You’ve been on the journey. Now it’s your turn to guide.

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Guided by Truth: Enduring Faith® Confirmation Journal

It is an honor to pass down the faith and see students affirm their baptismal identity. Guided by Truth is a complete confirmation curriculum in a journal format. Confirmands deeply consider their beliefs and better understand how Lutheran theology answers their questions about the Bible, Jesus, the Sacraments, and more—on their own schedules, but with structure and accountability.

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How It Works

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It can often be complex to see if students are really understanding the Six Chief Parts of the Christian Doctrine. Some students know what all the “right” answers are, but, digging deeper, they aren’t sure how to apply those answers to their lives. Other students may be quietly confused.

With this confirmation journal, students can work through lessons at their own paces, on their own schedules, and in their own homes. After each unit of lessons, confirmation leaders will give a unit check-in that provides accountability to the self-paced nature and gives an opportunity to make sure confirmands are really getting it.

With this journal, students learn what they believe and are challenged to know why they believe it.

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Students will ponder important questions connected to those found in Timeless Truth and related to Luther’s Small Catechism such as these:

Who am I?

Who is God?

How do I live my life?

How do I interact with God, and how does God interact with me?

Features

Note Margins:

Space on each page is provided to write down thoughts, prayers, and questions to bring to the confirmation leaders.

Lesson Guides:

Each section of the journal starts with a brief introduction to the topic to be read about. Additional pages have icons, info graphs, and applicable connections.

Read Sections:

Data from the Lutheran Youth Poll of 2022 shows that over half of our youth rarely or never read the Bible by themselves. The Read section aims to get students into the Bible on their own.

Reflect Sections:

Questions in the Reflect sections ask users to consider what they believe about God and His plan for their lives.

Written and Field-Tested by a Pastor

In 2018, Trinity Lutheran Church had a problem. Confirmation wasn’t working.

Their standard format of pastor-led lecture and small group discussion needed to change. The confirmation team felt they had too little time to teach and it was hard to know whether participation equaled understanding.

They formed a committee and looked at how other churches their size were doing confirmation. They combined different approaches to form a confirmation curriculum that worked for them. One piece was particularly successful—a confirmation journal.

According to Pastor Lee Hopf, what worked well about the confirmation journal was how students could work at their own pace through the material yet still have accountability through unit check-ins. This allowed for students to have an opportunity to speak with a trusted adult about what they were learning and for parents to uniquely walk alongside their confirmands.

Now, more than four years later, this journal-style confirmation has yielded fantastic results.

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“We’re in our fourth year of using this approach, and I have students from the first year talking to me about how they’re coming back and referencing their journal and everything they learned in that time. Now that they’ve had challenges in high school that have made them ask deeper questions of faith, they’re able to go back and look at this stuff and it makes more sense.”

Changing confirmation to meet the needs of their community and context was a risk for Trinity Lutheran Church and Pastor Lee but one that made a significant impact.

Hear more from Rev. Lee Hopf

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