I was just doing a little research looking for some ideas for worship that could involve children more, rather than just being an adult happening. I would really like to hear some of your thoughts and ideas in this regard. I'm talking about brainstorming a little bit here. Keeping in mind that the elders will make all decisions pertaining to the spiritual well-being of our congregation - they need ideas to consider that apply to our particular circumstance of having an abundance of wonderful, joyful, cheerful, happy little children in our midst. Here are just a couple of ideas I have heard mentioned:
Children's Church Deacon - Organizing children's church is a huge undertaking and also a very important one. One of the articles I was reading was written by a deacon in charge of children's church. I thought, "Hey! We could really use a deacon for this purpose!" Our children's church is good now, but with better scheduling, better materials and equipment we could have a Children's Bible Time that is excellent!
Bible School on Sunday Evenings - One of the problems we have now is rushing through the Sunday School Bible lessons, hurrying to get morning worship started and cutting the worship off to get out on time. Then we bore our children to sleep on Sunday night with nothing that interest them. We could make Sunday morning for fellowship and worship (with Children's worship) and Sunday night for Bible study (and Home groups; btw, what do we do with our children in the home groups? Bring toys???)
Let's hear some of your ideas! BRING IT ON!
Wednesday, October 11, 2006
Throwing Out Some Ideas
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11 comments:
The idea about moving Sunday’s classes to the pm service is very worthy of serious consideration. Sunday’s am energy could be devoted solely to worship. Worship time could swell a bit with us still dismissing earlier than we do currently. The total time spent at the building would be decreased by 45 minutes to an hour. This would be easier for both the elderly and parents of very young children. Most importantly, we could focus on creating and maintaining an atmosphere of worship.
Sunday pm would then operate similar to our Wednesday pm service. Personally, it would make Sun pm feel more significant rather than sheer duty.
Another idea, not directly related to worship:
There are some great materials created to be used in a small-group format. For example, Crown Financial has some tremendous material that challenges participants to consider how Christ-like living impacts our day-to-day money management. Walk Thru the Bible has a very challenging series on parenting. I get excited about materials like these because they push us to the basics. We too often speak of Christian principles in vague, abstract terms, never really letting it get to our daily decisions and priorities. I think it would be great for us to be exposed to materials that push us to consider our daily financial decisions and offer us a concrete vision for what we are attempting to accomplish with our children. I offer these as examples; the possibilities are endless if we are open to them.
Ok this is what I have been thinking about all day while at work. It's interesting to me that you would bring up the same idea.
What about the idea of allowing a little kid who was willing, to get up with one of the song leaders during our worship time and lead the congregation in a song(s)?
What about allowing a child to come forward and lead the congregation in a prayer to begin services or to end services? Have you ever heard how beautiful and straight to the point a child's prayer is?
Those are just a couple of my ideas!
Jennifer
P.S. I have been thinking alot today about how our entire church building is set up for adult use and not one bit for children. This really bothers me and I hope to see some changes in the near future. When a child comes into the church building, they need to feel as though that building is there for them too and not just for mommies and daddies.
I like the ideas that have been suggested. The Sunday night bible classes sound promising.
I have thought for some time that starting a bible trivia team for the kids would be fun. I could see having different levels according to age groups. I know that some churchs travel to bible bowls, but I was thinking just for the church and then growing outward if it ever came to that.
I see a lot of interest in my 4th and 5th grade class and then the bible bowl at church camp seems exciting to the kids. Wouldn't it be great if at camp all the finalist were Sunshine kids, then we would show those other kids (did I type that out loud, must be my competitive juices flowing).
I was thinking about what Ryan Coriell said at our retreat, he was wondering if there was something we could do for the kids to old for children's church. Well, I think that this age group should be able to stay and listen to the sermons, but what if once or twice a month we allowed them to go back and practice for the bible team. They would be learning and having fun at the same time. If we did it during services then parents would not have to bring them back at some other alotted time and hopefully we would get more participation. We could do it for kids in high school down.
Also we could have young kids involved, the weeks that we do bible tivia, we could seperate the kids between school and non-school age kids. I am sure that the leaders of children's church would not mind if they didn't have as many kids, as long as they knew ahead of time.
I don't what you guys think but I think it could be a lot of fun for all. I know I would be interested in helping out or even organizing with some help.
Ramble thoughts by Aaron
These sound great, let's hear some more!
Older kids can help pass out bulletins, read the scripture before the sermon starts, and be excellent door greeters! I think several of the older kids would love to restart Harry Woodworth's tradition of passing out candy to the smaller kids and saying "give me 5"! I feel it would be great for them to start welcoming each other. This could grow well into the future. I can think of nothing better than showing up where I'm suppose to be and someone saying "Give me 5!" just for showing up!
This, I'm sure, sounds kinda' funny, but I think you get the idea.
All in all, everything we teach the kids how to do now, will continue on into Sunshine's future. I want to start creating the kind of congregation I want to be a part of in the future, right now.
Jennifer
I remember visiting a church while Kim was in college at Morehead that brought all of the kids up front and sat them around the youth leader or minister on the stage. He then brought out a book or had prepared some type of mini sermon for the kids that lasted maybe 2-3 minutes and just read to them while everyone else listened. They then sang a song and sent them off to their Childrens Bible Time. Was neat to see them incorporate them into the worship for just a short moment before sending them off. Kind of like what Scott did last week.
I like the idea of moving the Bible classes to Sunday night and also in favor of moving up Sunday night to 5 or 5:30 to allow families with schoolchildren to have some fellowship time after church is over before having to get their kids home and to bed.
What if every Sunday before sending the kids to class or whatever, we gather them all together and the entire congregation pray over them?
I love your idea about what they did at that one church while Kim was in college, Aaron!
I think it would also be great to have some of the kids to get up and talk about how God has worked in their lives during our annual Thanksgiving service. We always have adult men up there talking about their lives. Why not listen to a child?
Jennifer
I love the idea of children teaching other children. They would really enjoy the puppets....those behind the curtain and those watching the show. Great idea!
There needs to be a great rotation system put into place concerning the teachers of the bible classes. I am especially interested in seeing this happen in the 2 and 3 year old class. Teachers in that class are stuck in there because no one else is willing to get down on the floor and play and teach these little ones. There has to be some else interested in this class besides Heather, Nola, me, Ann, and Rose. There needs to be at least 2 helpers for the teacher in the class in order to have an effective class time in there. There are lots of bathroom runs and lots of "shhhh, listen to the teacher". The class is very do-able and I would love to see more people take on this class in a regular rotation and enjoy watching these little minds learn and grow. It's a beautiful thing. I really, really miss going to my own class on Wednesday nights with the rest of you.
Jennifer
A few years back we moved Wednesday night to accommodate the school age children--don't remember if we started at 7 or 6:30 but apparently everyone wasn't for that change and it was moved back to 7:30.
Kim, Not all can prophesy, not all speak in tongues, not all can interpret, not all can be teachers, and I surely am not a nursury attendant! That's just one of those talents I lack!
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