Want to teach your kid to love God and love others? Start with these verses.

Parents, this month we’ve talked a lot about faith and why kids need it. One of the biggest concerns I hear from parents about teaching faith to their kids is they are worried they don’t understand it well enough themselves. I understand that. Teaching your child about God, heaven, and hell, and what the scriptures say can be intimidating. But it is worth the courage it will take. God is good for kids, their self-esteem, their future success and nearly every single area of their lives.

And, you don’t have to get all yourself before teaching it to them. Simply reading a few verses of scripture with your child is all you need to do to start teaching your child how to love God, love others and how much God loves him.

In fact, I made this even easier for you. Below is a list of scriptures that are all self-explanatory and don’t require a degree in theology to understand. These passages will encourage your child, teach her how to treat others with love and kindness and they will instill a sense of value in her, explaining how much God loves her—what kids really need to know.

Make a habit, at least for this month, of reading these together as a family or reading them over your child before she goes to sleep at night, and you will soon start to see how these verses can affect your child—and you--no matter how young, troubled or adolescent he may be.

If God is for us, who can be against us? (Romans 8:31)

I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made (Psalm 139:14).

Do to others what you would have them do to you (Matthew 7:12).

“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future” (Jeremiah 29:11).

“But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you” (Matthew 6:33).

Neither death nor life…nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:38-39).

“Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another” (John 13:34).

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life (John 3:16).

Find encouragement in these words and share them with your child. If she asks a question about them and you don’t know the answer, simply say, “Good question, let’s look it up.” Read the verses around it in the Bible or have your child research it online. You don’t have to know all the answers; you just have to let your child know that God loves her, that there is a clear right and wrong in the world and that following God will serve her well. It’s really that simple.

Give your child a faith in God and you will give him everything he could ever need and much more than you could ever give him.