Own Church

It started out as an idea.  “My friends and I were talking, and we want to try to do our own church,” Christian told us.  He then explained how once a month, they would meet during the 40 minute sermon part of our church’s worship service.  He would put together a sermon and then do game time and prayer and small groups.  And we said, “Go for it.”  So he did.  Encouraged by his Dad, who knows a thing or two about putting together a sermon, he worked and studied and planned.  He then formally met with the Chairman of our Elder Board to propose his idea.  He got permission and today the kids had their very own church.

Like I mentioned before, we were all together for the main part of our worship service.  And then, when Pastor Jerry called together the Kindergarten through Second Graders that usually go down for Children’s Church, he also invited the Third through Sixth Graders to join them.  There was a definite air of excitement as they all walked downstairs.  While the younger kids met in the main room, the older ones filed into the Youth Room.

Christian gave a few introductions and instructions.  They started out with a drawing game.

It was the perfect icebreaker.

The kids worked together and had fun playing the game.

And then, Christian brought them together for a mini sermon and then introductions.  They all went around and shared their names, grades and what they would wish for if they could have one wish.  It was really sweet too, because one of them shyly explained that they wished they could be closer to God and then many of the ones that followed shared the same thing.  Positive peer pressure at its finest.

Afterwards, Christian started his main sermon.  The topic of the day was love and how to love one’s neighbor.  All of the kids had their Bibles open and followed along with the story of the Parable of the Good Samaritan.

It was so cool to see them all participating and helping each other find the Bible passages.

They acted out some of the main parts of the story.  It was a great way to get them engaged and involved with the passage.

And I just have to say that I was super impressed with how well all of the kids behaved.  I was mostly there to be an adult presence and stayed out of the way to observe.  And having worked with many of these kids, having a room of 13 third through sixth graders could be a little challenging.  But all of them were incredibly well behaved.  They listened and participated and it was really impressive.

And all in all, I was so impressed and so proud of our son.  He had a dream for him and his friends to do their own church.  He put his heart into planning this out and he did an incredible job.  And everything went really, really well.  It was so inspiring to see someone so young have a love for Jesus and a desire to do something great.  Well done Christian and a huge thanks to all of the kids who participated today.  You were all amazing!