How to Make Children's Ministry Actually Fun w/ Jessica Bealer

Hey guys, Frank here with another episode of Modder Church Leader, excited to have this conversation today with my new friend. We've been chatting for a while. She's in her kid's bedroom. I'm going to tee that up now. But, Jessica, why don't you say hi to the audience?

Hello everyone, I'm excited to be here with you in my son's bedroom. We are full sending today during this podcast.

Full sending. It's going to be the title of this podcast Full send. Full send Sounds good. I love that he also has like the mini basketball hoop. Like I was very fond of those as a kid Always playing with one. So much respect.

Well, and there's a Tennessee ball flag over here, and so he's a big Tennessee ball fan. So that's over there. Yeah, I'm sitting in front of a. Playstation 5. That's to my right.

That's like the classic teenagers bedroom right there. Yeah Well, I appreciate you coming on the show. Why don't you tell folks a little bit about yourself? Like you've been in ministry for a long time, you've done some really cool things. It's been in the family and now you're. You know you've moved and now you're working at Generes. But I'd love for you to just give folks a little intro into you and kind of your background.

For sure. So this is my 22nd year in ministry about to be 23rd and I started when I was 19. And my dad was a church planner in rural East Tennessee area just outside of like the Knoxville area, so East Tennessee Valley area and I and my dad came to me and was, like I want you to do children's ministry. I had this idea that I was going to be the reporter that follows the president around. Like that's what I wanted to be. That would be an awful job. Now, like, looking back, I'm like that's so. I was really protecting me. I'm so glad what happened.

What did you get? What caused? How did you get interested in that?

Well, I love. I do love like political science. So I knew I wanted to go into broadcasting and so when I started college, I went into broadcasting and I was a reporter at WVLT in Knoxville for a while. But when I was in college they make you take, you know, different courses. And I took political science and realized that I absolutely loved it. Like I loved learning about the government and regulation and I know that sounds boring to some people, but like I was just enamored with it. And so I ended up getting a minor in political science because I took so many classes of it.

And so when I decided I wanted to be like in Washington DC and I wanted to either be, you know, like in the press corps or or doing something, that didn't work out. But my dad came to me and said, hey, I need to do children's ministry and I'm an only child. And I said I don't like kids and I don't want to be a ministry. And so he was like, okay, I'll just pray about it. And I think it was like four months later that he was sending me to North Point to get some training, and so I helped him launch a few of his campuses and I did fall in love with children's ministry and just the idea that church could be fun. I think I had.

You know I had been raised in a good church. I'm not saying it was. It was a good church but there was no children's ministry. There was Sunday school where we learned the Bible stories, but there was no actual like empowerment of parents. There was no owning your child's faith development. There was no like church fun. We went to a church camp in the summer, you know, like I went to GA camp in the summer girls in action.

There was no like fun at church, it was just church. And I remember when dad sent me to the training me thinking wow, this is actually fun, like it's fun for kids, like they could be here every single week, not just like dreading it, you know. And I remember going to getting up on Sunday mornings and you know faking that I had a cough because I just didn't want to go to church that day, you know. And so I just fell in love with this idea of relevant ministry to parents and kids and so I did it, both bivocationally, for a few years and then just said, you know, like it's time for me just to follow the calling, because I knew God was calling me into full time children's ministry. So I did that for a few years. Transition to Charlotte because of some things that happened in the business world with my husband and we really quickly got connected with Elevation Church led by Pastor Ferdick, and they were just kind of honestly in a leadership vacuum. I think they would probably affirm that as well. They just they were growing so fast. They had 1800 people. They were only a couple years old and had 1800 people and they started with seven families, you know, and and they knew they needed to launch. They got it very clearly, told them that they were going to go multi site but not very many people had on their you know and their on their staff had any experience in that. And I did.

And so Frank and I came on staff and we came on staff as campus pastor and children's campus director at the Rock Hill location in South Carolina, which was the first location they had.

That was just over the state line Charlotte sits on the state line and but then within a year we were on the executive team and we were central and I was overseeing the campuses. So I had the opportunity to launch 16 of their campuses for them got to see, to be a part of. Like you hear people say this is a movement, and I'm not saying that things aren't a movement, but I think sometimes we use that phrase just like, oh, it's a movement of God, but like we watched our church go from 1800 people to 30,000 people in you know, six, eight years and it genuinely felt like, but it felt like that we weren't in control ever and it was just the most beautiful thing ever, like it was such scrappy ministry, even when we were that big and we had bigger budgets and still felt like scrappy ministry because it just felt like we are not in control of this.

