Every time you meet, make sure you do these three things :
#1. Pray. I don’t mean you pray before the session (which you should) or at the end of the session (which you should) or during the week in preparation for the session (which you should), I mean with the children. Model prayer, show them prayer, encourage them to pray, “do” prayer. This is something to include every week and think of different ways you might do it. Be creative, be flexible, be short and punchy AND experiment with longer times of prayer – but, above all PRAY. Your children need to learn that the life blood of the Christian life is prayer. They will not learn this simply by you telling them it is, they will learn this by actually praying.
#2. Study Scripture. I don’t mean before the session (which you should) or at the end of the session (which you could) or during the week in preparation for the session (which you should); I mean with the children. Model opening the Bible, reading from it, using the passage. Get them to read (as appropriate for the age they are), have them find the passage, give them the context – draw them in to who wrote it, who they are addressing (as well as us today!) what some of the pictures, language might mean (Hebrews being full of Old Testament references – why is that?). Your children need to learn that the map, the guide, the source of what we know and understand about God and His Son Jesus Christ is scripture. They will not grasp this simply by you telling them it is, they will learn it by actually opening the Bible and reading it.
#3. Worship. I don’t mean before the session (which you should because everything we do should be worship) or at the end of the session (which you should because everything we do is worship), I mean with the children. What does worship look like? How do you worship? You can teach about praise, thankfulness, giving our time and talents, giving our money (yes, children could learn to give of their money too where they have it and receive pocket money etc), when told of a need I have seen children out give adults every time if it is proportional to what they have. They will not get that our lives are to be worship unless they are immersed in that kind of atmosphere where it permeates everything that happens.
No, in Junior Church you cannot make the ultimate difference – it takes the whole Church, it takes families and parents in particular to take responsibility for the spiritual growth of their children – but, if your kids just have junior church – do they go away with enough each week that they KNOW what being a follower of Jesus looks like (not an abstract concept of Christianity, or a vague notion of a bunch of people in history who believed some stuff, not a series of stories only . . . ) they have been to junior church and they have seen and witness and joined in with a LIVED faith, and maybe they begin to taste and see that the Lord is good and begin to reach for this life we have in all its fullness.
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