There is a secret issue just under the surface in the ministry lives of many children’s ministers. The issue is the feeling of a lack of respect from others about what we do. We work with children and are separated from the main service. It’s easy for us to feel removed, forgotten, taken for granted and disrespected.

We can feel disrespected by our leaders and fellow pastoral staff as we sit through staff meetings listening to conversations about a service we weren’t a part of. We can feel disrespected by other ministries when our equipment is thrown aside when our room is used for other purposes. We can feel disrespected by parents when they want to side-step check-out procedures and pick-up their child how and out whichever door they want. Even our own volunteers can unintentionally make us feel disrespected when they are consistently late or call in sick at 9:30pm Saturday night.

Though as a whole the Church has come a long way in realizing the validity of ministry to children and families, she still has a long way to go. And who cares about the Church as a whole if your church happens to be functioning a few years behind the curve. There are still plenty of churches and plenty of pastors that do take children’s ministry for granted. It’s a reality for many of us. My point? All of your feelings about being disrespected may be right!

As a minister you should be respected… at minimum you should not be disrespected. But there is a hard truth: If you’re not a part of the “big-show” on Sunday morning, what you do will generally not be regarded as equal or as important. Even in the perfect and ideal church, this will always to some extent be the case.

So what now? Do we quit? Do we try not to care? Do we buckle down and claim that we’re doing it for the Lord and the kids anyhow? Do we convince ourselves that it’s prideful to want equal treatment and attention after all? Or do we start to get bitter and demanding? Spiteful of our peers and leaders? Neither direction is beneficial or acceptable.

This article is the first in a short series so I’m not going to try to address and answer everything at once. My goal with this first post is to validate your feelings. To let you know that others out there have felt it… and how some of us are dealing with it. But I will say this…

We’re a support ministry… not the main ministry.

I like what I’ve heard Jim Wideman say. He says he doesn’t see the title “Children’s Pastor” in the bible… so he figures it falls under the “Pastor” category. He’s saying that without the head Pastor there is no Children’s Pastor or children’s ministry. Without the “big-show” there is no “little-show”. We are there to serve and support our Pastor and the parents of our churches… even if they never know how much we do for them. Secondly…

Respect is earned.

Respect isn’t given, it’s earned. Sometimes we children’s ministers forget that. We think that we’re owed special treatment because of the things we endure. The reality is that we do a job that very few do understand. Most folks are scared to death of children (though I’ve never understood that) or think of them as dirty, bratty, needy ragamuffins (I do understand this one). To many our job falls somewhere between the folks who hand out bulletins and the folks who clean the toilets. So it falls on us to earn the respect that we do indeed deserve. Not because we’re prideful but because respect in ministry results in ministry that’s easier to do, and easier to attract others to do with you. One more…

Not everyone shares your vision, nor should they.

Just accept it. No one on the earth is going to have the same passion or vision for the ministry God has given you like you do. Not even your own pastor. Example: Do you have a vision for my ministry? No? Well I don’t really have one for yours either. Same goes for the choir at your church. They don’t really have a vision for your kids. Even your parents… they have a vision but it’s for one or two kids (theirs) not the whole group of them. Everyone has their own calling and passion and you have yours. Don’t be bitter about it, relish it. It’s yours. God gave it to you.

Next post we’ll talk about how to go about being a ministry (and minister) who earns proper respect. In the mean time I would love to get your feedback! If any of this has rung true, let me know in the comments. Even if it’s just a simple, “Amen!”

I found a link to this excellent article on ChildrensMinistry.com via a buddy on Facebook. I was sure I’d be listed as one of the top ten things that would ruin a good kids ministry… but I guess I’m number 11 or 12.

Number 1 on the list is communication.

1. Lack of communication — If people don’t know what’s happening in your ministry they assume nothing of consequence is happening. Refuse to communicate, and your children’s ministry will never be a priority to the church and community. People vital to your ministry need to know what’s going on in order to support the work. If they don’t know about it, they can’t support it.

Talk about your ministry with your pastor, other staff members, volunteers, parents, the community and children. Promote your ministry in church publications, community advertising, and best yet, word of mouth from satisfied participants.

If I had an 11 or 12 to add they would be:

11. Lack of Personal Spiritual Growth – It can be easy to get disconnected from the “Big Church” and miss the worship, sermons and fellowship that nurture and grow most Christians. It’s also easy to fall into the habit of only reading the Bible and studying in order to create lessons and sermons for ministry. Make sure some of it is just for you! Make time in your schedule to go to an Adult Service at least once a month.

12. A Bad Attitude – Children’s Ministers are often tempted to be huge complainers. Often they’re under the impression they’re just being visionary… but vision needs to be balanced with being completely grateful and content with the resources God has given you already. There’s a spiritual principal here… if you’re faithful over the little (even a little budget or a little team), God will make you master over much.

