LifeWay

Kids Ministry

Dedicated to helping Kids Ministry leaders in their mission of making disciples

Kids Ministry, Leadership, Podcasts, Resources, Training, Uncategorized

The Art of Delegation

By

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Android | Google Podcasts | RSS

In children’s ministry, it is very easy drift into the mindset that you must do everything yourself. This is why the art of delegation is, for many of us, an area of growth in our leadership. Does delegation mean you are working yourself out of a job? How do you know when you need to delegate something? In the newest episode of the LifeWay Kids Podcast, Chuck Peters, LifeWay Kids Director of Operations, sits down with Heidi Hensley, Children’s Pastor at Bayside Church to discuss answers to these questions. Heidi also shares some of her insights and delegation techniques as she leads her team of staff and volunteers at Bayside Church.

Kids Ministry, kids101, Leadership, Levels of Biblical Learning, Podcasts, Resources, Training

Developing A Philosophy in Children’s Ministry

By

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Android | Google Podcasts | RSS

In this week’s episode of the LifeWay Kids Podcast, Chuck Peters, LifeWay Kids Director of Operations, sits down with Dr. Shelly Melia at last year’s Kids Ministry Conference (now called ETCH Family Ministry Conference) to discuss how important is it that we have a distinct philosophy behind what we do in children’s ministry. Having a philosophy helps provide clarity and focus in our ministry and that focus helps us to know what to say yes to and what to say no to. In other words, it’s a critical aspect as a children’s ministry leader, to help build and develop a philosophy for how you do what you do.

Many start out in children’s ministry in reactive mode. To develop a philosophy, you are getting to the 30,000 foot level where you can think about the big picture and become more proactive to your approach. Dr. Melia helps us think about practical steps for how we can start to develop a philosophy of ministry.

Dr. Melia has been in children’s ministry for over 20 years and currently serves as the Director of the Master of Arts in Children’s Ministry program at Dallas Baptist University.

Kids Ministry, Kids Ministry Curriculum, Resources, Worship

From Basic to Blown-Away: Different Types of Kids Worship

By

rp_land-150x150.jpgA few years ago, when we created Worship For Life: Kids, I had a brilliant idea. I emailed our children’s minister and asked if I could start Kids’ Worship at our church. He did have some reservations, but at the time our kids ministry associate at the church was also excited to help start kids worship. With the blessing of the kids’ minister, we proceeded.

  Like many churches, our church is configured of several different buildings connected by a labyrinth of hallways. We decided to meet in the choir room so that it would be close to the sanctuary. We had the right technology and a couple of volunteers, so we were set to go. As God often does, he called away our kids ministry associate to serve in another church and soon, there I was, with one other faithful volunteer planning kids worship.

  Gradually we have been able to build our volunteer base to a few faithful volunteers so we are no longer in children’s church every week, but it is still a struggle. So, we have what I would call a “basic” kids’ worship. Here are some different ways I’ve seen churches using Kids Worship resources from LifeWay.

  1. Basic: This kids worship option is one where you have rotating volunteers and they are able to read over the session quickly and mainly rely on the videos available. Worship For Life: Kids is a great option for this type of worship. Please note that Worship For Life: Kids is becoming Bible Studies For Life: Kids Worship starting in the Fall of 2016.
  2. Blended: This kids worship option combines the best of both worlds. You have video options, as well as, live host links. In the blended option, volunteers do not rely upon the video options as heavily as they do in the basic option. Explore the Bible for Kids, The Gospel Project for Kids, and Bible Studies For Life: Kids Worship could all be examples of using a blended approach. Using this approach you might use the music videos and Bible story videos provided, but the host or leaders do all of the other teaching segments. The blended approach might also be for churches where kids are in the worship service for part of the time and then move out to children’s church.

Blown-Away: This is a totally produced children’s worship service. Live music, drama, and Bible story tellers. The use of video is limited to countdowns and other bumper type videos. Bible Studies For Life: Kids Worship provides a fully scripted kids worship hour that a church could use for this type of service. For more information about this service, check out this video from an awesome Kids Worship service at SugarCreek Baptist Church in Sugarland, Texas.

Jeff Land serves as the Publishing Team Leader for Bible Studies for Life: Kids. Jeff holds degrees from Mississippi College and Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. Jeff has served as a Children’s Minister and teaches kids weekly in his church.

