Skip to main content

How to, what for, and why: Children's Stories


Children’s Stories

Goals:
  • Incorporate children in the life and the worship of the church.
  • Faith formation: primarily for the kids, secondarily for the adults.
  • Support and reinforce the overall (theme of) the worship service.
  • Help children to form horizontal relationships with peers and the congregation as well as a vertical relationship with the Divine--as is appropriate in all worship.


Practices:
> The pastor or sermon giver will contact the children’s story leader with specific direction early in the week.
> The children’s story should be 3-7 minutes. 5 minutes is a sweet spot for attention.

Pro-tips:
> Keep a clear focus--it’s good to stay on one point; We don’t have to cover the entire scripture.
> Engage multiple senses. Ideas here.
> Be interactive.
> Something you’re interested in or excited about will be interesting and exciting to others.


Resources:

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

James 1: Two Calls to Worship

James 1: 17-25 One: Come now and worship God For every good and perfect thing is from above Many: Given by the Father of heaven All: We worship you, unchanging Father One: We are the first-fruits of God’s creatures Many: Birthed by God’s word All: We worship you, Mother of truth One: We are brothers and sisters Many: We are hearers of the word, we are doers of the word All: We worship you, righteous God ------ One: We gather in the house of God, Many: We gather with the people of God, One: to worship God. Many: to hear God’s word. One: The word of God Many: is a good and perfect gift, given from above. One: God gave us birth Many: through the word of truth. One: God planted this word in us. Many: It has power to save us. One: Be doers of the word, Many: not only hearers. One: Listen to the word, Many: to live in God’s righteousness.

My body has forgotten how to cry

My body has forgotten how to cry. I mean, I regularly tear up, I’m not a monster. But to cry, actually let the tears slip down my cheeks, sob, any actual catharsis, no. I cried at the beginning of last summer. It was the last day my family was worshipping at the church where we had attended for 11 years, where I had been the youth pastor, where my girls were born, with the people who rebuilt my house after the fire . It was also the last Sunday some of our best friends would be there. They were moving to Iowa. I cried from the moment worship began and all through the carry-in meal. I cried as I told them, “Thank you for allowing me to help raise your children and for helping me to raise mine.” That was the last time. Before that, I cried twice in the fall of 2018: both pretty intense circumstances. But, generally, the tears don’t come. They ball into a painful pressure at the top of my sternum. (Yes, I am aware that’s the heart chakra.) The world feels like it’s falling down. I have n...

A vision for a humble Easter

One of my ministry gifts is being able to see things with fresh eyes. One of my favorite parts of motherhood is watching my girls learn things and experience them for the first time. Seeing through the eyes of a child is truly wonderful. I often use the technique of defamiliarization in sermons to let us get at old stories and reveal something new. " Defamiliarization i s the artistic technique of presenting to audiences common things in an unfamiliar or strange way in order to enhance perception of the familiar. " In central Kansas, we are in the calm before the storm. Pastors in NY and other overwhelmed places are writing out and saying that first come the online worship services and the questions about how to be community. But soon those concerns change to “How do I comfort the dying when they are quarantined?” “How do I comfort the widow in quarantine?” “Do I livestream a funeral??” As Joy Harjo writes, “What shall I do with all this heartache?” Artist Geof...