What’s Going On? Children and Worship - September 18th

On Labour Day weekend we had all of our children with us in the worship service. If you were there you probably remember. If you watched online, as I did, you could barely tell as Pastor Brady did a great job of staying on track. The first thing to say about this event was that it is unique. Only on Labour Day weekend do we have an indoor service with no kids ministry whatsoever for any age.

I emphasize the uniqueness because on the fifth Sunday of every month we also do not have kids ministry, but the pre-school age children are still cared for apart from the worship service. This will happen next on September 29 and then again on December 29. Staff has heard the concerns from our kid-inclusive services; and we are committed to continuing them. Let me say more.

The reason we have services without the full complement of kids ministry is not simply to give volunteers a break – that is more of a nice by-product. The focus is on having us be attentive to intergenerational worship – gathering to worship God with our full community of all ages. There is a long history of compartmentalizing worship and ministry by age groups. However, there is great benefit to learning to be all together and attentive to the variety of ages present as we learn from each other.

As a staff team, we realize that we may need to be more intentional in planning worship services that include our younger members. You may be glad to hear that the meeting to plan September 29 happened about an hour prior to the writing of this blog. We have a number of ideas to help us all learn and grow together that we hope will benefit all of us. It may take a little patience as we adjust to some slightly different ways of doing things, but fortunately for us the text for that day from 1 Corinthians 13 is “love is patient, love is kind” and so we may get to practice that text in real time during the service.

So please understand that we have the good intention of worshipping in full community even if we are still growing in our ability to pull it off. We trust that as we walk forward in faith together, we can listen to each other and learn how best to build a worshipping community.

For September 29, there are interactive, child-friendly parts to the service. Parents, you are encouraged to be "worship whisperers” which means be the one who helps your child participate as fully as possible at their level. Grandparents, you can get in on the act as well.

Henri Nouwen once said “Jesus does not ask me to remain a child, but to become one.” I think this suggests that all of us may find some benefit in participating in child-like ways.

Pastor Erick Schuringa

What's Going On? Children and Worship