We offer faith milestones for littles with a big-who-loves-them to make for a sticky faith memory with some accountability as a platform to teach the holy habits of growing our faith in Jesus. Most are 45 minutes long. Most include a teaching, a practicable interactive element, takeaways, a certificate, and a class photo. Most, especially the Communion and Baptism milestones, will include a collaborating clergy. If offered as a workshop, we begin by lighting an LED pillar candle and repeating, “We light this candle….as a symbol…of God’s presence with us…and around us.”

The schedule looks like this:

K5 – I Can Go To Sunday School (August) … A meet and greet with tour into McEachern Kids (K5-5th grade) the Sunday prior to Promotion Sunday especially for rising kindergartners led by the Ambassadors

K5 & 1st – I Can Receive Communion: Bread & Juice Class (Sept) …. Holy Communion 

1st & 2nd – I Can Pray (February) … Prayer stations with takeaway tools to use at home

2nd & 3rd – I Can Love My Church (Nov) … Group treasure hunt to locations throughout campus and learning vocabulary like narthex, pew, along with local church history

3rd-5th – I Can Serve (August) … Acolyte training

3rd-5th – I Can Follow Jesus: Baptism (March) NEW

4th & 5th – I Can Lead: Ambassadors (August) … Leadership Training 5-7pm w/dinner

4th & 5th – Road Trip Retreat (March) … Fri-Sun shared event with other local churches retreat at local state park (alternate Ambassadors Road Trip and Disciples Road Trip)

5th grade – Moving On Up to Middle School (March) … begin transition to youth group

5th & 6th – Wonderfully Made: Loved By God (January) … Human Sexuality & Jesus w/parents; 3 days

K5-5th – I Can Worship With My Family – various worship services with intentional teaching of worship elements specific to our denomination and honoring of our local church

K5-5th – I Can Go On A Mission Trip: Family Mission Trip (July) NEW

I started these years ago to make special for families a time/place for intentional teaching and practice what I considered the most important practices of our faith in Jesus. I chose these elements since they were practices of Jesus. Each year we edit to excellence with shared language and interactive elements. I started with three in the first year.

As a great number of new families are moving into our state and into our community, offering these faith milestones help us…
1. Find common language with those new to the faith and new to our part of the country/world with shared experiences with new friends-in-the-Lord. Moving from other parts of the country/world, these experiences practice our commonalities and give space for sacred conversations.
2. Give the littles and their bigs access to the spiritual leaders in our church Teaching for a little and a big-who-loves-them, the big learns alongside their little, removing the anxiety which could be part of joining a new faith community. Young parents today are looking for integrity and truth in their spiritual leaders. Faith milestones give space to begin and grow those relationships.
3. Remove the expectation that a robust faith in Jesus will be ‘caught’. Faith milestones give intentional space for developmentally appropriate faith formation family experiences. This generation of bigs of our littles want to learn alongside their children. Faith milestones sets the table for bigs to be the spiritual heroes in their little’s lives.

Want to take it a step further? Blessing of a driver’s license, Confirmation, Bible Ninja Warrior, first job, biblical finance, etc. You get the idea. I’m responsible for K5-5th grades, but so much more could be accomplished if shared throughout for 0-26yo.

How could you set a table for faith milestones in your church family?

“My feet have closely followed his steps; I have kept to his way without turning aside.” Job 23:11

Milestones are the significant cultural and developmental markers that we experience throughout our years of life. They are our firsts. There are ordinary firsts of steps and teeth, walking and talking. There are also firsts of our faith life: baptism, beginning Sunday School, receiving a Bible, our first retreat, making decisions for Christ, and more.

Faith Milestones are those firsts as we grow in our faith experiences because we know it doesn’t happen just on Sunday mornings.  It’s part of all we are and all we do as God’s beloved people.  Attending a CEF (Christian Educator’s Fellowship) national conference last year gave me the jumping off point to identify intentional firsts, presented as Faith Milestones, for our little people journeying through children’s ministries.  A huge thanks goes to Donna Draeger, Minister of Disciple Formation at Centennial UMC in Roseville, Minnesota and Deb Johnson, Children, Youth, and Family Minister at Spirit of Hope UMC in Golden Valley, Minnesota for leading the workshop that got this ball rolling around in my head.

It was important these Faith Milestones were in partnership and shared with the whole family as we sought to help families find ways to grow in their faith together.  We wanted shared spiritual experiences for our families and decided to put a few ages together just in case a family missed it the first time.  I calendared throughout the year based on our church’s rhythm of activities and wanted to introduce as much faith-filled vocabulary as possible for these firsts.

I put out a brochure (old school, I know, but it has all the dates on it for the year and that seems to work best for my parents to be able to keep up with it, especially those with more than one child.) I also put it in the monthly newsletters, bulletins, and sent a personal invite as well as a personal email a few weeks out inviting families to preregister if a meal was involved.

