Hello? Who is this?

Here is this month’s Think Tank question:  “How do you understand God’s calling to children’s ministry in your own life? How would you counsel a young person who is exploring children’s ministry as a vocation? What do you make of Kids Pastors who move on to other positions in the church such as executive or senior pastor?”

Here is my response:

My calling to children’s ministry was simple and difficult at the same time. That statement sounds contradictory, doesn’t it?

I graduated from college with a BS degree in elementary education, but during my college assignments, I came to understand that I wasn’t positive classroom teaching was the exact career path in which God was leading me. I loved working with young children and I wanted to combine my work in the classroom with my work in the church.

After college I enrolled in seminary to explore the possibilities of children’s ministry. Through my course work, conversations with mentors, and continued church experience, I discovered that God was calling me to children’s ministry work.

But there are many ways of doing children’s ministry work. A person doesn’t have to be a full-time children’s minister doing that type of work as her primary position in order to be a children’s minister. In fact, many churches do not even have a full-time children’s minister on staff. Churches use part-time staff and volunteers to lead this ministry.

Throughout my years in children’s ministry, I have come to agree with churches that employ part-time or volunteer people. I have served as paid and as volunteer and have learned more about how to minister and invest in others while serving as a volunteer. For my paid position, I work in the same world along side people with whom I strive to lead the church to minister. Working in the church building everyday didn’t allow me the freedom and ability to see what “regular” people are doing and what they need.

I answered God’s call to be a children’s minister on the volunteer level because of our church size and because I wanted to combine my call to teaching with my call to children’s ministry. I have learned more about children’s ministry through this combination calling and have been better able to minister to the “real” world of children and families.

My advice to a young person considering children’s ministry as a vocation is to seek God’s will and find out what she does best. There is a definite need for children’s ministers — full-time, part-time, and volunteers. This young person must decide where she can make the best investment and where her skills can best help her in making that investment. The answers to those questions are sometimes best discovered after working in the field a few years.

Sometimes children’s ministers or youth ministers make the move “up” to senior pastor or other pastoral staff positions. Often those moves, too, are determined after experience in the field and determining the better fit. I don’t agree that people should use the children’s minister position as a stepping-stone up to the senior pastor position, but I do agree that sometimes people refine their calling after experience in the ministry. It is similar to a person working with children who later discovers that she is better suited for youth. Sometimes the size of the church determines a person’s ministry choice. He may work as children’s minister in a small church and later receive a call from a larger church to be senior pastor. That idea should not be his reason for accepting the children’s minister position though.

Each person called to ministry must discover his/her interests and skills and the best fit to make the best investment for furthering God’s Kingdom.

Click Here for responses from other children’s ministers and leaders.