kids ministry...
at our little pub church thing, we've been talking about kids ministry for a year. So far, we've come up with a patch of carpet, a sign-up calendar and some background checks! Which actually, has been pretty much all we need so far. We're seeing more actual children now (as opposed to 6 month old babies who are happy to simply be passed from person to person) so the conversation needs to evolve a bit for us, I think.
I found this parable on my friend Ben's blog. (thanks mate!) I offer it for your consideration, dear blog.
Peter and Penny Go Swimming
by Janet, Laurie Jennie & Victor Metcalfe
Soon after Peter and Penny were born, their parents began taking them to the local swimming pool every weekend. The parents were enthusiastic swimmers, and they hoped their children would be keen swimmers too.
Of course Peter and Penny were not allowed to go the swimming pool itself, they were looked after in a little room right beside the pool. Sometimes they cried because they wanted to stay with their parents, but that wasn't allowed because they might disturb the adult swimmers. Besides they were too young to understand swimming, and they wouldn't appreciate it fully.
When Peter and Penny were three years old, they were allowed to go to another room just down the hall from the swimming pool. There they heard stories from the Swimmers Manual, and they colored pictures of people swimming.
When they were six years old, Peter and Penny went to another big room - a big room with lots of children. Here they began to get really serious about swimming. For the first ten or fifteen minutes they were allowed to take off their shoes and socks and splash around in the wading pool. They then went to classes with other children their own age to learn more about swimming. They were taught by some dedicated people who loved swimming, but who hardly ever swam themselves any more because they were busy with the children.
By the time Peter and Penny were thirteen, they had studied the Swimmer's Manual in even more detail and had learned the rules of the swimming pool by heart: "You will not run on the deck, you shall not bring flotation devices into the pool area..." They had also learried about the properties of water, the muscles used in swimming, and the various swimming strokes. They had studied great swimmers of the past, including Olympic medal winners.
They had heard about swimmers who went to other countries such as Africa or India to teach swimming, and they had seen slides of groups of African or Indian swimmers standing beside their swimming pools.On special occasions, Peter and Penny had been allowed to go with their parents in to the pool as long as they didn't splash around too much and disturb the other swimmers or bother the life guard.
At last Peter and Penny finished swimming school and were allowed to accompany their parents into the swimming pool every week.They tried it a few times. Much to the disappointment of their parents, Peter and Penny had lost interest and preferred to watch television instead.
I found this parable on my friend Ben's blog. (thanks mate!) I offer it for your consideration, dear blog.
Peter and Penny Go Swimming
by Janet, Laurie Jennie & Victor Metcalfe
Soon after Peter and Penny were born, their parents began taking them to the local swimming pool every weekend. The parents were enthusiastic swimmers, and they hoped their children would be keen swimmers too.
Of course Peter and Penny were not allowed to go the swimming pool itself, they were looked after in a little room right beside the pool. Sometimes they cried because they wanted to stay with their parents, but that wasn't allowed because they might disturb the adult swimmers. Besides they were too young to understand swimming, and they wouldn't appreciate it fully.
When Peter and Penny were three years old, they were allowed to go to another room just down the hall from the swimming pool. There they heard stories from the Swimmers Manual, and they colored pictures of people swimming.
When they were six years old, Peter and Penny went to another big room - a big room with lots of children. Here they began to get really serious about swimming. For the first ten or fifteen minutes they were allowed to take off their shoes and socks and splash around in the wading pool. They then went to classes with other children their own age to learn more about swimming. They were taught by some dedicated people who loved swimming, but who hardly ever swam themselves any more because they were busy with the children.
By the time Peter and Penny were thirteen, they had studied the Swimmer's Manual in even more detail and had learned the rules of the swimming pool by heart: "You will not run on the deck, you shall not bring flotation devices into the pool area..." They had also learried about the properties of water, the muscles used in swimming, and the various swimming strokes. They had studied great swimmers of the past, including Olympic medal winners.
They had heard about swimmers who went to other countries such as Africa or India to teach swimming, and they had seen slides of groups of African or Indian swimmers standing beside their swimming pools.On special occasions, Peter and Penny had been allowed to go with their parents in to the pool as long as they didn't splash around too much and disturb the other swimmers or bother the life guard.
At last Peter and Penny finished swimming school and were allowed to accompany their parents into the swimming pool every week.They tried it a few times. Much to the disappointment of their parents, Peter and Penny had lost interest and preferred to watch television instead.
3 Comments:
Bob,
We have just recently made this transition at our church. Prompted by the book, "Post-modern children's ministry" we looked for more integration of the kids.
We used to have a place that was blocked off with books and chairs and toys and the like. We stopped doing this and began to ask parents to bring their kids in.
We are now moving into a phase where we are going to prepare little booklets to help the kids understand what is happening sunday morning. Could be a maze or a coloring page of some kind. Either way we want to promote conversation between parent and child after the service is over.
cont....
Reasons for having kids in the service:
1. We want them to be a part of our community. We don't want them to feel excluded.
2. We want to be a church that loves kids. Not just put them in the corner so the parents don't have to bother with them.
3. We believe that parents are the primary disciplers of their kids, not "sunday school teachers".
4. We believe the family is the primary small group for the kid to experience community and love.
5. We want all of our church to know the kids, feel comfortable around them, and have the kids know us.
I could keep going but you get the idea. This is definitely the direction we are moving in.
I grew up in the church. We had kids' church during our Sunday morning services, but not during the midweek or Sunday night service. The kids' church was not very fun or engaging. There were a few teachers that we had on occasion that knew how to tell a story and understood how kids think well enough to speak to us on our level. The rest of the time I spent in the "big church" floundering and trying to figure out what was going on, bored all the way. I left that kind of church when I got older and didn't come back for years. Today, I am a kids' pastor and I feel that reaching kids in a relevant way with the Gospel of Christ is the most important thing that we do as a church. The parable is cute, but the alternative to all of the swim classes is to just throw kids into the pool and watch them drown. I'm not okay with that. I don't think it is reasonable to think that kids are going to thrive in a setting that is designed for their parents. I think being drowned as a child is going to keep kids from ever going back into the pool as adults.
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