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Kids Ministry, Leadership, Resources, Uncategorized
July 27, 2016

Bible Journaling with Your Kids

By Kids Ministry 101

maryWelcome guest blogger, Mary Wiley!

Last week, I took the kids at my church to camp.

Every morning we would get up, walk to breakfast, and then head outside on the cafeteria’s empty patio for quiet time. The first morning, I explained to kids that they would follow the guide provided by the camp to read their Bibles, respond by answering questions, and spend time praying. Kids spread out quietly, and then one-by-one they came back to me to ask questions.

I quickly realized that I needed to not only tell them how to have a quiet time, as I’m sure I’ve told them dozens of times at church, but I needed to show them. I herded them into a circle and we proceeded to walk through the quiet time guide together.

These are great kids who are growing up in Christian homes, but many of them needed a little reminder about how to have a quiet time and why it is so important that we spend time with God each day. Your kids might need a frequent reminder as well!

As a children’s minister, one of my biggest goals is to help equip parents to disciple their children; and as a parent, my biggest goal is to point my kids to Jesus. There is no greater thing you can do for your kids than to model following Jesus for them. Let them see you do your quiet time. Help them with their quiet time. Spend time praying and reading the Bible together. There are so many great resources to help you do so today.

I’m a big fan of the Bible journaling movement. I love to draw and meditate on Scripture by writing out a verse. Recently, I’ve discovered that this can be done alongside kids as well! My kids are too small to do this yet…they can’t read, or write, or talk for that matter, but I look forward to the day I can do Bible journaling with them. For now, I’ll have to settle for journaling for them – writing in a Bible I will one day give them.

Screen Shot 2016-07-25 at 4.34.16 PM

If you have littles (or like to color yourself), Lifeway Kids Director Jana Magruder and her daughter, Morgan Grace, have created the cutest little journal set for kids. You can grab a set, get your teenager an Illustrated Notetaking Bible for Teens, and get yourself a Notetaking Bible. Sit down at the kitchen table and spend some time together reading, praying, and memorizing as you draw and color.

We are giving away 15 copies of the Life Verse Creative Journal by Jana and Morgan Grace. Enter here!

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Mary Wiley works with B&H Publishing now, but she was a member of The Lifeway Kids team for 5 years prior. She lives in Lebanon, TN with her husband, two babies under 8 months, and tiny, hyper dog. She serves as the children’s minister at Fairview Church.

Leadership, Podcasts, Resources, Training
July 14, 2016

Reaching Kids Outside the Walls of Your Church

By Andy Dukes

http://media.blubrry.com/lifewaykids/p/ministrysites.s3.amazonaws.com/podcasts/kidsministry/EP47_LIFEWAYKIDS.mp3

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Linda Ranson Jacobs, of DC4K joins us again on the Lifeway Kids Podcast to discuss how to reach kids outside the walls of your church. This more than likely will mean addressing tough issues that are prevalent in our culture. Linda & Chuck Peters address some of the following questions and issues:

  • How are families different today than they were in biblical times?
  • How do we address these new issues & pressures from our society that are becoming prevalent in our culture?
  • Most kids pastors are not well prepared for tough conversations and because things move so fast, it’s hard to keep up with how to appropriately respond to specific issues.
  • Leaders and teachers in the church should provide a safe place for a child to come, but leaders should also be aware of how to face tough issues.
  • As a children’s minister, if a child comes into my ministry from a family of a homosexual couple or transgender parents, how do you serve that child well?
  • You should not necessarily change what you do in your ministry, but be aware of the approach you take, and what that means for kids that might not be regular attenders at your church.
  • What are some specific pitfalls you should avoid in handling tough situations?
Leadership, Podcasts, Resources, Training
June 30, 2016

Security for Your Kids Ministry

By Andy Dukes

http://media.blubrry.com/lifewaykids/p/ministrysites.s3.amazonaws.com/podcasts/kidsministry/EP46_LIFEWAYKIDS.mp3

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John Murchison, Director of Children’s Ministry at the Austin Stone Community Church, provides several tips & procedures for keeping your kids safe in your ministry.

  • As a children’s minister, you must get educated & trained.
  • Have policies in your church that are known and followed.
  • Background checks are very important, but they are not enough.
  • Complete reference checks on your volunteers.
  • Train as many volunteers as you can on the risk of sexual abuse to kids in your church.
Evangelism, Leadership, Podcasts, Resources, Training, Uncategorized
June 23, 2016

The Gospel Is For Volunteers Too

By Andy Dukes

http://media.blubrry.com/lifewaykids/p/ministrysites.s3.amazonaws.com/podcasts/kidsministry/EP45_LIFEWAYKIDS.mp3

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This week’s episode of the Lifeway Kids Podcast features a conversation with John Murchison, the Director of Children’s Ministry at The Austin Stone Community Church in Austin, TX. In our desire to share the gospel with kids, have we neglected to share that same gospel with the volunteers serving with us? The gospel is not just the way to become a Christian, it also sustains and motivates the work of ministry. In this episode John & Jeffrey discuss ways to recruit, train, sustain, and send volunteers with the basis of the good news of Jesus Christ.