Ages 3 & 4 and any new rising kindergartner students: Welcome to Sunday School – Scheduled the Sunday before fall’s promotion Sunday from 12:15-1pm.  Program: What does Sunday School mean? What do we do there? Through story, song, and hands-on activities, learn what a fun place Sunday School is!  I invite a couple of the Sunday School teachers to participate so the families meet & greet and learn the routines.  We play some songs, tour the children’s hallway, decorate a cookie, and we give out a copy of The Berenstain Bears Go to Sunday School to each student.  The following week, I send a personal, handwritten post card as follow up inviting them to Sunday School.

Age 5/Kindergartners and 1st Grade: I Can Pray – Scheduled on an October Sunday from 12:15-1:30 and includes a snack lunch – Children and parents/grandparents learn the parts of prayer and when and how to pray through word and song.  We’ll have prayer stations the families can share similar to the Praying On The Go Bags that are prepared each month.  We’ll make a prayer list and trace hands in a prayer journal for the family to share together…to be left on the kitchen counter for everyone in the family to write blessings or prayer requests and read throughout the comings and goings of their family.  Their take-aways will be the family prayer journal and a glory bell…something to place in the home to ring when they want to praise the Lord!  We hit it and shout, “Glory!”

1st & 2nd Grades: Touch & See My Church – Scheduled on a Spring Sunday from 12:15-1:30 and includes a snack lunch – A chance to explore the sanctuary ‘behind the scenes’ and learn more about worship.  The students and their families will go on a scavenger hunt in the Sanctuary (What is the name of our pastor? How many pews are in the Sanctuary? What’s in the baptismal font? What’s bigger…the pastor’s office or church library?, What’s the color of the Sanctuary doors?, etc) I invite the worship leader, a musician, our senior pastor, a worship singer, an acolyte, and the church secretary to be a ‘station’ where the children ask each of 3 questions:  What do you do? How did you get to do what you do? Where do you do what you do? Students receive a sticker at the end of each station because little people like stickers.  Their take-away is a search book of bible stories.  This milestone is more involved, so I’ll post about this one next week.

3rd & 4th Grades: I Can Serve – Scheduled on a Sunday before Advent/November an hour before our CLUB345 gathering and led by our Senior Pastor.  The students learn how they can ‘help’ in the worship service and practice communion, lighting and extinguishing candles, get a tour of the chancel/stage area, etc.  The students also get their first hands-on teaching on the sacraments of baptism and holy communion.  This is also a very specific time when our students spend time with their pastor.  Anytime I can build their relationships with our pastor, I’m all in!

3rd – 5th Grades: A Bible of My Own – A student late night 6pm-9:30pm to learn about the bible and how to use it in daily living.  I’m in the process of writing this one now, so check out the blog later.  Our church gives Early Reader Bibles to students entering 1st grade and NIV Red Letter edition bibles to those entering 3rd grade (they’ll use these for CLUB345) on the Sunday during worship before the first CLUB345.

4th – 5th Grades: A Day Away At Ms. DeDe’s Retreat – Scheduled on a Tuesday in July practicing personal spiritual disciplines which help grow our focus and love for the Lord.  Deep & Wide Retreat

The scriptures share that Moses prepared the people of Israel to enter the Good Land by asking them to remember and tell the ways that they had experienced God’s love and care. In this way, he knew that faith in the God of Israel would live on.  These shared spiritual memories are special and we have sought to set them apart as such.

Deuteronomy 6:6 “Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart. Recite them to your children and talk about them…”

 

Family Ministry: A Holistic Approach was a breakout session led by Kathleen Jaoudi at the 2023 Children’s Pastors Conference. Wearing 3D glasses, she invited us to look at ministry with families through a different lens. Not the silo-ed lens of post-Young Life to the present, but generational discipleship for today.

Using a pie chart, she shared a model for intentional focus in six key areas. In these six key areas, you probably are already doing a good bit. Grouping what you are already doing might offer some insight for what to edit and what to shore-up.

First, she said that all ministry is Family Ministry. Agreed. Family Ministry is a process rather than a program with the goal of operating as a full Body of Christ in your local church. Agreed even more. Here are the six key areas:

Milestones: Milestones we make are the developmentally appropriate teachings of our faith symbols, rituals, and holy habits; Milestones we mark are the remarkable moments of life to commemorate the work of God in our family’s life in ways that we did not see coming.

Educational: The intentional building of educational experiences for some and for all. Ex: CLUB345, K2Club, Sunday school, Missions lunches, bringing in a special speaker, etc.

Caring: This is the congregational care of sharing life in grief and celebration; food ministry; new babies; hospital stays, etc.