Encouragement, Evangelism, Kids Ministry, Leadership, Missions, Podcasts, Resources, Training

Reaching the Inner-City with the Gospel

By

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Android | Google Podcasts | RSS

In this week’s episode, we sit down with Dr. Eric Mason (@pastoremase) at our Kids Ministry Conference in 2015. Dr. Mason is the lead pastor at Epiphany Fellowship in Philadelphia, PA. He is also the founder and president of Thriving, which is an urban ministry organization committed to training leaders for ministry in cities locally, nationally, and internationally.

In this conversation, we talk about the greatest challenges in our culture to reaching kids and families, especially in the inner-city. Dr. Mason shares his insights on what churches can do to reach across ethnic, socioeconomic, cultural and other boundaries to win kids and families to Christ. Dr. Mason also expounds upon how his church has engaged their culture and some practical things they do to reach families and their community.

 

Kids Bible Study, Kids Ministry, Kids Ministry Curriculum, Parent Helps, Resources, Sunday School

Using a Social Media Plan

By

Jeff Land-150x150Are you a planner? Do you always want to know “What’s next!”? It seems that lots of Kids Ministers are planners and for a very good reason. We have to have a plan for helping kids know Jesus as their Lord and Savior. That plan is effected by what camps we choose, which VBS we use, and the weekly curriculum we choose for our kids to study. Each of LifeWay Kids’ curriculum lines will help you as you develop that plan.

In the past few years, Kids Ministers and church leaders have recognized what we have known for many years: Parents need to be a part of the plan. Apps, take home pages, cards, and other resources have been developed to help bring parents in on the conversation.

There’s another great planning resource that you might not be aware of: it’s a social media plan. Each of LifeWay Kids’ ongoing curriculum lines now offers a social media plan to help you connect parents to what their kids are learning each week in their Bible study classes.

Using the plan is easy:

    1. Find the social media plan that fits the curriculum you use in your church: Bible Studies For Life: Kids
    2. The Gospel Project for Kids (choose the quarter you want and look under “Parent Resources.”
    3. Explore the Bible Kids (available on Enhanced CD)
  1. Decide how you want to share the information. Consider starting a Facebook page, Twitter Account, or Instagram for your church’s Kids Ministry.
  2. Copy the information provided from the Social Media Plan for your chosen curriculum and paste it into the status update bar for your social media site.

Remembering to update your church’s social media every single day could be a confusing and time-consuming task. I like to use Hootsuite, because you can schedule multiple posts to update each day on several different sites. I take time at the beginning of every quarter to use the social media plan on Hootsuite for the entire quarter, then I don’t have to think about it again for three months.

By providing social media posts for your parents to read each day with their kids, you are giving them little nudges toward spiritual conversations with their kids.

Keep up with Bible Studies For Life: Kids and The Gospel Project for Kids on Facebook for all of the latest information.

Jeff Land serves as the Publishing Team Leader for Bible Studies for Life: Kids. Jeff holds degrees from Mississippi College and Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. Jeff has served as a Children’s Minister and teaches kids weekly in his church.

Events, Fun, Kids Bible Study, Kids Ministry, Leadership, Podcasts, Preschoolers, Resources, Small Groups, Training

How Do You Setup Your Classroom?

By

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Android | Google Podcasts | RSS

rp_emeott-1.13.web_-150x150.jpg

In this week’s episode of the LifeWay Kids podcast, our lead kids ministry specialist, Bill Emeott, sits down to discuss the importance of setting up a classroom. This is an element of kids ministry that has evolved over the years. Setting up a classroom in today’s culture can mean very different things because a classroom setting looks different at every church. For this conversation, we are simply defining a classroom as a physical place where kids will gather. The classroom environment starts with what kind of person is leading that small group, but then it moves to all the physical attributes of the space you are in. Bill and Jeffrey discuss the different types of environments and how that environment impacts the type of setup you need.

Bible Skills, Bible Study, Kids Ministry, Parent Helps, Parenting, Resources

Empower Parents for Home Discipleship

By

by Tim Pollard

Strengthening family relationships is very important, especially as they relate to Scripture. You’ve heard it said that Deuteronomy 6 gives families the responsibility to bring up their children in a knowledge of the Lord, but sometimes families still need a little bit of help to get that ball rolling. Kids ministry leadership includes equipping parents for at-home discipleship.

In reference to Bible verses, Deuteronomy 6:7 very simply says, “repeat them to your children.” That’s pretty basic don’t you think? Explain to parents that this can be as easy as taking the Bible and reading it. They don’t have to be gifted at preaching; any literate parent should be able to read the Bible. The verse continues by giving the further instruction to talk about them in four different places, sitting in your house, walking on the road, when you lie down, and when you get up. Besides reading straight from the Bible, parents should just talk about the Scripture with their kids. If something is going on in their lives that needs to be talked about, parents can relate it to Scripture that they’ve previously read to them.

