I’m so glad that God loves chocolate and vanilla… and pistachio almond, and mint chocolate chip, and butter pecan.
If no other ice creams had ever been invented, then I suppose I would love me some vanilla ice cream (and sometime, vanilla is still my choice)… but I sure would miss chocolate, not to mention my all time favorite butter pecan (a super concoction that my dad always makes starting with vanilla).
Churches are kind of like ice cream don’t you think? There’s churches that like things pretty standard and do a really good job with that… they’ve been around for a long time and have done and are doing some incredible ministry. Most of us know these churches really well… they helped us become who we are today. I’m thankful for those vanilla churches.
A few years ago (20+ now) chocolate churches hit the scene. They started singing "Pass it On" and "Family of God" and threw some other ideas into their ministry mix. These churches have done well and have complimented vanilla nicely.
Over the past 10 years we’ve begun to see quite a few other flavors come forward. I mean there really are as many "kinds" of churches as there are "kinds" of ice cream. I know churches that have added nuts, and chocolate chips, and cookie dough… I even visited a church not long ago that had gummy bears mixed in with their plain vanilla.
Okay, enough of the bad analogy.
What I’m trying to say here is this: There are a lot of great churches out there doing Kids Ministry in a lot of different ways. Some use the traditional methods, some are using things we never dreamed possible, and some are mixing it up and using some of everything, The important thing is that God is using churches of various styles and approaches to do some really great work and they are reaching kids for Christ!
Bottom Line: If all churches were alike and chose do Kids Ministry the same, some folks would simply not be reached. There is a need for all God honoring churches.
I have my preference… and so do you… that’s fine! But let’s be careful not to decide that ours is the only "right" choice. After all that’s why there’s vanilla and chocolate (and pistachio almond, and mint chocolate chip, and butter pecan)!
What do you think?