This is clearly what God is doing and I learned so much, I mean just being thrown in the fire and I learned so much and then six years ago my dad or my husband, not my dad, my dad did eventually move down here to be with us.

But my husband had an opportunity to join with Orange and to be the CEO of Face Family Centers, which is a non-profit division, or a for-profit division of Orange, which is a non-profit company, and and do some very cool things that would appeal to millennials and also kind of merge the the business world and the church world and he's doing really good with that.

But when I moved here, I got connected through a couple different people with Genevres, who was looking to start a church coaching and consulting team, and I had been doing that when I was at elevation. Like I was the person that if you needed a new number from a table because you wanted to order it in one of our campuses, you called me. Or if you wanted our volunteer coaching documents you know like that's I would share those with you or whatever it may be, I was the person that you called. So I was still getting calls about that even after I left the church, because other churches were calling and then they would just call me and so Genevres said why don't you come on and be a ministry coach for us? And it worked really well because I already had some people that I was coaching and they needed coaching.

And so now it's been yeah, five and a half years, I think, with Genevres, and every day is an adventure. I mean new churches, every church is different, but honestly, the ministry problems remain the same. We need more volunteers, we need to engage more we want to impact our community more, you know.

So we all have kind of the same, the same issues, the same challenges. But honestly, in the bigger picture it's just God's kingdom and so you know, every church may be a little unique, but we all kind of have to deal with the same same issues. But I love it.

I love it absolutely love it. I mean that's a. That's a pretty amazing ride. I could only imagine what it'd be like to be at, you know, elevation or you know or another church that went through some kind of growth like that, and just watch, watch it grow and watch God work and just see the whole thing like I mean elevation been around for a long time but definitely right, like yeah, like this thing exploded and it is everywhere, yeah, you know right.

I mean, when we were, I remember pastors even saying you know, in 2010 we wanted to be at 10,000 and we were all like that's crazy. Like we were like that's, that's a crazy, like why. Why'd you say that out loud, you know, like?

you can think it to yourself like keep it over there and, and then, and then we were, and and it was just and I mean it was just at every turn and just watching God move and the incredible things and we weren't perfect. We made lots of mistakes and we ended up in the news quite frequently because we made mistakes.

Because, we were all in our late 20s and early 30s Like we were just like trying to follow the calling of God and do the best we could. But we all made mistakes. We weren't perfect but we learned from them. And yeah, it was man. It was such a fun, enjoyable experience to be in truly like this movement of God. And just a funny little thing, my very first conference. I speak it. Probably I don't even know six to 12 conferences a year, depending on what year it is, but my very first conference never spoke at a conference before but elevation was up and going and Pastor Stephen had gotten invited. So they were like, well, just bring your whole team, we'll use them as our breakout speakers. So my very first conference was the Hillsong Conference. Like that was my first conference speaking at and I was like, wow, this is from zero to 6D, real quick, you know that kind of thing Like that was easy.

Yeah, everything from there was just like you know. But yeah, it was, man, it was just such a ride Like I mean watching our albums, you know, like we would be in the room when songs were being written, like we were in the room when the altar was written, you know, and now the altar is the altar, like it's, like the song ever made these things.

You know, and so, just like at the time, it wasn't that we took it for granted, it was just we're just people, like we're just normal, like people trying to do God's will and then to see God take control of it and, like use it in this magnificent way, that could only be from him, which is incredible so that was a really fun ride, but, honestly, this new season that I'm in right now, or newer season that I'm in right now, is just as fulfilling. It's just in a different way.

It's just kind of behind the scenes way, but it's so fulfilling to work with churches and help them.

Well, I love you. You made a comment at the beginning about just making Children's Ministry fun. Yeah, and like how do you deal? Let's talk about that Cause.

Like we were both, like we both have lots of kids you have more kids than me, but we both have kids. We love being parents, so Children's Ministry is like close to our hearts just because of that right, like whether you work in it or you're just somebody going to church. Like you want your kids to be taken care of and inspired and enjoy church. Like you really want them to actually enjoy being there, so that like they're influenced spiritually. And I think like churches the place that they're gonna be converted, necessarily that's gonna come from the home, but like church certainly has a lot of, or can have a lot, of influence, especially if they like it. So like how did churches do that? Like you lived in a world where you're like I didn't necessarily like it, but then I saw it could be fun, and then you went on this journey, helping it be fun, and now you help a lot of churches with that kind of stuff and other things. But I don't know like walk me through, like how you would go help a church make Children's Ministry fun.

