us when we say yes to Him. When we invite Jesus to live in us, He lights the flame of the Holy Spirit in our hearts. 


As Christ’s friends, we get to carry His light wherever we go, just like the torch bearers got to carry the Olympic flame.


The Holy Spirit helps us to show the world what Jesus is like. In “torch terms”, the Holy Spirit is the light of Jesus shining through us.


Josh smiled at the thought and assured me, “I’ll carry my Jesus torch wherever I go, Mommy.  For my whole whole life.”


I kissed my five-year-old and we prayed that he would be a strong and mighty torch-bearer. 


Then when I woke up this morning, I stumbled on an amazing image in the book of Revelation– a picture of the torches around God’s throne. 


The Apostle John writes: I was caught up at once in deep worship and, oh!—a Throne set in Heaven with One Seated on theThrone, suffused in gem hues of amber and flame with a nimbus of emerald. Twenty-four thrones circled the Throne, with Twenty-four Elders seated, white-robed, gold-crowned. Lightning flash and thunder crash pulsed from the Throne. Seven fire-blazing torches fronted the Throne (these are the Sevenfold Spirit of God). Before the Throne it was like a clear crystal sea.  –Revelation 4:2-6, The Message