Kids and Worship

My first 7 years out of college, I was involved in Children's ministry. Five of those years were spent on a church staff in a pastoral role. Generally speaking this meant children's programming, family events, and pastoral care (hospital visits, home visits, calls/letters, etc.)

Today, we are part of a small Nazarene church of about 100. We don't have a children's pastor, or a family pastor, or a director, or any other position that ultimately means "disciple our children." But our church is heading towards dynamic discipleship of whole families.

A lot could be said about this church in regards to how we spend our money, the staff (positions) we choose to employ, the philosophy behind less/no programming and the push toward intergenerational worship. But let me just say one thing. Our pastor cares deeply about discipleship of all people, and that certainly includes our children.

One aspect we are becoming more aware of is inviting our children to participate in corporate worship. For you logistic-types out there - we do have a nursery (6m-4years) and we have Keiki Focus (5y-11y). The nursery is open for the duration of the worship service and keiki focus takes place during the sermon portion of our worship service. Kids are invited forward, prayed over, and exit the building for the 25 minutes of sermon time. During this time, they participate in a teaching of the exact same scripture as the rest of the body. When the preaching pastor finishes the sermon, the children are welcomed back.

As a staff, we take seriously the role kids (should) have as part of the body of Christ. Over the past few months I have had the privilege of beginning to invite kids to participate in more explicit ways. I am once again retraining my eyes and my heart. Instead of asking, Where can our kids go? or What should our youth be doing during this time? or Do we have anyone else that can teach our kids? or How can we make our children's programming better? I have found myself thinking our kids add indescribable value to our worshiping body. How can we involve them more? 

I think we're off to a good (read: slow and steady) start. We have a child start every service with the blowing of the pu, kids reading scripture, kids dancing out of their seats in praise, youth sharing personal testimonies about camp, family-led prayer... We have an even longer list of additional ways our kids will be incorporated in the coming weeks and months. To be honest, I'm totally excited about having more kids involved, watching parents/aunties/uncles be proud of their kids, and marveling at how worship can be a little more right when it's intergenerational.

Are children welcomed in your worshipping body? What are some ways you include children and whole families? What are the positive results and challenges you have experienced?