Parent Equipping: Helping along the way in bite-sized pieces for resources, special events, emails, social media, etc. Ex: My son told me that a website is too much info and no one has time to get lost down a hole of too much information. But providing weekly resources in bite-sized pieces by email or social media posts make for a much easier application.

Family of Families: This is what we do to fill the holes of families, Jesus Loves You Boxes, prayer, moving, car care, Lent Dine-outs, mentoring, coaching, etc.  

Families in Service: Multi-generational opportunities to serve others and one another, family mission trips, hospitality, family VBS, cleaning and/or building spaces, Great Day of Service, delivering, collecting, donating, etc.

Christina Embree is the founder and creator of ReFocus Ministry. She presented at the most recent Bible Creatives Online Conference about the pillars of creating a plan for generational discipleship: Institutional, Spatial, Technological, and Relational. 

As I’m still processing how to incorporate these pillars within this family ministry pie, I really like her vocabulary: Generational Discipleship. I’ve spent some time with her and I really like her plan for intentionally setting the table for folks in at least three generations and sharing the life of the gospel through everyday discipleship in ways that all can engage in a life of faith in Jesus.

Whatever we call it, we know that the purpose of the church is to equip the saints for ministry. Equipping Christians is the one thing we are called to do. Everything else is good, but equipping Christians to live as Christians in the world is what we are to do no matter what. Let’s have a plan for it, let’s set the table for it, let’s push beyond the awkward, and quit protecting turf that we imagine is there because we can’t imagine anything else. I’m putting on my imagination hat!

“But you, Lord, sit enthroned forever; your renown endures through all generations.” Psalm 102:12

Sunday morning is still king. Why?
1. It’s the day and time historically celebrated as a local church honoring Jesus rising from the dead on a Sunday morning. The resurrection of Jesus is the very basis for our Christian faith.
2. It’s the day and time for critical mass of the Body of Christ.

Though other times and days of the week are growing in popularity to fit the rhythms of the families of my communities, Sundays are still ‘game day.’ 

So what does our Sunday morning look like?

8:30am – Set up
We share all of our spaces with weekday preschool and/or recreation ministry meaning staging takes place on Thursdays, but full setup for Sunday am happens on Sunday am.

9am – Welcome Center opens
We begin receiving children K5-5th grade in one area with shared table games and building toys, understanding that kids will chat while their hands are busy setting the table for time with church friends. The goal is to receive children early as their parents need to arrive at their areas of service before services at 9:30am unhurried and relaxed AND to build in time for ‘hanging out with my church friends.’

9:30am – Large group
Welcome, Announcements, one song, one game, one locating and reading of scripture passage as they yell out the next word they find with their reading finger as I read from my red Bible (if it’s red, Jesus said), short story video from Pursue God Kids, follow-up questions to share in their age group (begins the transition from large group to small), repeat after me closing prayers, then dismissed to small group classrooms.

9:45am – Small group
For a consistent number of littles in each class we group kids K5 (our college intern leads this group every single week alongside a parent volunteer for relationship consistency), 1st grade (a leader who has looped up from K5 with them with a high school intern), 2nd & 3rd (two art teachers trade one month on/off and provide a worship art response which aligns with the lesson), 4th & 5th (led by two adult leads one month/off with an apologetic – defending your faith – lens with each lesson). The apologetics lens is the basis for choosing Pursue God Kids and all of our curriculum choices. Pursue God Kids is only $35/month no matter the church size and includes a fabulous library of Godly parenting resources from a biblical worldview.

10:30am – 10:45am Small groups return to Welcome Center awaiting pickup
This is a level of hospitality of making the drop off and picking up a smooth, with-friends transition. A bucket of fruit snacks and fruit bars is set nearby for kids to self-serve a snack and ice water is always available in a dispenser with paper cups. Will Guidara of Eleven Madison Park restaurant trains his staff in unreasonable hospitality. He writes, “Design the beginning and end of your time for the feeling of ‘this is where I belong.'”

We gather together for a worship service at 11am so only the nursery is available for 4 year olds and younger. Though the service looks no different than the 9:30am service in a traditional setting, I’m permitted to incorporate movement with a children’s moment, sign language the Apostle’s Creed and Gloria Patre to offer interactive and teaching elements along the side aisle, and clipboards with Alphabots and reading games to align with the service or teach the worship service elements.

Other regular welcoming and teaching opportunities:
* K2 CLUB – K5 thru 2nd graders with a big who loves them on the 3rd Sunday of each month 4-5pm on holy habits.
* CLUB345 – 3rd thru 5th graders on the 3rd Sunday of each month 3:45-5:30pm with an annual theme of The 10 Commandments, The Lord’s Prayer, or The Apostle’s Creed
* Tuesday night Kid’s Bible Study – we align with an adult Bible study 6:30-7:30pm with pizza dinner and developmentally appropriate study of God’s Word from an apologetics standpoint. We’re starting a 4-week Advent study tonight. Parents are studying “The Case for Christmas”. The kids are studying “Songs of the Christmas Story”.

