Ministry Needs Today...

Small segment taken from review questions... I believe that the most immediate needs for this ministry include the recognition of the beginnings of faith development as early as infants, training teachers in the developmental levels and spiritual formation levels of the age groups they work with, and recognition of the role the church plays as a support for parental guidance in early childhood. Research has proven that even before a child speaks, they are learning from the world around them. Children begin to learn about a God they cannot see by their relationships with people they can see. Many people fail to recognize that faith development is formed just as cognitive development and motor skills are formed. It is important to not only fill classrooms with teachers that care about the kids, but to train these teachers in the most effective way to reach the children they are ministering to. A teacher can be placed in a classroom with no information on how a toddler processes information and will, in a sense, spend every Sunday “talking at” children and not reaching them effectively. If we had a group of adults that were being taught by someone in a foreign language or in strong theological terms that are not understood by most lay people, there would be an uproar. Why do we not think that it is just as important to reach our children for Christ in the ways that are understandable to them? Finally, there are many theories of parenting floating around and many parents are stretched thin as is. It is important that the church is a partner with the parent, offering training or advice if needed, and ultimately offering a safe support system that offers parents sound Biblical answers regarding their parenting dilemmas in all areas. If these three areas were given more attention within children’s ministry, think of the development that a child who grows up in our church would receive. Children’s Ministry is a huge foundation for our children’s future concepts and beliefs! -If you read this and wonder if I think educational practices and concepts should be integrated into Sunday School...yes I do;-) That means print rich environments, hands-on learning, and the like! We're ministering to the WHOLE child! THAT is why simple training for teachers is SO key in reaching children where they are! Little Johnny may come to Sunday School and that will be the only time someone tells him about Jesus, but it may also be the only time someone shows him how to work a puzzle, reads to him, or even says what all of the different colors are around him. Christian education is the gelling of those two worlds in my mind!

Yep, Yep, Yep...

Key things that have opened my mind or made me scream "Amen!" internally... -The CHILD is the best indicator of what methods should be used to teach that child. (Opened my Mind) -In order to truly focus on the child, we must focus on the parent as well. (Opened my Mind) -In the daily grind of life, children are learning how to relate to God, even if that is not the parents' intention. So parents must develop ears and eyes that are sensitive to helping children recognize God at work in the world around them. This sense begins the process of a child's developing a worldview. (Can I get an AMEN?!?) -The relationship parents have with their child is the best indicator of a child's relationship with God. If the relationship with the child is constantly rooted and built on God's Word, the child more likely will follow the model of his family. (AMEN!!) ****True light bulb moment for me, since I feel passionately about the need for actual lessons and the beginnings of spiritual formation as early as bed babies..."Referring to the preschool area as the 'nursery' and to teachers as 'workers' may be only a matter of terminology, but most people outside of the preschool area will understand these in terms of caregiving, not teaching."**** -Church members, please pay attention...parents are often miles and even states away from other family members. Parents need individuals who are willing to minister, coach, and mentor. Often our support system only extends as far as the door to our mailbox! (This I can attest to!)The ministry it would even be for older couples within a church to adopt couples with young children and commit to caring for those families through impromptu lunches and a few worry-free nights of babysitting!

Thank you LORD for some affirmation!

This week I read my first chapter assigned in my Early Childhood Ministry class. God knew that it would be the exact encouragement I needed as I started this program. These are thoughts I have and statements that I have actually MADE to people....and now, I'm reading them in a BOOK for my Masters! Anytime I'd share my feelings on this subject with others...even fellow Christians...more times than not I was met with blank stares or people thought I was crazy! I've known I wasn't crazy, but God used this chapter to be a small piece of encouragement to let me know I'm doing what He's called me to do, and I'm not crazy! Here are a few facts that pull at my heart strings.. -A foundation is the most important part of a structure. It supports and undergirds everything within the structure. In the same way, foundational teaching supports and undergirds a child's life. Patterns developed early in life become the habits and basis for decision making in the future. -Young children are our future, but they also are a part of the church today. -The first two years of life are critical! For this age, the parents and teachers at church become representatives of who God is. The child begins to learn about a God whom He cannot see by his relationships with people he can see. A word of caution: The concrete of the first foundational concepts sets and dries quickly, and once dried, must be broken to be reshaped. The first and foremost thing young preschoolers learn about God is that He loves them. They understand this concept before their first word is spoken. They understand love not by mere words, but by actions. Yet, when words like God, Jesus, and Bible are used early and frequently with a young preschooler, and when they are associated with loving and engaging activities, the words are bound forever into the preschooler's ears and mind. -God works with preschoolers as well as adults on an individual basis. -Where there is no model, there will likely be no example to follow. Boys and girls need to see dads and moms and men and women involved in children's ministry ***All taken from "Teaching Preschoolers: First Steps Toward Faith"