Yeah, well, I think I mean. The first thing that we have to look at is what is your mission and what's your vision, because every church's mission and vision is different, and we wanna make sure, though, that the Children's Ministry vision even though it's gonna be relevant to Children's Ministry, it also has to be in align with your mission, and a lot of times, it's Children's Ministry is out of sight, out of mind.

So, like you really can have to start from like the very bottom, like foundational infrastructure type stuff, like do we have values in our Children's Ministry and in our Student Ministry that reflect the same values of the church? Are those woven together? That's really important. And then and so from there you look at that and make sure that, like your foundationally you're good. And then you have to assess, like that's the thing, like and I think people they'll call me in to assess and I'll ask like when's the last time that you've done assessment, even in either an internal one where you assessed your own ministry, or an external one where you brought someone like me in to assess your ministry? And most of the time I get like blank, like I don't know you know, I don't know if we've ever done it.

Or it's like yeah, like maybe 10 years ago, I think, we brought this person in. I remember that you know that kind of thing. But like that would be insane in the secular world. Like if a business was only looking at their product, you know like what their deliverables, that they were only looking at them once a decade or once every you know 25 years. They're looking at them and saying are we relevant, are we meeting the needs of our customers? Like they would go out of business within a couple of years because, like our society, our culture moves so fast.

So you probably have to assess yourself and there's lots of different ways to assess. I mean you can do parent surveys, you can do parent focus groups, you can do kid focus groups. You know you can do a lot of research and try some new things, try some innovative things for your season and then, like you know, test and see if that works. You know that kind of stuff. But I mean you do have to put in a system for assessing, like how frequently are we gonna assess? And I would say minimally once a year. You need to be looking at all of your ministries, all of your you know your calendar, everything that's on there, and saying is this still working, is this still relevant? And then something like that's minimally. I mean, I would probably do it a couple of times a year if I could and then, once you've kind of got okay foundationally, we're in alignment. Okay, now we know we're gonna assess and we're gonna make sure that we are relevant At that point. Then you start looking at your actual programming and we look at how you're resourcing parents. Because parents can set you up for success, like if they have done what they're supposed to do at home throughout the week, then church is not gonna feel as awkward because kids are gonna have the answers to the questions that people are talking to. It's why the kids who are the most vocal in church enjoy their experience more, and that's typically the more vocal ones are the ones that the parents have empowered them throughout the week to grow their faith. So, but you do have to look at your programming and your parent engagement and you have to say, okay, what is relevant, what is not? And I'll tell you there's not. Like, when it comes to programming, there's not just like one true formula for it.

I went to a church and this has been. This is one of my first engagements. I went to a very large church, timberlake church in Redmond Washington, just outside of Seattle, and I was with them for a year and a half and I would go down for at least four to eight days a month. I mean it was a really intensive or go up to Seattle and there was a really intensive engagement. And I remember one of my first things that I shared, because they had these big church and they had filled this room with kids. But I remember watching like they're programming as a whole.

And then one of my recommendations was I really feel like that we should probably take the motions out of the songs and I don't recommend that to everyone now, but at the time I did. And honestly, it's just growing as a coach and consultant and figuring out that every church is unique in their demographic. And I said the reason why and there's information or there's studies that have been done on this the reason why is that the most influential person in the room is the fifth grade boy. So if you have K through fifth grade in a room, even if you break it into small groups when they're in large group, the most influential person is the oldest boy in that room. If the oldest boy in the room is having a great time, then the youngest boy and girl in the room is going to have a great time and it's gonna chip all the way down.

Yeah, so, like the girls are gonna be, it is the guy. I think it's cool, because if the guy thinks it's cold, then I think it's cool. And then the fourth grade boys are looking at the fifth grade boy, Everybody's looking at the fifth grade boy, and fifth grade boys don't typically do motions when they you know Jesus they don't do that, they just don't stand there and.

My kids just graduated fifth grade. I have three fifth grade boys, so they're not the motion kids Like they're not about it.

So Right and so, like my recommendation made sense. But then so they did. The church said exactly what I said and they took all the motions out, and then they started forwarding me. The ministry leader started forwarding me all of these emails that they were getting from parents, and they weren't mad. It was more just like my kids loved, like they loved the motions to the songs, Like they would come home and share them, you know, and we would all learn them as a family, blah, blah, blah, whatever, Anyways.