Additional holy habit teaching and intentional discipleship come through Faith Milestones. I’ll be co-leading a Faith Milestone workshop with the fabulous Brooke Barksdale on Wednesday of this week at Marietta First UMC in Marietta, Georgia. If you’re local, we’d love to have you. If you’re not local, we’ll be uploading files of the workshop in the Facebook Group: Faith Experiences for Kids and Families later this week. 

What does your Sunday morning look like?

“We need kids in our churches not because that means the church is growing or at the very least not dying; we need kids in our churches to show us what it looks like to have faith in God.” Shaun Stevenson, “Redefining The Kidmin Wins: How to Face Discouragement”, p. 134

The local church I serve is going through a discernment process for how the congregation will move forward into the future. I affectionately call them ‘Family Meetings’.

#1 Son and Baby Girl never liked family meetings when they were growing up, but they were absolutely necessary for the health of our family. Family meetings meant we would be walking into a difficult season or resetting from a difficult season. We could expect the first ten minutes of the Reilly Family Meetings to be awful as we faced some elephant in the room, but afterwards we’d always be okay, even better over time. Nobody liked Family Meetings, but they were necessary to share information, offer space to process the information, then respond and move forward as one family in the healthiest way. 

In many local United Methodist Churches, this Family Meeting process is covered in prayer and lots of information. Lots of information. Lots. Of. Information. Study and prayer.

My church leadership has sought to make a way so that everyone can BE heard, BE informed, and BE loved through the Family Meeting process. A task force composed of amazing Jesus guys and gals has led the way. I’ve covered them daily in the armor of God through prayer.

As a staff member of the local church we’ve been asked to continue to plan for and prepare in a neutral position to engage in our community in ministry and mission. As a peculiar people (see last week’s post) I’ve seen the fruit of that with new families participating in women’s Bible studies, children’s Bible studies, religious badge clinics, recreational soccer, special events, local and international missions, and a sermon series diving deeply into 1 John. We have Jesus work to do and have no time to be distracted, sloppy, nor halt everything until.

Take Courage: The Book of Haggai is a wonderful small group study authored by Jennifer Rothschild. She uses Jeremiah 29:4-9 to lay out three practices of a woman in exile (in a foreign land) which speaks to how to navigate through a place we did not ask for, yet here we are: (1) Participate with it by planting, building, increasing, multiplying, (2) Pursue God in it through daily study, model with my whole heart and mind, and (3) be Patient with the exile, patient with myself, patient with the process. Rothschild finishes with the promise of faithfully participating, pursuing, and being patient: “Then you will call on me and come and pray to me and I will listen to you.” Jeremiah 29:12.

Though chatter is thick, the navigational beacons to share the goodness and faithfulness of our Triune God have remained clear because I’ve worked through my own three BEs.

Be in prayer.
Lord, let me not be distracted from doing the work of growing in Christian community through sharing the gospel of Jesus. Let me not sin in any of it through word or deed. You alone are trustworthy and I trust You to make a way for the littles and bigs to love You with their whole hearts for their whole lives. Let me faithfully drip, drip, drip into the faith buckets of the families I serve. For those who are serving on my local church’s task force, I pray Your full Armor upon them, as shared in Ephesians 6. Amen. 

Be clearly informed.
The chatter is about many issues. I’ve discerned the good, the beautiful, and the true as best I can. For the rest I have to stay out of the weeds and trust the Lord to work out the details. As a pilgrim on the Walk to Emmaus in 2000 we were challenged to study church history. Outright craziness! How in the world can the church still be around?!? Yet here are. A holy remnant I hope to be. Even now I’m enrolled in a great online class about the church and leaders of the era around King Henry VIII and Martin Luther entitled, “Off With Their Heads”  led by Brandi Diamond who served a season as a children’s ministry leader. 

Be ready for the change that is coming.
Change is coming. It’s unreasonable to think anything will remain the same regardless of what happens. We have been actively (or reactively) engaged in change for quite some time now. We’ve gone through a shift in family rhythms, routines, culturally, and can truthfully report that everything is still changing. So the gospel of Jesus my focus must be. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever and oh, how I love Him. This is where being clearly informed will be helpful to navigate the flux in the flex. I’ve become a student of my families to know seasons, holidays, work rhythms, and am involved in their lives even if only online through social media with an attaboy for riding a bike without training wheels, losing a tooth, winning a contest, and so much more. So I’ll move forward with my plans to expand Faith Milestones beyond the local church to home in 2023 and beyond. Stay tuned because we have Jesus work to do and have no time to wait. 