Read the article here: 10 Things That Can Ruin Your Children’s Ministry

Just about everything we do in Children’s Ministry is about the long term. It’s about the investment. This comic series by my podcast mentor, Scott Johnson, called The Bigfoot Diaries really spoke to me. It reminded me that our investment in children, no matter how small… matters.

Start with this one, 2, 3, end here.

Check it out and add your thoughts in the comments below.

I have been at Sheffield Family Life Center in Kansas City, Missouri for the past 10 years. Two of those were as an intern, but the past 8 years I have been involved in full time ministry for youth and children.

November 8th, 2009 will mark my last Sunday at Sheffield. I have taken a position at a church in St. Petersburg, Florida.

Why the move? Family mostly. Jenn and I have felt a ‘stirring’ for a while now. I’ve even told folks I felt like a major life change was coming… but didn’t have a clue what it would be. Jenn and I finally decided to sit town and ask God what the deal was. We started with putting together a 5 year plan for our family. I asked Jennifer where she saw us in 5 years… the first thing out of her mouth was, “I want to raise our children around family”.

I guess I had known that she had a leaning toward her folks. There had been quite a bit of travel back and forth since the kids had shown up. But this was the first time she’d just laid it out.

We prayed about it, wrote out our list, and told God that though we were making plans, it was His that we truly wanted. God rarely speaks to me directly… so we committed to two things:

We’re Moving Slow – We gave God plenty of time to let us know if we were moving the right direction. We literally prayed, “God we ask for brick walls if we’re moving the wrong way… but we look forward to mile markers of conformation if we’re headed the right way.”

We’re not going to make any decisions that we’re not willing to unmake in an instant – Though we make our own plans… we do not put our trust in our own decisions. At any point in this journey that God leads differently, we’re ready to change direction in a moment.

There were a couple of brick walls. They typically hurt when you hit them… but if you’re moving slow… not so much. Eventually after every networking resource I had in Georgia, North Carolina and Florida dried up… I got an email from a Pastor in St. Petersburg. We talked, really hit it off and the next thing I knew I was in Florida for two days of interviews.

Long story short… we’re packing up the house and moving to Florida for the next chapter of our life. The job is everything I’ve wanted. The location is everything Jenn wanted. It’s a wonderful gift from God.

Though it’s a little heartbreaking to leave the kids and folks at Sheffield, I know that they are in God’s loving hands… and that He will send someone along to replace me that will be so great that they’ll make me look like dirty dish water by comparison.

So, reader. Have you ever changed churches? Do you have any tips? Post them, or any other thoughts, in the comments.

They say the average youth or children’s minister stays in a position about three years. Leaving a ministry position is apparently a common part of our ministry lives. Though I never planned on joining the statistic… my family and I have accepted a position at a church in St. Petersburg, Florida and will be moving from Kansas City in two weeks.

My wife and I have felt for about a year that we’ve been waiting for something but we didn’t know what. Apparently God was preparing our hearts for a transition. Though we weren’t planning to go anywhere, we committed ourselves to prayer and found that God had released us and was calling us elsewhere. I’m pleased to say that we’re leaving on great terms… no drama to report. Our primary reason for the move is to be closer to family. This has become very important to us since we’ve had children.

Once a few years ago, I was going through a pretty dark time in my life. No moral failure or anything like that… I was just “going through” as they say. I was feeling as if I wanted to be done with ministry… that I wanted to leave… to get away from the pressure. I talked to a mentor of mine and he gave me some sound advice that I wanted to share in this context. He asked me to recall when God called me to my current position. I was instantly able to remember that moment. He said, “When it’s time to go, He’ll release you the same way. He called you here… he’ll call you away.” His words really clarified things for me. I realized that leaving wasn’t my choice to make. I remained faithful… and God was good.

So when is it time to leave? When God says. It makes all the difference. On those bad days in ministry sometimes the Call is the only thing that keeps you hanging in there. Knowing that in spite of all of our shortcomings and flaws, that you know that you know that God put you where you are can give us the strength we need to hold on. I’m finding that I need that same assurance as I transition between seasons in ministry. Thank God I have it. I know my future is secure, in spite of all of the unknowns, because we’re following the path that has been laid out for us by our Heavenly Father.

Those of you who may be struggling where you are… I would urge you to remember that moment God called you to be where you are. If you want to leave, ask… but wait for that call to go before you throw in the towel. God still had a lot of work to do on me that would have not been possible if I had left before. If he doesn’t release you it’s because he has unfinished work to do in your life and the lives you minister to. Trust that.

