When I started seminary in the early 2000s, I was part of a small “shepherding group” led by one of my professors. My seminary assigned groups of eight-to-ten students to a professor. We’d meet monthly—usually in an empty classroom or a local coffee shop—to talk about our family lives and studies. The seminary’s leadership wanted these groups to emphasize Christian friendship and pastoral care. Their goal was to guard against the danger of enriching our heads while impoverishing our hearts.
My professor certainly kept with those goals, but our small group was more. He also used those gatherings to introduce us to a group of men we came to affectionately call his “dead friends”. Each month, we’d read a short sermon or essay written by a long-deceased saint—often Martin Luther, sometimes C. S. Lewis. One semester, we worked section by section through Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Psalms: The Prayer Book of the Bible. We reflected together on how the reading challenged us, then we shared requests and prayed. It was simple discipleship, really. But those times profoundly affected me. From my professor’s “dead friends,” I learned enough humility to listen to ancient wisdom. That’s a gift I’m eager to pass along to my children.
Danger of Chronological Snobbery
To one degree or another, we’re all products of our time. When we were teenagers, we listened to different bands, and wore different outfits and hairstyles than our parents chose when they were in school. We also think about the world differently from past generations; in fact, it’s easy to look back at the past’s prejudices and obvious (to us) sins and then simply dismiss all its thinking. C. S. Lewis called this chronological snobbery, “the uncritical acceptance of the intellectual climate common to our own age and the assumption that whatever has gone out of date is on that account discredited.”
There are several problems with only giving preference to ideas that are fashionable now. One is that old ideas aren’t always rejected because they’ve been disproven by better arguments. Often they simply go out of fashion because a new idea comes along that draws the collective eye. Did you know, for instance, that research has begun to verify that hand-written notes are retained longer than typed notes? It’s true, even though tech-loving 1990s kids raised to pine for a new laptop have trouble believing it!
Another problem with chronological snobbery is that both good and bad ideas, like fashions, can be cyclical. Even when an idea, like Christian nationalism for instance, is shown to be unbiblical, faulty, and dangerous, it can roar back into the culture like bell bottoms and mom jeans. What’s to keep our kids from simply being swept along with what’s trendy? We must teach them, as Mark Ward writes, “to escape the insistent demands of the moment by really reckoning, in love, with the writings of long-dead neighbors.”
Friends to See What They Can’t
A year or two after those shepherding group meetings, another of my professors issued a challenge in class. He told us, “Pick out one or two people from history you really enjoy reading. Then, read everything they wrote.” “Go to the source,” this professor encouraged us, “and find out where you agree with your chosen author, and when you don’t.” He challenged us to get to know a few historical figures well enough that they become regular “conversation partners” in our thinking.
I chose Martin Luther, C. S. Lewis, and a lesser-known Dutch theologian named Herman Ridderbos; they’re my small group of “dead friends.” I read something by or about them each year, and they’ve served me well. Getting to know these three men has grounded my thinking and given me a first “take” whenever I encounter a new idea. When I read something new about culture or ministry, I don’t at first know what to think or say. So I ask, “What would Luther think about this? What would Ridderbos say?” In this way, these “conversation partners” give me clarity of mind. As Lewis wrote in his famous introduction to Athanasius’ On the Incarnation,
Every age has its own outlook. It is specially good at seeing certain truths and specially liable to make certain mistakes. We all, therefore, need the books that will correct the characteristic mistakes of our own period. . . . The only palliative is to keep the clean sea breeze of the centuries blowing through our minds, and this can be done only by reading old books.
A good friend helps you see what you can’t. If there’s mayonnaise smeared on your face, he doesn’t giggle (at least not for long). Instead, he hands you a napkin. If you’re talking too much at the dinner party, she elbows you and quietly says, “Maybe we should hear from someone else.” I want my kids to have friends like that. Old books (and the men and women who wrote them) can be friends like that for our minds.
Introduce Your Kids to the Greats of the Past Now
It’s easier to make friends when you’re young than it is when you get older. I think that truth goes for friends from history, too. And if a kid learns to love old books during her middle or high school years, going back to those books will be easier as she ages. So, how do you get started? Here are some ideas.
- Give your kids a broad overview of history’s great men and women. When our girls were young, my wife picked up an audiobook version of Susan Wise Bauer’s Story of the World. We listened to it on road trips, and it helped our daughters see the big-picture timeline of world history. An added benefit was that we learned which periods and historical figures our kids found most interesting.
- Read solid biographies. There are lots of great middle-grade and high-school level resources available. Our family began with the excellent missionary biographies in YWAM’s Christian Heroes Then and Now series (also available in an audio book format). I’d also encourage you to check out Crossway’s new Lives of Faith and Grace biography series. I wrote the volume on Martin Luther, and my friend Gretchen Ronnevik wrote on Katie von Bora. Reading biographies is a great way for kids to meet friends from history. It’s also a great bridge to reading old books directly.
- After your kids find a few historical figures they love, encourage them to read what those men and women wrote. It’s tempting to think old books will be too difficult for kids, but Lewis had a different idea. He argued that reading and understanding a good translation of Plato, for instance, is a great deal easier than reading a book about Platonism: “Firsthand knowledge is not only more worth acquiring than second hand knowledge, but is usually much easier and more delightful to acquire.”
Want to give your kids a gift that will stay with them for a lifetime? Do what my professor did. Introduce them to old books and “dead friends.” When you do, you’ll open a door for them to a world of wisdom and delight.
In 2024, Rooted had the honor of publishing three new books for teenagers: The Jesus I Wish I Knew in High School, Asian American Edition (by Rooted authors); Longing for Christmas (Rooted authors), and Identity: Discovering Who You Are in Christ by Lindsey Carlson.
