Continuing from my article “Becoming a Passé Pastor – 10 Hot Tips,” I have been dissecting the ten different elements that I contended were very important to continued relevance in kid’s ministry.
Of course it is a given that the Bible is foundational in kids church, to say anything otherwise would be terribly supercilious of me. We all know that teaching children biblical values is incredibly important. We know that the Biblical record is truth, and need teach children that important fact. We know that the Bible is God’s word and within its pages we read, just like Simon Peter exclaims unto Christ in the book of John, the words of eternal life. These things we as children’s ministers know, and with all our best efforts we try to instill these beautiful truths in children’s lives.
But I think we might cloud the message by accident sometimes, by a lack of emphasis on teaching God’s word and too great an emphasis on being relevant. To clarify: relevancy is important, and the message of the Bible is completely relevant to all generations and will be across the ages; its words are alive, and our teaching of God’s word must also be alive. I am not going to tell you to stop giving out sweets and to light candles for quiet reflection – make church fun, make it relevant, make it a place that children want to be by all means possible.
A possible issue lies although with the way many of us may plan and prepare for our kid’s churches. A lot of preparation and thought is given to games and fun elements of the program which draw kids in, but the message is made subservient to these parts of the program by less effort being given to them. The rest of the program must be made subservient to the message that is coming from God’s word (except that is the move of His Spirit) and planned accordingly. We need to look at how we can, with all the elements of our programs, drive home the point of the lesson: using games, worship, etc, etc. We need to change the crux point of our ministries from achieving fun, to kids loving God, his Word and the Spirit – this is not done through statements but actions.
My personal opinion then is that the old “life story” can devalue the Biblical message depending on presentation, especially when the life story is fictional. Don’t misunderstand me, real life stories and even parables are great for helping kids understand the biblically taught message, within the context of a Bible message. It is when the life story is given more attention and effort than the Biblical message we get things a bit mixed up. For example: when we have big colorful pictures for a “life story” about a talking pineapple, whom, falls off a ledge and dies, sacrificing his life for other fruit – a metaphor for Christ’s sacrifice. Then we tell a less prepared “story” about Christ on the cross, without anywhere near the attention or effort that the pineapple got… Kids might start worshiping the pineapple, or at least associate the Bible in the realm of fiction.
What we need to make sure of is that our presentation of scripture is every bit as excellent as the “fun elements” of our kids programs, even better prepared than them. We need to make sure our leaders are also placing a high value on these parts of our services that speak to kids about the Biblical record of a God who is our very real salvation. It is not ridiculous to think that the Bible can be central to our kid’s services, but still have services that are vibrant, alive and fun. To make concise what I am saying is this: By way of preparation and presentation, what is your ministry presenting as most important? I contend we need to make sure it is God’s word, which presents to us the living God and how to come into relationship with him – the number one goal for kid’s church.
