It was a thought I had preparing a message on what a fellow pastor calls, “a dog of a text!” On a recent Sunday I took as my text: Ezra 8:1-14. Just in case it doesn’t quite come to mind, it is a list of names, “heads of families” who returned to Jerusalem from Babylon in the middle of the fifth century B.C., along with Ezra the scribe. The specific details need not detain us here, but the fact that those who returned are grouped in families, listing only the names of the family “head,” appears countercultural.

The bonds of family lines were strong in Jewish society as even a cursory reading of the Old Testament reveals. But in a culture like ours in which the breakdown of marriage and family is one of its chief characteristics, contributing to what David Wells has called “the loss of our virtue,” we may find such a passage as this patriarchal and antiquated. However, it was a footnote in a commentary on Ezra by the Old Testament scholar, Derek Kidner, which held my attention. Kidner pointed out that this passage may appear counter-intuitive (and certainly counter-cultural) to the modern church, let alone modern secular society. This is what he wrote: “It is at least food for thought that church strategy often appears to reverse this order, concentrating on the children, the tail-end of the family, to the neglect of the head.”1 It got me thinking.

Our society shows increasingly scant disregard for older members. No, I’m not about to engage in a tirade against ageism, though at 55 I am tempted to suggest that age often (though not always) brings with it maturity and levels of expertise from which both society and church may profit. But we increasingly live in a culture (both religious and secular) where the youth rules the roost. Youth ministry, a necessary and valuable ministry, can take on levels of importance that invade, even dominate all other considerations. Church mission statements, hiring policies, worship values, and financial budgets can be tailored in such a way as to suggest that this or that church will do anything to keep the youth happy. In an interview with Mark Dever on the marks of a healthy church, he was asked a question about the relationship of youth ministry as typically practiced in churches in the United States and church health, to which he gave the response: “The most important teaching the youth receive is from the home, if they are from a Christian home, and from the pulpit.”2

When a society departs from the biblical norms, one of the signs it manifests is a disdain for the older generation. A keynote speaker at a Bible Conference in Toronto a few years ago was billed in this way: “St. ThomasChurch in Sheffield, England has grown to be one of the largest churches in England with 2,000+ in weekly worship, 70% of which are under the age of 35.”

The point being made is his greater credibility because he appeals to youth rather than the elderly. Somewhere, R. C. Sproul has written, “When I last crossed a decade barrier in my own aging process, God was good enough to grant me this small bit of wisdom—the Bible honors age, not youth. I came to understand that the disappearance of my youth was something God thought a good thing, and if I were wise, I would agree.”

Food for thought?
Yes, for as the Psalmist says: “Those who are planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of our God. They shall still bear fruit in old age; they shall be fresh and flourishing (Psalm 92:13, 14).”

1 Derek Kidner, 64.
2 [Editors note: the original URL (link) referenced in this article is no longer valid, so the link has been removed.] May 31, 2008.

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Dr. Derek Thomas is a professor at Reformed Seminary and teaching pastor at First Presbyterian Church, both in Jackson, Miss.