So then I had to take a step back and be like okay, maybe I made a wrong recommendation, and so we went in and what we actually decided to do was let's just separate the fourth and fifth graders, but because it was working for the K through third, so let's just give the fourth and fifth graders their own space, and so we changed the model.

But so so there's not like a one, like one set of recommendations fits everybody, because the, that church sits in a super diverse area, like I mean it is right next to the Amazon headquarters, it's right next to Microsoft, I mean like there's, and they bring people in from all over the world, so it's super diverse. A lot of these people are just being exposed to the gospel for the first time, and so to me, who lives in the Bible Belt and who always has, you know, motions to song, seems a little like two decades ago, but to them it's fresh, new, and so it really is different, and you have to assess yourself and you have to say who's our demographic and what is it that they are looking for Now?

we'll tell you even though maybe, programming wise, they were a little bit behind. What the rest of the country was, technology wise, it was insane. Like what they actually had they were able to do with their technology was crazy. And so it comes down to how do you make it fun? You have to make sure that you're in alignment, you have to with the rest of the church. You have to make sure that you're constantly assessing and you're asking yourself are we the best version of us? Are we connecting with the kids and with families? And then you have to make your programming fun. And you have to also then and that from that point, once your programming is fun, it's a little easier to then make the connection with parents throughout the week, because they want to interact with you, because they're very appreciative of your ministry and of what you're doing, and that kind of.

One little thing that's just very interesting and I think this is good if you're a ministry leader and you're paying attention is that the needs of parents change through every different season and different like the stage of development of their child. So when you first like I have a one year old and so I'm not taking my one year old church hoping that they're going to develop his faith at this point, I'm just hoping that they are giving him a loving environment so he sees church as a safe place Like that's what I'm hoping for him and his physical needs are met so that then I can then go and worship, like that's what I need at this stage of development. That's how most parents are when they move into preschool. It's really like developmentally they need you to partner with them to development. It's not just about faith development there's the beginnings of that but it's also just about socialization and structure and like I mean everything from like dexterity on your hands, like the things that kids are learning in preschool, that preschool age.

So you have to make sure that your programming is reflective of what parents' needs are and at that stage of development it should be very much about their actual like physical, mental, spiritual, like growth, development, that type of thing. And then when you move into elementary they already have structure, they have school, whether it be home school or private school or public school or whatever they have, or online school. They still have some structure in their lives. And so parents are a little less concerned about their development at this point because they have school now, but what they really want at that stage of development is for their kids to have fun.

And they want them to build the healthy habit of coming to church and that's why fun is so crucial at that K through like fifth grade level. As we want them to develop healthy habits, we want them to ask to come to church. You know, like the best music to my ears is when a parent comes to pick up a child and the child's like can I just stay five more minutes? Like that's like the best and that's always my goal when we're talking about programming. I'm like I want kids to beg to stay for five more minutes at the end.

So how do we get to that point?

How do we help? Sorry no go ahead and then I'll ask questions.

That's the last thing, and then I want to move on. But if you think about what I mean, you have three 11 year olds. So what do you ask your kid when you're picking them up from the preschool class, like everybody asks them one thing.

It's like what'd you learn today? It's the same. What'd you?

learn today? What'd you learn today? But when they get into elementary school, so that K through fifth grade, the question changes. You don't ask them what they learned today. You ask them did you have fun today? And it's because the needs of parents and the needs of the kids are changing as they get older, so gotta make it fun. It's gotta be so engaging.

Like I'm thinking kind of your normal, you know just your normal church, right, your local church. There are a few hundred members right. They've got, like you know, sunday school type of thing happening right. Like you know they kind of have the pieces right, they have a small staff and whatnot. How do you like, what do you see with like those types of churches as it relates to like making children's ministry fun? And then and my experience is most of them it is kind of Sunday school ask and they're doing their best, but like the focus is usually some other place in the church, like some other ministry, whether it's young adults or just maybe young families, but kind of more around the parents or whatever. But like actual kids ministry, you know it's hard to make it really fun and awesome.

Yeah.

And to infuse it into a church where, like, how do you get them to focus on that and really pay attention?

