Wherever you are in your ministry, this post is still relevant. Many of you may be in the thinking and planning phase. More will probably be in the near beginning figuring things out. Some of you will be a full blown program. Wherever you are, please stay tuned in!
When you begin thinking about a ministry, there are many places to start and things to do. But before you get carried away with policies and procedures and classrooms, you need stop and think and pray.
Ask yourself and your pastor (or whoever is supervising you) and God some questions:
Why does the ministry even exist?
What REALLY matters in a church? a.k.a. What is YOUR church trying to do? Why does a church exist?
How are disciples made in a church, and how are children and parents discipled?
What are actual needs of parents in your church?
Do children need to be "put away" during service times? Should they be in the service?
What atmosphere do you want your children's ministry to have/exude? High-energy? Safe and reliable? Home grown? Small and intimate? Official and programmatic? Calm? (haha right!)
How do you want your parents to feel when they drop off their children? How do you want visitors to feel when they come with children?
How do you want your volunteers to feel and serve and be served?
How should you serve? What's the ideal way to serve in leadership?
Most of these questions' answers revolve around one passage of Scripture for our church. Read Matthew 28:16-20. It should be a very familiar passage!
16 Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. 17 And when they saw him they worshiped him, but some doubted. 18 And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
Our (FGC's) children's ministry revolves around the command of disciple-making. Actually, our entire church revolves around that command. We are called by Christ Himself to go and make disciples and baptize. We also have the assurance that He is with us through it all, to the end of the age. Our church's mission statement is this: to go and make disciples. Our children's ministry should be the same. How does making disciples and being a disciple apply to the questions above?
Work out each question carefully. Write a small sentence for each one. Put it all together (hopefully in a coherent order) and BOOM! You have your children's ministry mission statement. You might even have your entire church's mission statement.
If you are one of the people who are further along in their ministry, I think it is still wise to look over these questions and re-evaluate whether or not your ministry is functioning as one that honors God, or has become just another cool program at your cool church.
I cannot stress this enough- EVERY FUTURE DECISION YOU MAKE WILL BE BASED ON YOUR CHURCH'S BELIEFS OF WHAT THE PURPOSE OF THE CHURCH AND CHILDREN'S MINISTRY IS.
Next post: The wrong reasons people start a ministry.... in my perspective.
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