The kids stay with the adults for praise & worship, and on days we have the Lord’s Supper the kids’ group re-joins the adults for that portion–which is fantastic. Fortunately the kids’ room is separated from the main room by one glass-paned door, so if they’re engaging in free-play I can go out to listen while keeping an eye on the littles.

I would love to hear some creative suggestions on ways to “invite” others to serve the children.

I try to attend as many small group and special programs as are offered so that I may meet other members, although I usually spend time getting to know the parents better.

“Congregational worship offers unique means of edification for us. Hearing the Scriptures taught and preached, singing and praying together, the witnessing of water baptisms and the taking of the Lords Supper are all important ways that God has prescribed to build us up in our faith. If we never join with the church in doing these things we’re missing something vital God has for us.”

If this is true for us as adults, then does this imply that we should not have any age-graded children’s programming, worship, teaching, and fellowship? The statement seems to imply that worship and edification is not occurring in the context of children’s ministry. I am sure that this might be the case at certain times in churches. If this is so, then why would we deprive children of the very thing which we as adults need? Or is it possible that both in children’s ministry and in other venues such as home groups or intergenerational worship, these very important sacraments and experiences can find expression.

Perhaps a middle-ground might be helpful as some churches have found, bringing age levels together at certains points for common worship experiences.

As for children noticing. I agree. They do notice. They notice that the church they grew to love as children and youth later becomes irrelevant when they graduate high school or college. Their spiritual tribe has been dispersed and they often feel they no longer belong, as Barna as so well documented. This is one reason I believe that intergenerational sermon-based small groups could well hold an important key to stemming the exodus of youth from the church, providing that they are included when they are children and later as youth.

I am very sympathetic to what you are saying. I am one of those workers in the church who rarely makes it to an adult church service. We have one service per week on Sunday morning and during the school year we run two age-graded kids churches, one for older elementary, one for younger elementary and preschool. Since CM leadership is my role in the church, I therefore am responsible for directly overseeing it.

Our about-to-be-launched sermon-based small groups should begin to fill in the gap, allowing me to get more involved with the content of weekly sermons. I also experience communion with friends outside of the institutional church, or at home.

Just thought you might appreciate a different perspective. I know you might disagree, and that is okay! Mine is not the final say on the matter:) Thanks for provoking my thinking. I appreciate it!