Moses’ instruction gives plenty of information to get parents started on getting Scripture into the daily lives of their families. For even more help as you empower parents to lead the way in discipleship, Explore the Bible: Kids created a family resource called the Explorer Pack. The Explorer Pack includes Explorer Guides and Family Cards. Explorer Guides are a visual resource made up of interactive activities and fun facts that help kids connect to Scripture. Family Cards include several leading questions parents can use to help connect the family to important Scriptures. These resources will give you a great way to start having Bible-based discussions if that’s something you aren’t used to doing. Our prayer is that God will give you great blessing as you start seeking family relationships through His Word.

Tim Pollard teaches 3rd-6th graders Explore the Bible: Kids Worship on Sunday nights at Tulip Grove Baptist Church. He’s passionate about helping kids dig deep into Scripture, which he pursues through his daily work as leader of the Explore the Bible: Kids team. Tim lives with his wife and daughters in Mount Juliet, Tennessee.

Bible Study, Devotional, Kids Bible Study, Kids Ministry, Leadership, Levels of Biblical Learning, Podcasts, Resources, Training

Growing in God’s Word: Teaching the Bible the Way Kids Learn

By

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Android | Google Podcasts | RSS

As kids grow, their understanding of foundational truth grows with them. In this episode of the LifeWay Kids podcast, Chuck Peters, Jana Magruder, and Bill Emeott discuss the importance of having a framework as we teach the Bible to kids. It’s vital that we understand how God made kids and how they learn at each stage of development. That’s why LifeWay Kids developed a framework called the Levels of Biblical Learning to help kids ministry leaders through this process. We introduce this framework in this episode of the podcast. To go even deeper, LifeWay Kids is also hosting a free, live webinar on Monday, May 9 at 11:30am (CST) that will fully unpack the Levels of Biblical Learning and how this framework can be applied in your church. You can register for free at live.lifewaykids.com.

Evangelism, Events, Leadership, Resources, Vacation Bible School

The Balance of “Outreach” and “In-Reach” in VBS

By

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Android | Google Podcasts | RSS

MelitaVBS is a milestone event in a kids life. We also know from research, that VBS is the #1 evangelistic outreach tool in churches today. Anyone that has helped to lead, plan, and execute a VBS event knows that there is a ton of work involved to pull it off. With all of that work, it’s extremely easy to get caught up in the details, to put more emphasis on the things that have a tendency to distract us from the main goal of introducing kids to life-changing relationship with Jesus Christ. So how can we maintain a level of excellence in our execution of VBS, while keeping evangelism at the center of what we do? In this episode, Melita Thomas, a member of our VBS team, joins us to talk about this delicate balance.

Melita Thomas serves as a Content Editor for LifeWay’s VBS and Zip for Kids resources. Melita holds a masters degree in Christian Education/Childhood Ministry which accompanies her passion and expertise as a leader in kids ministry—both in her role at LifeWay Kids and in the local church. Melita is a member of First Baptist Nashville, where she enjoys teaching kindergartners and preteens.

 

CentriKid, Events, Kids Ministry, Leadership, Podcasts, Resources

5 Great Tips for a Great Camp

By

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Android | Google Podcasts | RSS

JE

Here at LifeWay Kids, we consider the camp experience to be a mile-marker event in the life of a kid! We love camp at LifeWay Kids and if you are looking for a life-changing experience for your own kids, we strongly consider you check out CentriKid Camps. But whether you do your own camp, or come to ours, we want to give you five things you should do to make it a great experience for your kids and leaders.

In this podcast episode, Jeremy Echols, who leads the @CentriKid team, unpacks these 5 great tips for a great camp:

  1. Secure The Date
  2. Prepare in Advance
  3. Go All In When You Are At Camp
  4. Seek Out Intentional Conversations
  5. Follow Up

JE (@coachechols) leads the @centrikid camps team for LifeWay Kids. He met his wife Emily working summer camp, they serve in the kids area on Sunday’s at church, and they are blessed with their daughter #BabyMadison who was born in 2011.

All Ministry Sites

Pastors
Leadership
Kids Ministry
Student Ministry
Groups Ministry
Women’s Ministry
Worship Ministry

Digital Resources

Ministry Grid
LifeWay Worship
Digital Church
KidEvent Pro
MyCurriculum Manager
Simulcast Manager
LifeWay Reader eBooks
twenty:28
WORDsearch
SmallGroup.com

LifeWay Network

LifeWay Research
B&H
Ridgecrest
Advertising Directory