In the words of the MasterChief voice on my Waze app, “Stay the course.” 

“‘You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you’ declares the Lord.” Jeremiah 29:13-14b

A Faith Milestone is an intentional teaching and practice of various holy habits for a robust faith in Jesus. Faith Milestones include shared language and the same developmentally appropriate interactive elements of the saints who have gone before us. As new families join our church family, it is very important for us to make space for teaching how holy habits are shared and practiced within THIS church family offering historical teaching and a way to reduce the risk of anxiety and uncertainty when the opportunity arises to participate in corporate worship.

Bread & Juice Class is one of my favorites. Kindergarten and 1st grade littles with their bigs learn and practice the historical and current ways we intentionally remember Jesus with bread and juice.

We start with a discussion about how food and visual decorations help us celebrate important events like birthdays, Thanksgiving, Christmas, etc. Then we move around, chat through, and experience the following in ….

• Why do we do this? Jesus said for his friends to “Eat this and remember me,” and “Drink this and remember me,” and “Do this and remember me,” because we forget
• Bread (yum) – flat bread vs puffy bread; yeast; remembering how God’s people had to hurry up and get away from the meaners so they didn’t have time for the bread to rise with yeast (The Passover); when we eat we use all five senses
• Juice (yum) – deep purple grape juice; Welch’s in a cup
• Story of Mr. Welch (making a way for littles to participate)
• Read a book (cultural references)
• Worship placemats (this holy habit/practice is part of our worship table)
• Craft of cutting and gluing a challis and a round wafer with Jesus stickers since Holy Communion is all about Jesus (interactive)
• Intinction, wafer, smaller celebration cups (juice w/wafer) and all the new vocabulary
• We come to receive communion with our hands folded in the shape of a cross to receive Holy Communion (we don’t TAKE communion, but rather RECEIVE it)
• We say AMEN when we receive it because AMEN means “Yes!” and “Let it be so” (sacred vocabulary)
• Returning the unused bread and juice back to the earth (a favorite to break up bread and toss on the ground)
• Holy=set apart;  super-duper-awesome-special (use American sign language)
• Communion=in community where there’s always a place for little people and those who love them at all the tables (use American sign language)
• A certificate of completion because it’s a Faith Milestone (take home item) along with a small communion cup gifted to each child from a Holy Land pilgrim made of olive wood who loves them in their church (connecting to the saints still here)
• Davinci’s Last Supper (historic religious art)

Even the bigs learn something new or are reminded of what they’ve forgotten about this sacred meal, historical faith practice, and important faith milestone we practice in community as friends and family of Jesus.

Learn more about Faith Milestones at MilestonesMinistry.org for living and passing on faith.

“Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!” Philippians 4:4

Liturgical = relating to public worship. Agility = ability to move quickly and easily.

The updated edition of Bishop Robert Schnase’s Five Practices of a Fruitful Congregation has been the book in two summer book clubs I’m part of. An in-person, brown bag, small group at my church on Tuesdays at noon following lead staff meeting (for the purposes of shared vocabulary), and an online small group through Zoom on Wednesday mornings at 8-9am (for the  purposes of what this shared vocabulary looks like in other local churches). We discuss a chapter each week.

Last week was a discussion on the chapter entitled “Passionate Worship”. Coming from a kidmin perspective, I have no seat at the big church table. But when I read it from a kidmin perspective, I do sit in the seat to help ‘bridge the divide’ from The Treehouse (basement) or Food Truck Church (parking lot) to the Sanctuary (big church) for my families’ so that….

1. New families can find places and spaces of familiarity to decrease their anxiety level for entering a new space with its own rituals, and
2. Current families can explore multiple worship practices with their littles.

“Thank God for his (John Wesley) spiritual maturity and liturgical agility! Our rich Christian heritage of worship comes to us through many convolutions of style and practice. Outdoor camp meetings, frontier revivals, high-church liturgies, African American spirituals – these are but a few of many streams of practice that flow through our history.” Robert Schnase, Five Practices of Fruitful Congregations, pg 60

My first step was to watch a month or two’s services of my church’s ‘big church’ to find the pieces of ‘regularness’ in every single service. I took really good notes as if I was a first-timer each week. I compiled a list of those regular elements.

The second step was to evaluate the elements to determine one or two to intentionally teach at some other place and space in a participatory, developmentally appropriate way.

Worship experiences and practices are typically not taught, but caught. With the average attendance of faithful church attenders in my area of the state being 1 out of 5 Sundays which include Easter Sunday and Christmas Eve, we’re unreasonably expecting little people and new big people to ‘catch’ our rituals of weekly worship less often than twelve days out of 365.