Yeah. So here's the thing that I would say is that you do not have to be flashy, you don't have to have a big budget to be relevant and to have form, the connection. Parents bring their kids to church for a plethora of different reasons. We talked about a few I'm just a couple minutes ago growth and development, healthy habits but mostly parents bring them to church because they know they're not enough like I'm not enough if I'm, if I am, they're full. Like mental, emotional, like spiritual development guy. Like I'm not enough, I need people to partner with me. So that's why, most of the time, parents bring them.

But kids are pretty simple and students, honestly, they're, they're pretty simple. They come to church for two reasons and that's it fun and friends. That's why they come. Now we may we may say, oh, they come to memory scripture, oh, maybe there's one. They're coming because they want to have fun and they want to hang out with their friends.

Yeah, the great thing is you don't have to have a big, huge budget or have any kind of flashiness to create both of those things. You just have to have intentionality on. Okay, we definitely have to get through our discipleship right, like that's why they come to church just because we want them to learn about the principles and the boy with them to learn about God's you know story. So of course we have to do that. We can do that in a fun way. We can do activities or crafts or whatever fits your demographic, but you have to make sure that you've sprinkled fun in along the whole way. There should not be and this is where my church kind of missed the mark with the church that I grew up in. My studies will class was actually like decent, it was like deep, like my mom was my teacher and she was fun person and so like it was, it was pretty good, like I remember thinking it was fun, but then I had to sit through the service.

Right you know, had to learn how to sit in the view and and so, and and. That overshadowed all the stuff that came before it. And so when I thought of church as just a kid, I just thought of the boring part. Right, we wrinkle fun through. Everything like God's word should be fun If you're telling a story about that Bible, make the story fun.

And if your leaders aren't, if they're just like dry, then you need to do training with them, and training doesn't cost any money. And so, like there's lots of things that you can do, you do have to sprinkle fun in, and this is the key. You have to facilitate Christ-Centered relationships both, yes, mentor, but even more important than just like the mentor aspect, is the actual friendship, because the entire time that we are even now, like my daughter still rides with me the church, but the entire time that we're going, she's talking about Peyton and Megan and all of her friends that she goes to school with, that also go to church with her, and she's talking about seeing and what she's gonna take sight of them. And oh my gosh, I've got something I gotta tell Megan about blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. It's all about the friendships. So what can you do both on Sunday morning but also throughout the week to facilitate those friendships.

They have friends that come to church, then friends will also make it fun. So yeah. Bridgette, last thing I'll say is that one of the great things that COVID did Is that it made all of us realize the absolute necessity of personal relationships.

Yeah.

Because we all got super lonely right, like I mean even me, who's totally outgoing, and chat with anybody. I mean I was lonely, stuck in my house, you know, like I mean it was awful and that's where society was for three years really and we're just now coming out of it and People need relationships more than anything else. So the more personal that you can make your, your ministry, the better. And when I say personal, I'm I'm not talking about I Mean I'm talking about really personal. Like take that, if you're a small church, take all the kids and assign them to a leader and have that leader follow up with those families throughout the week.

Hey, check it in. When's your baseball game? Can I show up to your baseball game? Or are you gonna swim meet? Or you have a choir. Or like you have an art, your, your piece of art is being posted. Where can I go see that? I want to go check it out. You know, the more personal that you can make your ministry, the better you will meet the needs of families. So fun and friendship for kids make it super personal for parents and they'll stick around and they'll they'll engage with you.

Yeah, yeah, what do you see churches doing well as they move into, like you've kind of gone through fifth grade. Then you hit like middle school years. Like how do churches create great middle school year Program? Seems like a very. I feel like everything leading up is actually maybe the most important because they're developing a ton and their hearts are very soft and all the things. And you hit middle school and I'm just about to have middle schoolers I haven't seen it yet, but I hear things to kind of explode in middle school and so like how do churches create great middle school programs? Like what, what's what goes on there that you think might be a little unique?

So I will tell you that it all starts with the transition. I'm like you can't just be like bye, see you. Now You're a student.

Yeah.

The transition is so crucial and and the transition is probably gonna look different for every single church there should be some like best practices or some elements of it. But just because programming is different, timing is different, when. I have students different, all that kind of stuff, but the transition has to be so intentional. So your student ministry should be showing up into your children's ministry for about six to nine months before they leave and it should be more consistency towards the time of of you know, of their departure out of it of children's ministry.

