Awana Pledges Missing the Point

Last night, as is my normal custom, I worked with children in our church's Sparks program, a division of AWANA (Approved Workmen Are Not Ashamed). I love hearing the children memorize and come to understand various verses in the Bible, and am glad all three of my kids enjoy this.

In general, I think AWANA is a good program. However, this year, I have realized there is definitely room for improvement. Perhaps my biggest concern is the amount of time we spend on non-Bible memorization. Before a child can begin the first workbook of Bible memorization, earning jewels for their crowns, the following must be memorized:

• The Pledge of Allegiance to the United States of America
• The Pledge of Allegiance to the Awana Clubs

  "We pledge allegiance to the Awana flag, which stands for the Awana clubs, whose goal is to reach boys and girls with the gospel of Christ, and train them to serve Him."

• The Sparks song "We are Sparks for Jesus"
• The Sparks motto "My Friend for Christ"

For my daughter, who memorizes quite easily, it is no problem to learn these items quickly and move on to Bible verses. For my youngest son, however, who has been speaking English for only a year, this is more of a problem. In addition, we have several other non-native speakers in our group as well as children who either have trouble memorizing or who have parents that do not work with them at home.

Therefore, why are we wasting our time on the non-essential?

I enjoy living in America, but what place does the Pledge of Allegiance have in a local church program to memorize scripture? Americans are not, contrary to the belief of one Music Minister at a church where we used to live, God's chosen people. The Bible is not about extolling the virtues of America.

Even worse is the silly pledge to the AWANA clubs...I would like pledging my allegiance to something to have meaning, and there are far more important things I would pledge my allegiance to than this. I feel as if we are cheapening those words for our children.

Then there is the motto: "My friend for Christ." I could understand if it was "Helping my friends to know Christ", "Sharing Christ with my friends", or even "Christ for my friend", but what in the world does "My friend for Christ" mean?

For the sake of the children we only see on Wednesday nights, for those who have language difficulties, for those who only hear Scripture when at church, and for the boys and girls who genuinely have trouble memorizing, I believe it would be far better to focus solely on memorizing verses and understanding verses rather than making the children memorize a bunch of unnecessary stuff before they can even move forward to Bible memorization.

What do you think?