Village Children's Ministry

The classroom where I had spent all morning emptied, and I took a moment to breathe in the silence and take a sip of water after speaking and teaching all morning in French. I didn't realize how physically and mentally exhausting that is until the students - 45 village leaders, evangelists, and children's "monitors" (children's ministry leaders) - left the classroom and gave me a minute to breathe. 

What a great morning we had already had! Charlotte and I tag-teamed in teaching (as Rebeca translated into Dagara) the sessions of this first children's ministry formation: 

Introduction: vision and goals 

The importance of children in the church

Characteristics of a children's minister

The foundation: Prayer

How children are not like adults

How to organize a children's ministry (essential elements) 

How to prepare a Bible story lesson for kids

Tools for success 

Now the participants had a chance to start putting it into practice, and I didn't want to stay in the empty classroom and miss the activity that God was doing outside. So I peeked outside to see if the leaders and monitors had understood the activity that I asked them to do, and my heart lept with joy at what I saw. 

Scattered throughout the courtyard, the church leaders and monitors had gathered according to village and region to pray for the children in their area and for the launching of a children's ministry in each of their churches. I spotted seven clusters - some with only two people and others with as many at ten. As they prayed for their children and their children's ministry, I prayed for them, and I realized that God was doing something very powerful here. This is only the beginning. 

I came to Burkina with a dream to see a children's ministry developed in the village churches. Our churches in the Église Évangélique du Christ (Evangelical Churches of Christ) movement reach adults, but currently don't offer much to children, who either stay at home or sleep during church. This year, God gave Charlotte, Rebeca and I a vision to do something about it, so we spent every Sunday doing a tour of five villages to help them launch children's ministries in their churches. At the end of that tour, God gave us the desire to host a children's ministry training seminar. 

So the dream God gave me at the beginning of this year was being fulfilled before my eyes in this very moment as I watched church leaders and future children's ministers pray. God is at work. 

When the men and women gathered back in the classroom, I said, "So you want to start a children's ministry in your church or in your village? Congratulations! You just have!" If prayer is the foundation and these leaders have started to pray for their children, then God will hear and answer as we faithfully take the next step forward. 

I pray that each participant left with a box full of useful tools for starting a children's ministry, and based on the feedback received, I think that mission was accomplished. Now I pray a prayer that I pray more often than any other here in Burkina: Lord, take my small, humble efforts and do something big with them that only you can do!  May God take it from here. May he will empower the leaders to use the tools they have been given to do his work. May children come to believe in and follow Jesus.

Join me in praying for these leaders and their churches, the children in their villages, the identification and training of godly monitors, and the start of many sustainable children's ministries. We keep this vision in mind always: to raise up a generation that knows Jesus only and not idols and fetishes!