One place we teach these regular elements is through Faith Milestones. Each year our children’s ministry offers developmentally appropriate faith milestone events at 45 minutes for a little with a big person who loves them specific to…
(1) Bread & Juice Class – Holy Communion served in various ways and how we typically offer it at our church, ex: intinction, an open table and the logistics of before and after the actual practice. K5-1st graders
(2) I Can Pray – Offering prayer stations for individual/family prayer as well as what corporate prayer looks like in Big Church, ex: The Lord’s Prayer, journaling, glory prayers. 1st & 2nd graders
(3) I Love My Church – Spaces and places of worship on campus and the stories behind them, ex: Choir loft, who wears a robe and why, and vocabulary such as the difference between a pew and a bench. 2nd & 3rd graders
(4) I Can Serve – Acolyte training and Ambassador Training, ex: timing, dress, lighters, hospitality. 3rd-5th graders
(5) I Can Worship With My Family – the opportunity to learn ‘on the job’ about two or three elements of regular worship, ex: Signing the Apostles’ Creed and Gloria Patri; speaking into microphones, and other opportunities for physical participation like passing offering plates, instrumentalists, holding signs for the word-of-the-day, active visual elements, small-group/family prayers, processing in and out. K5-5th graders

Worship experiences and practices are typically not taught, but caught. I think that is why there are such deep, emotional attachments to how worship is presented and why most American worshippers think only the music is the worship part. American worship experiences today range from Vacation Bible School large group to Camp Meetings, from amateur musicians who passionately love the Lord to professionals in lighting and musicianship, from spaces of well polished wood furniture to a parking lot filled with cheeseballs. 

“Multiplying the opportunities for worship is about allowing God to use us and our congregations to offer a more abundant life for all.” (pg 70)

Several years ago I was invited to participate in a week-long planning and teaching for interactive and innovative worship. I participated alongside the worship leader and senior pastor of the local church I was serving. The week-long event was led by Dr. Marcia McFee and Chuck Bell. My greatest takeaway from the whole week was to set the table for participation for and by all God’s people…which means planning far in advance and collaborating with the Christian educators who are trained in developmental practices with the new attender in mind. Bishop Schnase calls it liturgical agility. 

I also regularly glean from the teachings of the fabulous worship artist Mark Burrows who I hear in my head say, “What’s good for kids is good for everybody,” when it comes to setting the table for participatory worship.

There are many of us in conversation about innovatively setting the table for worship with littles in children’s ministry, large group worship, as well as family worship. We’re going to get together to share ideas and experiences at a Children’s Worship Think Tank on Thursday, July 21st hosted by Alpharetta First UMC in Alpharetta, Georgia, 10am-12noon, sponsored by the North Georgia Conference Children’s Ministry Network. If you want to be inspired and can get there, you are invited to a seat at the table because we’re better together.

” Praise the Lord. Sing to the Lord a new song, His praise in the assembly of His faithful people.” Psalm 149:1

Having served on staff at several local churches there are interesting stories attached to furniture, windows, and land. There is unique vocabulary attached to spaces and places on campus which most people have no idea what you’re talking about, especially those new to the church. This is why we offer I Love My Church, a faith milestone for 1st and 2nd graders and their families. 

This age group are good readers, so they can follow signage inside and outside the buildings on campus to lead us (leaders and parents) to various locations. This age group can articulate and re-share a good story, too. The event covers all of 45 minutes.

I learned early on in family ministry that families will make certain faith training a priority because they are milestones like Confirmation. For this reason we chose very specific holy habits to teach and practice which are developmentally appropriate for each age level. To make it even stickier for our littles, they must attend with a big they love and who loves them. If they do not have a big, we will get them one and we do. The holy habit is important, but an intergenerational relationship with another follower of Jesus  is even more important. A great by-product is that a little attending with a big who loves them will take care of Safe Sanctuary compliance and all class management issues.

We start in the Children’s Welcome Center with a resource for the parents and give a packet with stickers for each little person to keep track of where we’re going. We talk about the difference between a church year (liturgical) calendar (round) and at their home (rectangle). We talk about liturgical colors and names for spaces, then head out to explore.

Our first stop is the original chapel (celebrating 90 years open this upcoming Pentecost Sunday!) and compare what they see with what they’ve seen in the spaces they know: aisle, books, pews, altar rails, organ, piano, choir loft, etc. Then I tell stories I’ve gathered from the saints of the church who were more than happy to supply me with dramatic stories of that space oh so many years ago. Our chapel has been in several movies! We share how it’s used today: weekly prayer groups, bi-lingual worship on Sunday, weddings, funerals, and other remarkable moments of a follower’s life.

