Would you listen to suggestions on how to throw a baseball from a person who had never seen a baseball?

--- Neither would I and that is why I have chosen to put a “how it got started” page under the bus ministry and children’s ministry sections. I want you to know that I am not an arm-chair children’s ministry leader. I have been involved in children’s ministry and bus ministry since 1973. A lot of what I have learned has come from trial and error, but another large portion has come from networking with other ministers and study.

How it got started…

If you haven’t already my account of how I got started in bus ministry, you may want to pop over to "How it got started" in the bus ministry section and read it first since this is kind of a continuation of that article.

As I got involved in bus ministry, I realized that it was not being used to its full potential. There were many kids that we were passing up on the bus every Sunday. I decided that if I was going to invest my time in bus ministry, I should do it right. I recruited several of my friends from the youth group and set out to fill the bus. Through visitation and some promotions, our weekly bus attendance grew to 40 children or more every Sunday morning in just a little over a month.

One Sunday morning near the end of service, a deacon pulled me aside and made a comment that changed my life. He put his hand on my shoulder and said “Brother, we have too many bus kids. They are disrupting the adults that want to worship.” I don’t think I said anything, but I plainly remember the shock and anger that I felt. Did he say “too many kids”?

Our church had just built a new sanctuary in front of the old one. The old sanctuary was not being used for anything. I asked the pastor that week what he thought about having somebody (note that I said somebody – not ME) take the children in there during service and having a special service just for them. He thought it was a great idea! He asked me what I was going to call it and said I could start it the following Sunday morning.

Children’s church was born and I was the leader!

I gathered some of my friends (other high school students) together and we came up with some ideas for that Sunday. We would start out with some Sunday School songs, do a puppet show (one girl knew how to use a puppet), take offering, pray, and maybe play some games.

On Sunday morning, five of gathered in the old church building with over 60 kids! Our well-planned out service lasted about 30 minutes… that only left us with an hour till the adult service was out. I drew pictures on a chalkboard that I found in a classroom in the back and told the story again. A couple of my friends acted out the story. We pulled out the bus candy and gave it to the kids that could answer questions. After what seemed to be an eternity, our first children’s church service ended.

Attendance grew and our services got better. The biggest problem was that not many churches were doing a children’s service in 1973 in Baton Rouge, La. We didn’t have many people to learn from.

The bus ministry and children’s church was run by our youth group with a 16 year old (me) in charge. We did have an adult driving the bus and I finally convinced the pastor to have at least one adult sit in on our children’s service each week. The adult was not there to help, just watch us. --- After about a year, a couple of adults became interested in helping us out.

When I left for college in 1975, I turned children’s church over to some of the youth that had been helping on a regular basis and a few adult helpers.

When I got to college, the first church I visited was looking for someone to help with their children’s church. They welcomed me with open arms – and food!

As much as I tried to work with adults and get a full-time pastorate, God kept pulling me back into children’s ministries. Working with children was not a place to start, it was the place that I needed to be.

God called me to work with children – that is why I am still going strong after over 30 years. Nobody should work with children unless they are called. I always tell groups that I talk to and prospective children’s workers that “unless God has called you to work with children, you are going to burn out.” (Burnout is a different topic to be covered later.)

I hope you enjoy the resources that I have put together on this site and I look forward to hearing from you.