EmailI just walked out to plug in our old diesel church bus for its weekly mission trip around our town. Big Blue is beautiful but starting to show her age. This church has been running a bus ministry longer than I’ve been alive. We all know that longevity is not the test of a ministry’s value, so it’s good to re-think the pros and cons every so often.
For more help in this vital ministry, read our 6 steps for improving your bus ministry or how to start a bus ministry.
Positives of Church Bus Ministry
- Kids come to our programs that otherwise would not. Bottom line, more children are coming to hear the gospel. About 30% of our Wednesday night kids come from the bus ministry.
- Our church is visible in neighborhoods where we have no members. Like many churches, most of our people come from the stable long-term neighborhoods of our city. The apartments and trailer parks, with their more transient populations, house almost none of our church members.
- It keeps our people outreach minded. Our volunteers get to know un-churched kids up close through this outreach ministry. We are constantly seeing new faces that remind us of the many children who are not active in church.
- It doesn’t cost much since we already own the bus and use volunteer maintenance.
- It opens new ways for people to serve. The bus ministry volunteers are pure gold.
Negatives of Church Bus Ministry
- Reaching parents is a problem. Very few churches, ours included, have really figured out how to get the families of our bus kids involved in our church.
- Bus discipline is a constant struggle. There are some frantic moments for the bus monitors; it takes special people to keep 25 excited kids safely in their seats. You might enjoy our sample discipline plan for the church bus. Having a good list of bus games is essential.
- We reinforce poor parenting habits. We preach parental responsibility, but contradict it by picking up these kids while their parents stay home.
- The kids from the bus route are often our most disruptive.
- We see very few conversions. Bus kids are often very open to the Gospel, but we don’t see much long-term fruit. This may be because they move away or because the home environment counteracts what we teach.
- There are safety risks. Any child waiting for the bus after dark makes me nervous.
So what about you? Does your church run a bus ministry? Are the pros and cons I listed here a fair assessment?
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Tony…your positives and negatives are right on target. We have had a bus ministry for 18+ years now. It has grown tremendously…tonight alone we had 215 children 5 years old thru 6th grade and 83 youth. We have 5 vans and tonight made 14 runs taking children home. We do encounter many discipline problems and that is why I am searching the web tonight…trying to find some advice or new ways of doing things. I have begged and begged for help but don’t have any one stepping up to help. My teachers are tired and ready to give up. If anyone has any programs or discipline ideas that work…please let me know. I would greatly appreciate it.
This excites me when I hear “bus ministry” for I did this also for many years. I had a few children and adults on Sunday morning but on Sunday evening services and our Thursday night miracle services there were more elderly people that were widowed and did not drive sitting in apartments and homes by theirselves wanting to attend church and oh what a time we had on the way to services!!! We had church on old “George” the name of our bus. By the time we got to church they would walk into the building shouting and praiseing God . Most of them are gone to heaven now, but we were able to make their last days on earth a blessing. it was a blessing for us to watch them on special days bring their little gifts and exchange and share with each other. Yes, a bus ministry is worth it all if a person’s heart and soul is in the work and one has the precious love of God and compassion for people to receive what God has for them.God Bless all who has this desire for a bus ministry and may you,God, provide all the nessary needs and finances and volunteers to complete their operations for this great ministry. In Jesus Name. Amen. Please e-mail me and let me know how God worked this out for you. God bless you all.
I have been involved in finding unchurched teens and getting them to church for 25 years. having pastored my first church now for 9 years I am starting to see something new. Can an imbalanced outreach ministry hinder long term growth? What I mean is that just as the article states, the bus kids are the most misbehaved. Over time your teen ministry developes a reputation as the “sweathogs”. Parents who are looking for a church to raise thier kids shy away because of the hardcore kids who create an atmosphere they dont want thier kids in. Im talking fights and honeriness which may be isolated and infrequent but take on a life of thier own. The question Im asking is is it better to keep the group made up of a majority strong church kids and then reach out only by fractional proportion to that population. I love reaching rough kids, but there comes a time when they take over and Jesus isnt Lord of the youth group anymore.
Our church has had a bus ministry for the last 40 years but now is in jeopardy of closing down due to lack of participation. I think our church has lost site of the pros and have focused on the cons. Please send prayers that Lord will take back control. The Children are to precious to ignore.
We have such an awesome responsibiity with the children who ride the church bus/van. A pastor’s wife at a church I attended in the past came from this type of minitry. Recently, as I was holding one of the toddlers in my arms while the mother was in line to get lunch following church, I thought to myself “I am doing what Jesus would do”. She has been attending for three weeks now (the mother) on the van with her children. It is precious! We welcome parents to sit with the children if they would prefer – a few have. It is work, work, work, but God is blessing the ministry.
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