We moved on to see the pastor’s office and to my office. We took a fire escape downstairs (an element of surprise) to explore the current sanctuary/worship space. We travel and define words like narthex, vestibule, pew, pulpit, communion table, etc. We read a couple of the honor-plates on furniture and I tell stories. Lots of stories. Lots of exploring and touching and laughing and running about paraments, symbols, and how they all point us to Jesus engaging all five senses.

When we return to the Children’s Welcome Center I ask questions about new spaces, new vocabulary, and the new friends they met. I give out certificates, offer a take-home coloring book, and we take a ‘class photo.’ 

Bonus: While all the littles’ teaching is taking place, their parents are chatting to get to know each other and learning the stories of their church family all along the way. Relationships with their children and age-level in common!

How could you set aside a time to teach of the sacred spaces and places where you lead littles and tell the stories which invite them to belong?

“I will sing of the steadfast love of the Lord, forever; with my mouth I will make known your faithfulness to all generations.” Psalm 89:1

Faith Milestones are those teaching workshops offering developmentally appropriate faith formation experiences for kids shared with someone they love and who loves them. Children’s Ministry offers multiple faith milestones each year specific to holy habits such as prayer for 1^st and 2^nd graders and their families.

Promotion: FB event (2 months out), bulletin (1 month out), posters (1 month), personal mail (3 weeks), fliers home from Sunday school (1 week), large group announcement (2 weeks), talk about it everywhere (3 weeks), email (2 weeks)

Set up a quiet room with two chairs at each station

• Photo station with Jesus
• Names of all registrants on a jumbo post-it note where I can see it (prompts me to use all kid’s names in attendance; know who’s not yet arrived)
• Start on time; end 5 minutes early
• Starter activity: kids pick up an empty bag; squishy Jesus; handout; ink pen

Schedule

5:45-6pm             Welcome; write-in the blank handout (big fills out the blanks while littles watch/listen and hold squishy Jesus); act out 2 prayer stations; surround room with pictures of kids praying artwork
6-6:15pm             Self-directed remaining stations
6:15-6:30pm       Review 4 steps of prayer (Greet God, Thank God, Ask God, Close in Jesus’ name); invite each child forward to receive their certificate (read one aloud so they know what the certificate says; students receive their certificate AFTER they tell me aloud their favorite station – as they speak aloud I tell them “I LOVE hearing your voice! God wants to hear your voice EVEN MORE!”; close in repeat-after-me prayer and group photo

Handout: How To Pray

Prayer is t_____________________ and l__________________________ to God. (talking; listening)
Prayer can be shared

1. In your m_________________ (mind)
2. Out l__________________ (loud)

For meaningful prayers, it is best to pray

1. By yourself and in a q___________ place. (quiet)
2. With someone you t__________ and love. (trust)

When we pray we speak to our Lord God, three in one:

God the Father Creator.

                Jesus, God’s only son, our Savior and friend.

                                The Holy Spirit, our helper and comforter.

G______ the Lord. (Greet) – who are talking to?

T______ the Lord. (Thank) – grateful for God the giver of all good things

A______ the Lord. (Ask) – after thanking God we can ask for help

Close in Jesus’ n_______. (name) – We do this because Jesus is our Savior, our mediator and go-between between death (physical and spiritual) and eternal life. We also close with saying AMEN because it means we accept or agree with what’s been said.

Pray for f___________ (forgiveness)

Pray in a g__________ (group)

God will answer prayers with a Y____, N_____, and a N______ Y_______. (Yes, No, Not Yet)

Prayer Stations (stations prepared from ‘What’s in my closet? What’s already in my hands?’)
Prepare signs for each station AND prepare a take home paper with same info/images to their take-home bags so they can implement clearly at home.
Journals – composition books; trace hands of those you love (as you pray, place your hand on the traced hand)
Glory celebration bells – celebrations of ‘glory!’ to praise the Lord (place in a room where everyone meets)
Berenstain Bears book on prayer to take home (read aloud book is super kid-friendly)
Prayer cubes leftover from last Easter (hardy, hand-held item with prayer language)
Fidget spinners – thankful prayers while it spins until it stops; waiting prayers for in line or waiting on appointments (encourages longer, unrushed times of listening and talking with God)
Mini scented playdoh (aka prayer-doh) – when hands are busy, minds are calm (God’s favorite smell = our prayers! Psalm 141:2)

What’s already on your shelf or in your supply closet? Make it simple, limited text, add an image of what you’re doing and kids can take it from there with someone they love sharing the teaching and practice.

“I call to you, Lord, come quickly to me; hear me when I call to you. May my prayer be set before you like incense, may the lifting up of my hands be like the evening sacrifice.” Psalm 141:1-2

We have been super intentional to equip and invite parents into the faith formation of their children. The scriptures outline this is God’s plan in Deuteronomy, Psalm 78, Isaiah 18, etc. 

