Connecting the Christian Faith with Children - section nine - part two (purpose)

Not everything, though, is quite so encouraging. And I have identified number of trends and significant issues we need to be aware of.

- What’s the Purpose?

2/22 (only 9%) of our churches have any specific mission statement / purpose statement for their children’s work. And the responses from the minister and children’s workers in the same church often contradicted each other with regard to the purpose of the children’s work. I don’t think any of our churches have a clear idea of what they are doing with children or why they are doing it!

When it came to the section of the form giving a list of options, many forms just had all or most of them ticked. And where the minister and the children’s worker had both filled in a copy of the form, they had generally ticked a different set of things.

A significant number of churches didn’t select ‘arm them against the dangers of secular culture’, or ‘nurture their spirituality’ as purpose statements. A number also disliked the phrase ‘convert them to Christianity’ – some saying that this is God’s work, and others objecting on the grounds that it is too strong a phrase, preferring ‘introduce them to Jesus’. Quite a number also added ‘having fun’ to the list.

This is an area of great concern. There seems to be, in our churches, total confusion about what the children’s work / Sunday School / Junior Church is actually for. Very few of our churches have any clear idea of what is the purpose of their work with children.