Encouragement, Encouraging, Kids Ministry, kids101, Leadership, Podcasts, Resources
June 9, 2016

Greatest Wins in Children’s Ministry

By Andy Dukes

http://media.blubrry.com/lifewaykids/p/ministrysites.s3.amazonaws.com/podcasts/kidsministry/EP41_LIFEWAYKIDS.mp3

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Leadership can often times be challenging and discouraging. Any seasoned leader will tell you that having community with other leaders is vital. It’s critical for a number of reasons, but often times, that community is where is an encouraging word that can lift up your spirit as you seek to follow God’s direction to lead the ministries He has entrusted to you. On today’s podcast, we sit down with 3 children’s ministry leaders and ask them one question: What is your greatest single win so far in your ministry? We believe their answers will surprise you. Our hope is that what God is doing in the lives of these leaders will be a catalytic moment in your own ministry & leadership. Today’s guests include Heidi Hensley, Chad Overton, and Chad Owens.

 

 

 

Kids Ministry, Leadership, Parent Helps, Parenting, Podcasts, Resources
June 2, 2016

Connecting the Church with the Home

By Andy Dukes

http://media.blubrry.com/lifewaykids/p/ministrysites.s3.amazonaws.com/podcasts/kidsministry/EP40_LIFEWAYKIDS.mp3

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The concept of connecting the church with the home is certainly nothing new, but it has recently become very popular. As this philosophy of ministry is considered, one question that church leaders must ask is who is ultimately responsible for the spiritual development of a child, the church or the home? In church ministry, there is a renewed wave of thinking that is seeking to not just teach kids the Bible, but ultimately equip families to minister to their children as well. So how do we practically equip families? What would happen if your kids ministry assumed your families never go to church rather than assuming they know what church is all about?

Heidi Hensley joins us on the Lifeway Kids Podcast to give us wisdom and insight from her experience leading at Bayside Church, a multi-campus church in Northern California. Heidi serves as children’s pastor at Bayside and has been in children’s ministry for over 20 years.

Heidi will also be joining us for Lifeway’s new ETCH Family Ministry Conference in October. Formerly known as KMC, where this podcast episode was recorded, we’ve expanded our national event to include not only kids ministry leaders, but student ministry and family ministry leaders too.  The topic of today’s podcast really helps to set the stage for what our new conference is all about. As we all work to minister to children, students and families, it’s important that you attend a conference together, as a team. This is where you begin to see strategic connection points with what you are doing in children’s ministry and how it feeds into your student ministry. To make our conference even more accessible, we’ve dropped our rates from last year and even extended these discounts to extend for a few more weeks, so now is a great time to register your team for ETCH Family Ministry Conference. Visit our website to learn more and register today!

Encouragement, Kids Ministry, Leadership, Podcasts, Resources, Training
May 26, 2016

Growing as a Leader to Grow Your Ministry

By Andy Dukes

http://media.blubrry.com/lifewaykids/p/ministrysites.s3.amazonaws.com/podcasts/kidsministry/EP43_LIFEWAYKIDS.mp3

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In this week’s episode, we gathered a few kids ministry leaders together to answer an important question: “What can a leader do, in their own life, to grow with their church or to grow their ministry?” The reality is that as a leader, two of your main responsibilities are to develop others and develop a vision for your ministry for the future. Regardless if you are at a small to mid-size church or a larger church, these principles remain the same. We invited Brent Moxey – Children’s Pastor at Westridge Church in Dallas GA, Danielle Bell – Minister to Children at Dawson Memorial in Birmingham AL, and Chad Owens –  Kids Associate Director at Grace Church in Overland Park KS to help us think about this question. These ministry leaders provide some lessons learned from their own journey of leading teams in their various ministries.

Kids Ministry, Leadership, Podcasts, Resources, Training, Uncategorized
May 19, 2016

The Art of Delegation

By Andy Dukes

http://media.blubrry.com/lifewaykids/p/ministrysites.s3.amazonaws.com/podcasts/kidsministry/EP39_LIFEWAYKIDS.mp3

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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
May 12, 2016

Developing A Philosophy in Children’s Ministry

By Andy Dukes

http://media.blubrry.com/lifewaykids/p/ministrysites.s3.amazonaws.com/podcasts/kidsministry/EP50_LIFEWAYKIDS.mp3

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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
May 6, 2016

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

By Jeff Land

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.

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