When young adults who never strayed from the faith are asked the how and why, they speak to learning to read/listen to the Bible as a regular habit. First and by far, foremost. Followed by the family minutes, moments, and milestones which impressed the priority of their faith in Jesus in community: home first, then church.

Let’s be real. There are 168 hours in a given week. Even if we throw everything we have into that one hour of developmentally appropriate faith formation in a typical Sunday school setting, it will never be enough for a robust faith in Jesus in any culture. 

A multi-level plan (developmentally appropriate), over time (habits), in community (home, car, extracurricular, church) is the best strategy. That’s a big elephant to eat. We can eat that thing one bite at a time and over a period of time, but we need permission for accountability.

We can’t tap into the accountability of ‘if you’re not here for practice, you can’t play.’ We can’t lay out expectations to parents like a teacher can at a parent-teacher conference of ‘Sue is lost and I would suggest a faith tutor to meet with her every week, sometimes twice a week, to get her up to speed.’ We can’t send a note home with ‘Joe has already been absent 9 days. One more day absent and he’ll be held back to be sure he gets the material to be successful.’ None of these options are reasonable for the local church.

So what do we have? 

Side note: Our parents have more than enough guilt. They lay awake at night questioning their parenting skills already. I’m not adding to that. Every parent I’ve ever met wants the best for their kids. The very best! They have dreams and hopes for their children and want desperately to make available every opportunity for success. Christian parents want their kids to have a robust faith in Jesus. An hour a week, even if they come every week, is not gonna cut it for a robust faith in Jesus.

So what can we do?

We can equip and train parents and grandparents (the greatest untapped faith formation resource in any family) and offer space to make all their minutes, moments, and milestones count for Jesus. Everything we do must point to Jesus. Everything!

We offer Parenting With a Purpose classes each fall and spring. Last week it looked like this with a PowerPoint and a Ziploc bag of 167 M&Ms + 1 jumbo gold gumball (representing the weekly Sunday school class): Parenting With A Purpose – A Blueprint.

6pm-6:30pm Kids had pizza dinner (+water, fruit) with 3 kid’s Bible study leaders wearing candy corn flashing headbands (a visual that this is a special night); greeted and checked in by an Ambassador (relationship with an older kid); eat and check in with friends (relationships; food; table life).

Parents set up in another room to get a chance to breathe, get water and cookies, take a bio break, chat with who they sit beside. Hospitality time for me to work the room saying, “Hey ___, do you know ___? She goes to the 11am service and has a 3rd grader” to intentionally introduce the commonalities of participants. Then give time for them to chat before the program starts at 6:15pm.

6:30pm-7:30pm Kids bring in buckets of building toys they chose from the Children’s Welcome Center and sit together at the feet of their parents to play. The visual for parents and children was intentional.

Program: Though six Biblical holy habits are important only one, the research tells us, bears the greatest weight, so we will focus on Bible Reading.

Read the Bible, not a devotional, not a study Bible. Read the Bible. Listen to it in the car on a Bible app. Use Breath prayers to remember phrases and words from the scriptures. Begin with a book with a narrative like the Gospel of Luke. Introduce the author as Dr. Luke and the gospel is his letter to his friend Theophilus. I wonder if Theo was short, tall, quiet, or his loud friend? Dr. Luke investigated and determined these events to be true, historical, and worthy of defense.  

The Next Generation Ministries suggests the narratives of the New Testament first. Then the Old Testament. Then a Chronological Bible. Several of our kidmin leadership team took an online conference of Discipleship Begins at Home sponsored by Women In Apologetics last summer which taught and offered the Blueprint resource to all participants to share with our families in their local churches. 

They reminded us that if a kid can read a chapter book, they can read the Bible as a family and in Christian community.  “This is what Christians do and we are a Christian family.” At middle school, purchase a study Bible. Invite the grandparents to purchase it and make notes in the margins of their favorite passages. The kids can read. The parents can read aloud. A Bible app can read it aloud for you.

Each participant received a children’s book on a hard faith subject (the Trinity) and what I think is the best Bible Handbook in print (which is hard to find) published by Gospel Light (I miss them) which is child, youth, adult-friendly to give context to the family Bible reading.

Parents are front-line disciple-makers and the saints the local church is supposed to equip. This is one very intentional way we are living into Ephesians 4:12.

At the end of class, I gave them each a heads-up. By walking out with all those resources, they are inviting me and everyone else in the room to hold them accountable. 

That accountability might sound like a hallway conversation, “How are you doing with your family Bible reading?”, or “Have you started with your family Bible reading yet?” That’s what partnership looks like. A life coach does that. A pitching coach does that. A personal trainer does that. A math tutor does that. 

Let me ask you, “How did you do last week in your Bible reading?”

Nehemiah 6:3 “I’m carrying on a great project and cannot go down.”