Yeah so maybe it's with the children's pastor showed up and and he's doing the devotional for that day, you know nine months out. And then maybe it's, you know, another a month later. He shows up just for the game and he's just participating in the game. But the closer that you get to that transition, the more, with more frequency, should your, your children or your student leaders and your student pastor any of those kind of like leadership positions should be showing up in your children's ministry. And then, when you're right up on it, it's really important that you over communicate all the details with the parents. Like absolutely have to make sure that they know what all of the expectations are, how their child can make it. Maybe you have a class about how to make the transition really well.

We lose people as a church. This is across the board. Like just having launched campuses, I'll tell you that we lose people the most during transition times. Like that's when we lose them the most. And I mean I want you to think about it.

One of the hardest things on a church is when you're transitioning a senior pastor, right, and it's because there's a transition and people. It's the unknown. What comes next, I don't know. So I'm just, you know, gonna start to disengage until I check it out within, you're already disengaged, and so you have to make sure that that parents are fully informed. You have to let them taste, get a little taste of of Student ministry when they're still in children's ministry, so it makes them desire that more. Yeah, and then, ultimately, you also have to make sure that you are running your report. This is this is a really transparent behind the scenes. We were messing up. When Frank and I took over all of next-gen ministries for Elevation, we ran a report Looking at all of our fifth graders. We went report all our fifth graders and then all of the the incoming sixth graders, and we were we were losing 60% of them.

Wow, we had a 60% attrition right. We were only transitioning 40% yeah student men weren't connecting. We were like what is happening?

Yeah, it wasn't. It's weird, right like for me that yeah.

And our student ministry was amazing, like it was incredible. So we were like how? But they had gone from Small group, you know, like 12 people in a group max, to now they were. We were expecting them to, just because our student program at the time. It looks different now, but at the time it was just all large group experiences. I think they, you know, they would disappear in it, and so we kind of just had to realize that like okay, we're gonna have to walk them through the whole process. So I would tell you to also you have to run the report and make sure and then you need to follow up with each one of those people who haven't made the, the transition. Well, they haven't connected.

Yeah, you need to follow up with them one-on-one. So that's the start of it is making sure they transition well. And then beyond that, student ministry, middle school ministry, high school ministry. It is all about having incredible small group leaders or some school leaders with small church but and they don't even have to be the best teachers. I mean, we want, would love for them to be the best teachers, but even more important than that is just an approachable personality and someone who has really good character. You need people of character in your student ministry who have a really approachable person. That's your qualifications, that's what you're looking for.

Yeah, I love that.

Yeah, I'm gonna face with character and they need to be really approachable because and also just willing to invest in students.

Yeah, you gotta have you gotta have people that actually kind of want to want to do that or, right, see the value in it.

Yeah, because I have been to really boring Student ministry programming that was blowing up and like, and I'm sitting there thinking why is this blowing up, you know? And then I sat through their small group times with a couple different small groups and I'm like, oh, it's because this is their tribe, but these are their people, and so like. And then I've sat through really really like exciting, flashy, like hip, you know, like super cool programming for students and they can't figure out why they're not growing. And it's because they're small groups. They're just reading questions on a piece of paper, right, and like that's, that's not gonna work.

Yeah, and so it really is. It all boils down to the actual lay leadership that you have. How invested are they, how approachable are they? And and the litmus test for even they have to be a person of faith and character. We've had too many stories, big C church with. You know, mistakes made and, and we have to be above reproach and so, but it has to be so I mean, like it's the most important thing, is it all? It's all about relationships. We have to have somebody lay leadership in these small groups that are facilitating those friendships, making it fun, making it funny, and is willing to invest their time and energy into this group of students and that's yeah, that's that makes it.

That makes it. Yeah. Well, how are you weaving in? Just maybe as we Approach the end? Like, how are you weaving in hybrid church? Or what are you seeing churches do in the children's ministry or even student ministry, like it's? It's tricky, you know broadcasting service or doing online church in the in one way, you know.

It's so hard.

Yeah, like it's that part Sounds easier, but doing kids ministry online just Sounds nearly impossible.

Yeah, cuz, I mean you. If you go back to everything we just talked about fun and friendship, how can you create friendships online? It's so difficult you do it.

It can be done. I mean, I do have, especially in student ministry, I have a couple people who are doing some zoom groups at different churches and so like that that might be working. But I even then like I Don't know. I just think it is so very difficult. So I Think at that point, if you have people who you know that are not engaging with your church in a one-on-one personal, like I'm here present type way, they're more online, then you have to reach out and empower those parents even more and and like they're gonna have to own that, their faith development and and that's the thing we don't do that like we will broadcast our location within or we broadcast our service.