There are differing opinions on the level of excitement and fun that should be used in children’s church. Some would say that it should be filled with video clips, sound effects, games, object lessons and fun. Others would fight against such things by proposing we train children to be able to handle big church by giving them their own version of an adult-like service.

I find myself falling into a different category if you can call it a category at all. I think each church has to decide for itself what atmosphere it provides based on the requirements of their congregation. Even then I don’t believe that you can set the bar and walk away. My own services have changed over the years, going from one extreme at times to the other, based on what my kids needed at the time. Sometimes even within the same service.

I have an unwritten rule that I use to gauge the amount of ‘fun’ I use in my services. I often share this with my kids as a way to improve their behavior if we’re having a ‘full moon’ Sunday. Every week we make a deal:

If you promise to learn, I promise to make it fun.

There are times when fun makes the learning go smoothly. There are other times I have to rein it in in order to get my point across. I find that I have to keep part of my mind on the message… and the other part out there in the crowd. If the one part isn’t receiving what the other part is sending, it’s time to change things up. Right there… on the fly.

Sometimes fun works. Sometimes fun looks serious, like a secret club meeting in the back yard. Sometimes it’s not about fun at all… but about interest in the topic. Mostly it’s about where your kids are and what they need. Here’s the other guideline I heard somewhere:

A child’s experience with the content is as important as the content.

If you can’t get it in their heads somehow, it doesn’t really matter how good of a point your making. I refuse to slot my children’s church into a ‘fun’ or ‘church-like’ category because doing so would limit the methods I need to use to get the Word out. My hope would be that other Children’s Ministers would keep their options open as well. It doesn’t always have to be a playground… or a funeral.

You often see articles on how to avoid burnout in ministry… but what about when it sneaks up on you? How can you get out of the hole of despair your in? Below I’ve listed some things that help me when the well doing makes me weary.

5. Time Away – but not necessarily

Taking time off if you haven’t had a break can be a great way to recharge… but not always. Sometimes taking a break can be like running away. If you don’t do things to recharge in your time away, you’ll end up coming back right into the same situations as ill prepared as you were before.

4. Act Your Way Into Feelings

I’m not talking about faking a good mood… though we’ve all been there. That would be an attempt to feeling your way into actions… which is killer. Acting your way into feelings means that you get up, get out there and keep on trucking. If you can’t do everything you’re supposed to do, do what you can do. Give God room to move in your ministry life by continuing to do as much of it as you can. The rest of the steps depend on this.

3. Change Things Up

Most of the time we’re not burned out on ministry as a whole… we’re just burned out on parts of it. It may be time for a change in those areas. I’m a fan of giving away parts of the ministry that grind my nerves away to those who are especially gifted at it. Even if you don’t delegate everything… doing it differently can be just the thing to renew your interest and passion.

2. Ask For Help

We get burned out when we try to do more than we can handle. Sure, there are things God has called us to do that may be beyond us and all… but His yoke is easy and all that. I’m talking about when we take on to much and try to do it all ourselves. It’s time to delegate. Don’t know how? Try asking yourself, “Who would take my place if I were sick this Sunday?” and go from there. You don’t have to give everything away… just the parts that anyone else can do.

1. Pray Through

As a child I would hear people talk about ‘praying through’. I didn’t understand it then… but I sure do now. Praying through, for me anyway, is praying until my attitude changes. Literally bugging God until He helps me through. Typically for me it means Him humbling me and realizing it was some sort of independent pride that got me where I was in the first place. Along with seeking energy, attitude adjustments and such, you might also ask for creativity… or if you’re season has changed. God loves you more than the ministry you provide. He knows that you minister out of your overflow… and He will fill you if you wait on Him.

If you were leaving your position in three months… and wanted to leave the ministry you’d been building in the best condition possible… what would you do in the next 30 days?

I have recently put this challenge to myself and realized I had a vision or two that I had been holding off on for no good reason. I immediately called a meeting and boldly laid out my vision and I think things are going to start moving that direction. It’s exciting.

It’s the same as when you sell your home. There are a ton of things that you suddenly realize you need to fix that you were living with and had actually grown to accept. Looking at your home through a buyers eyes helps you see things in a more honest light. This exercise can help us to light a fire under ourselves to jump on those projects, programs, tasks or whatever that we’ve gotten used to being less than what we’ve wanted them to be.

I used to do a lot of Bus Ministry. Things have changed in the last few years where running busses is not feasible right now… but I still have a little place in my heart ready to pounce when the time is right again.

Bus Ministry is a great place to learn a lot… hard and fast. You make a lot of mistakes… and you ask a lot of internal questions… and it challenges the living crizzle out of your beliefs and makes you wonder if it’s worth it at all.