Blessed

I can't believe that in two days I start my Masters program! God has truly blessed my life and orchestrated each moment leading up to this. I am so thankful for a loving husband who supports and encourages this calling each and every day. God called me to Children's Ministry in April of 2012. It was an audible, physical call....not to be denied on any level. I knew at that moment that I was undoubtedly called to children's ministry. It's no secret to those around me that I love kids, I love teaching,I love God, and I love evangelism....my mom says this calling combines it all :-) Children's ministers have always caught my eye...and I always thought that to be a children's minister would be an amazingly fun job (second only in being Miss Patty Cake...the singing evangelist on my kiddos DVDs), but I never thought I was qualified to do such a thing. Children ministers were older and had it all together! I knew I was called to the ministry and surrendered to it my Senior year of high school, but in true fashion...that'd mean I'd be a pastors wife, right?!? I wasn't sure what that calling meant, but I'd always kind of hated the phrasing "called to the ministry" because aren't we all? I frequently thought of that calling as the years went on and waited...but beyond that, looked at my life in each season and situation and tried to use that as ministry. I married a military man...we move often! Ministry to military families. I worked for a little bit after we got married at an After-School program...that meant ministry to kids and the workers there...maybe even parents who picked up their kiddos. I had my own kids...ministry to them. I mean, after all, the first Christian your child ever meets is you. I became a leader in MOPs at our church...ministry there. I made my life not about that calling, but about serving Christ and others wherever He had me...and whenever I'd sometimes think back to that moment in high school where I surrendered...I'd think, well...this must be my ministry. I do believe that at all of those times, in all of those moments, I was doing the ministry that God had for me...until 2011 hit. We moved to a small town and started attending a prominent church, but with a struggling children's ministry. I plugged in and decided to help where I could. Not very far into "just helping", did it consume me. I wasn't able to sleep because I was thinking of kids or rearranging classrooms or researching curriculum. I'd be washing dishes and an idea for our children's ministry would come to me. I'd be relaxing and watching TV and have to turn it off because I wasn't paying attention and all I could do was write and diagram and pray for this ministry. As I started to speak up and implement new safety programs and new curriculum and love on the children...I fell more and more in love with ministry to children. I'd look at their little faces each Sunday or Wednesday and break inside wanting nothing more for these children than to feel the love of Christ in all of their being and accept Him as their Savior someday. I'd go to the grocery store and be burdened for kids I had never seen before...it was truly a new passion in my heart that I could not extinguish even when I tried. Through the whole process of stepping out and helping...God also showed me that with his help I was capable too! Me....I thought I was just a wife and stay at home mom after years of feeling like that's all I do. Skill? Leave that to working moms...sure I had a degree in Education, but what does that mean when you're not doing anything with it? (I do realize I was and am educating my children, etc.)...but in the woe is me state...I didn't. I am so thankful for the hard moments at our church where God showed me not only was I passionate about reaching kids for Christ from infancy on...but I was also capable! I had knowledge others may not have, but more than anything I had HIM leading. As I dug deeper and deeper in our ministry at church, I drove home from a meeting one day...cried all the way home burdened with the ministry...and simply said, "Lord, what are you trying to tell me? What do you want me to do? I'm just a stay at home mom....I love this ministry. Please tell me!" It was that instantaneous moment that a physical feeling passed through my body that I felt from my head to my toes...I leaned over on a bookshelf that was in our computer room, and I wept as I heard the voice of my Savior saying, "Ashley, you are children's minister." Even in my tears, I audibly said, "What? No, I'm not." "Ashley, you are a children's minister." That was it for me. I knew. I called my husband at work, a royal "no,no" in the military ;-), but got ahold of him and told him exactly what happened. My husband is sweet and kind, faithful to his Savior and lives a life of humility I could only wish to, but is not a great decision maker....let me rephrase, great...but not quick! I thought I'd relay the story and he'd tell me "Well, lets think about this and wait and see, etc." Ben simply said, "Well, honey, that doesn't surprise me at all. I've never seen you as happy or as passionate about anything other than this. I'm glad you finally know." WHAT? Huh...so the man knew, but didn't tell me?!? Good grief! We ended our brief phone call and I took a few days to let the magnitude of responsibility and happiness of the responsibility sink in. From that point on, I was a children's minister. I may not hold that official title in a church, but I know that's what God has called me to. I've devoured books that Amazon has to offer and attended Group's KidMin this past fall (I highly recommend it and will be going this fall too!), but I still want more knowledge....thus my Masters in Children's Ministry. I know to be a children's minister you don't need a degree in it, but for me, it's about making me the best I can be so that I can have the most knowledge to be the most effective in ministry for the kids that God will place in my path one day. I am so excited to see what God has in store, but also overwhelmed with the depth of the calling. I pray each and every day that I will disappear more and more and God will mold me and make me into an instrument that He can use to bring others to Him and glory to His name. I am so blessed to start this journey with support from all sides, and I only hope that each day I work on my school work: teaching practices, learning styles, theology, theories, church formation, leadership....I hope amidst the facts I never miss the Father. If you want to pray for me on my journey, I won't turn you down! I've never juggled military wife, mom, and full-time student, but I have a peace that passes understanding that I am walking step by step exactly where God wants me. I pray the same for each of you! Life's circumstances can sometimes be suprising, sometimes hard, and sometimes flat out confusing...you know what God wants you to do, but you can't see "the end"....sometimes you can't even see the path to get there, but worry not! You don't have to see the path...because if you're walking hand in hand with the One who is leading you...you'll get to 'the end' one day...and be able to look back and be thankful for every step of the journey, knowing when you were blind, confused, or tired...you followed where your Savior lead each and every step of the way. God's blessings to you all!