Then we will take the numbers that we have oh, this is how many people tuned in and we like present that at some kind of staff meeting. But then you've got to think about how many kids does those numbers represent, how many kids are in the homes, and you can probably even get a roundabout number may not be perfect, but it'll be close, because you can look at your demographic and say how many kids per family that attend here and so say you have 700 families that are attending and you have 2.1 kids. Well, we're talking about 1400, and you know 50, 50 or 1400 and or 1500 kids who aren't coming to. Well, then then what, like how do we then empower those parents? And it really comes down to resourcing, and you have to resource them. Well, and resourcing doesn't necessarily mean that it's a, you know, a kit or a card, like we're not giving them a parent card to put on like that's they're not gonna do that.

I mean, I'm all for refrigerator door cards. No, no, nothing one that goes well, that's not gonna do anything. You know, even if you meld into their house, it's not gonna do.

Yeah.

So so then what? So then what? And I would probably tell you, go going back to that assigning families, even your, your families, who are turning in digitally, assigning them to an actual physical leader on your campus. Hey, here are your four families that are that are have a tendency to tune in more ditch, like like, in a digital way. We need you to reach out to them and connect with them.

Right because the goal would be to transition them back and find a way like you gave a bunch of examples, like go to the sports game or go to the art, like any, any of these things, like Find a way to go get in person with them, with the family, see them right and bring them back.

And if they won't Give you those details, or at minimally, then be really consistent with your connection. So like send them a card every couple weeks, you know, text them and you know, like, a couple times a month, do a little drop gift at their, at their mailbox, or at their at their front door, like that kind of thing. Like be super initial. If they won't allow you to kind of break that barrier of engagement, then you've got to. You know, use all the tools in your toolbox to try to create some kind of engagement, right.

Yeah, yeah, that's amazing. Are there any? I'm like trying to simplify some stuff down. Are there any things you're like, oh man, I like churches need to do these three things like every time, like sit, like very practical things, like they like Church that can't do all the big stuff, but really practical. You're like, oh, every time I go in this one or two or three things Like they got to do this.

Yeah, they got to nail their first-time guest experience. Absolutely have to nail it. And I'm not even saying like I love a good first-time guest gift, I love a second-time guest gift, like I love that, I love like incentivizing them to come back and then we can get really I wrote a book about this like we can get really, like lots of ideas, yeah, but ultimately at the end of the day, you need to have the right person at the first-time guest check-in area, or at least a person that's assigned to that, that can Create a conversation and get to know them. That's my volunteer position at my church and the reason is because when they asked me where I wanted to volunteer, I knew I wanted to volunteer in children's ministry, but I also knew like this is one of the most important things that churches miss and Because they treat it like a system and yes, we have, we have first-time guest systems.

But, you.

You can't be like, just you know, oh, you fill out this card here and you flip it over here, whatever. Okay, now I'll walk you back to your class, right like that's. That is not what he's gonna be. It needs to be. How did you hear about us? Oh, you go to that school. I know a kid who goes to that school. Would you play any sports there, you know? And then, as you're walking back, you're telling them hey, listen, when you come to pick up just some insider information, we want you to. You know, pick up your preschool or first, because the line is gonna be longer with the elementary. That'll save you some time. My name is Jessica, so come and see me at the first. I'm guess you have any questions, even if it's not related to children's ministry, I'll find an answer for you now.

They have an advocate and so, like they know somebody at the church, yeah so it's so very important that you nail that first-time guest experience and the first-time guest follow-up, yeah, follow-up. So like that's a that's a crucial point. I would also say, like some just other like quick best practices, um, environments will set you up for success or failure. Give a dark room or stinky hallway or whatever. Like you got a change, and this after you don't have to remodel everything, but you got add some lights, you got to get some febrize, whatever. Like your environments will set you up for success With me with creating fun experiences.

If people have a negative View when they're just walking in the door because it smells bad or it looks bad or it's not, you know it's too crowded, you don't have enough space, that's the problem too. But or you don't have enough volunteers, whatever. They're already Expecting you not to meet their expectations. Like they're expecting you to fail, yeah, so you know you're not, probably not gonna overcome them. So I would say you have to focus on your environments. You have to have a great first-time guest experience and I know I mentioned it earlier. So I'm not going to go into those door conversations. They are the last. You are the last, like light of defense. You're the last thing that the parent is going to, to talk about, to see, to have an interaction with before they go Into the, get in their car and leave.