Once I remember questioning whether pulling a kid out of their situation for only a couple of hours a week was actually doing any good for them at all. I was explaining to God how they’re bombarded with family issues, inner-city pressures, peer-pressure like you’ve never seen… how was my little song-n-dance once a week going to provide any help… especially for those who didn’t half listen?

God told me—I must stop here for a moment and make sure you understand that when I say “God Told Me”, that it works like this: I get a really excellent idea in my mind that I know in a million years would never come from my own jacked up, over functioning brain—flatly”:

“When you’re in a fire… any moment you’re not burning is a great moment.”

I knew exactly what He was telling me. These kids were in the worst of situations… and though I was questioning our effectiveness, God was making it clear that every moment they were free from that situation was a precious, precious time for them. It helped me so much. Suddenly I saw their hyperactivity in a new light. They were excited to just be kids for once. They were getting a chance to play, a chance to connect with adults who truly cared about them as people. I wasn’t allowed to downplay any of the time we spent with them after that.

This concept doesn’t only apply to Bus Ministry… but to any ministry to children. Sure, we only get them a few hours a week… assuming they come every time the doors are open… but that time is precious. Especially from God’s point of view. Even if all we did was play with our kids rather than teach, for some of them it would be the most spiritually refreshing moments in their week. Experiencing God’s unconditional love in a safe, accepting environment should be the foundation of every children’s ministry experience.

I interviewed a few kids from my children’s church last week. I asked them what they thought would be the greatest struggles a children’s minister would have. Without exception every single one thought that they, themselves were the greatest challenge.

“Trying to get kids to sit still and listen.”

“Kids talking too much.”

“Making sure we don’t try to leave.”

Though I’m convinced their answers come from a naturally me-centered world due to their level of development, they still have a bit of a point. For many children’s ministers maintaining discipline in children’s ministry is a huge struggle. It doesn’t really matter how much you prepare that illustrated sermon if the kids won’t still still enough to listen to it.

Though I thoroughly cover Proper Discipline for Children’s Ministry in a podcast series, and I encourage you to give them a listen, here are a few basic tips for lowering the ‘badness’ level in your group.

1. Discipline is not a bad thing.

Many of us hate the word discipline because we were mistreated or abused under that banner. Discipline is not punishment. It is helping children into becoming more like Jesus. Proper discipline is discipling.

2. Discipline is based on a relationship of mutual respect.

Children don’t respect people because of position… they respect the folks who they have a proper relationship with. It is only though relationships that we can learn what makes a kid tick. It’s only through relationship that they can see your example. It’s only through relationship that they’ll open their heart to you and allow you to shape them into the person God created them to be.

3. Discipline is not trying to get a child to be good… but to be Godly.

For to long we’ve been trying to get kids to be ‘good’ in church. We succeed… but only in teaching them to put on a face when they come to church. Then we wonder why they turn up pregnant or suicidal in their teens. “They were such a good kid,” we’ll say. Teaching a child to be good only teaches them to not get caught. Teaching a child to be like Jesus goes beyond changing their behavior (so that I can get through my service without drama) and becomes more about changing their motivation. We should be teaching them that it’s okay to be themselves, but that they only become who they truly are when they allow the people God has placed in their lives to guide them.

Feedback? Do you have any? Post in the comments.

This week we focus on several key concepts regarding proper discipline in children’s ministry.

I was recently interviewed by Josh from The Broken Mug podcast. They asked me a lot of questions about the day-to-day of children’s ministry and I feel it would be a benefit to our listeners.

Check it out!

This month I interview my wife Jennifer about the transition into ministry, church expectiations and ways we pastors can protect our spouses as they support us.

Resources mentioned in the show:

• Random Student Selector
• The Brick Testament

Get more of James and Jenn on their weekly podcast, Geek Loves Nerd!

James is joined by guest-host Austin who poses the question, “What’s the goal of Children’s Ministry?”

Email cmmonthly@gmail.com for your chance to win 12 cd’s of animated clipart from AnimationFactory.com

Vote for CMMontly at PodcastAwards.com every day!

Resources mentioned on the show:

• http://www.kidzap.com
• http://www.whitsend.org/podcast
• http://www.clubhousemagazine.com
• http://cmconnect.org
• http://www.fiveamproductions.com

This month I’m joined by Thomas, a ‘rookie’ Children’s Pastor from Texas and we’re talking about the dread you can sometimes feel when it’s time to ask your volunteers to take on some of what you’re doing. How much can you ask them to do? Aren’t I getting paid to do this stuff? They have a full-time job already!

These questions answered and more!

Resources mentioned on the show:

• 100 Pushups
• CMConnect.org
• KidsTurn Labs
• Bubbl.us

Be sure to call in or email in your comments! (206) 600-5704 – cmmonthly@gmail.com