Yeah if that, if that door interaction is good, you can save an experience. I always say the most powerful people in the entire church I are children's ministry door leaders like people at the door and the reason that I say that is because I saw it happen over and over again at Elevation Pastor Stephen, he's incredible. He's one of the best communicators on the planet. He's gonna deliver an incredible message. It's elevation worship. They're like nominated for Grammys and stuff. It's gonna be awesome. You know, the buildings are fantastic. Even if it were to be non-permanent or permanent, it's gonna be a beautiful building. The volunteer teams are trained to the inf-degree. Like. It's a great experience. If they come to pick up their toddler and their toddler is in a dirty diaper and they have a bad interaction at the door with the door leader, they're never gonna come back.

It doesn't matter what their experience was. So you have to make sure that those last conversations, that those are important conversations that meet the needs of the parents and also have a great interaction before they go get in their car, Because that's what they're gonna be talking about when they get in their car and they may go on to the sermon later on, but when they're getting in their car they're gonna be talking about the last thing that happened. So great that's so true.

I mean, I can think of my own experience with that and whether it's like the door person or even like the teacher might be interacting with you as your kids are like checking out or something like that, and there's just like a good experience and you feel like, oh man, they love my kids, they really like having.

I can just tell Like there's like you just get this feeling like, oh, they gave to my kids today and you feel it. You know, when you feel that from somebody connected to the class of the teacher or the door person or somebody other volunteer that's in the class, like you walk away feeling like amazing, I had this only happened one time. We were going to a new location at the church I go to in the kids ministry teacher called my wife like the next day after our first like time there and my wife was like blown away. And I was blown away Cause I was like how cool, like she just was like loved having your kids. They're awesome, like they bring so much life to the class, like just that alone. And who knows, they could have been a disaster for all I know, but feeling that love from the teacher was awesome.

So it's just so funny that you said that, cause I was about to say, like the last thing I was going to say is the more personal that you can make it speaking about the actual child, the more impactful that it will be to the parents, because it affirms that they're doing a good job, like every parent wants to be firm and so good job. So say things like, man, your kid is so inquisitive, she asks the best questions or, you know, every time that we're in worship she worships so big, like I just love it, like she's a little leader, you know, or something like that. And the parents are like yes, my kids, you know. Like that.

But it relates to them, like when I come to church. They build healthy habits, they become better people and you know they become more Christ, like when they're here and they'll come more. So, yeah, the more personal you can make those conversations better.

I love it. I love it. This has been awesome. I could talk kids stuff all day long, as could you, obviously, but thanks for sharing some of your wisdom and experience with us For sure.

Thanks for having me. This has been so fun.

Yeah, can I ask you two quick, like quick quick questions to end? The first one is what's a book that you've read that you're just like everyone's got to read this.

Oh my gosh, people ask me this question. I mean, I know it's probably like an answer, but if I'm picking one book, I just talked about the power of small group, so I think you have to read Leeds, small Like if you're in children's ministry, you have to read the book Leeds Small. I think it's just absolutely crucial and when you read it you'll understand why.

So Leeds Small? Ok, Leeds Small. And then what's a podcast that you're listening to right now?

I'm listening to Carrie Newhoff because my husband was just on the Carrie Newhoff podcast.

That doesn't count. That doesn't count. Give us another one. Give it like a regular podcast that you like to listen to.

I do listen, though I do. That's the one I go to the most.

OK.

But Carrie's so long like his podcast or like an hour long that you have to. That's why it's like my primary podcast, Because I actually get like four days out of that podcast, Like at least I think Frank, my husband, Frank, and Carrie's podcast was like 92 minutes and so I had to break it down.

Yeah, you got to watch that. Yeah, you're like how many drives or gym you know? Or a point like where can I get the whole thing in? I love it. Well, he's got a great podcast, so I'm not down on the podcast, I was just digging for something else.

No, I have another one that I listen to. I know it's just funny because I just started listening to it a couple weeks ago because somebody recommended it to me. But it's just, it's like two sassy moms. It's not faith at all, it's just two sassy moms talking about things that, like moms do.

Like stuff yes.

I love it. It's just like it's a little bit of a guilty pleasure for me, but I'm like every time I listen to it, I'm like, yes, yes that's awesome.

That's awesome. Well, thanks for coming on the show today. It's been great. Thanks for telling me Absolutely Thanks, guys, for listening or watching. We'll check you next week on another episode of Modern Church Leader. Bye.

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