Kia Ora Bay Kids Whanau,
It’s a shortened and busy week this week, particularly with Easter Camp getting underway on Thursday; So this month’s Family Discipleship Email feels a little bit more like what we used to call in the ‘olden days’, a PotPourri - a mixture or medley of things, usually scented dried petals and wood shavings thrown together randomly. I’m not entirely sure what the modern equivalent word might be for you… a pick and mix, a lolly scramble, a curated collection? Or my favorite - a hodgepodge.
So here it is, the hodgepodge:
Easter Camp may be for the Youth Group, and not necessarily on your radar yet, and that’s totally fine, but it does mean that this is the beginning of what your children will experience one day too - we are creating intentional formational opportunities across all our age groups from 18 months to 18 years. And this is very exciting news, especially for the Team Bay Seniors who will be joining Youth from next year onwards. As these Team Bay Seniors flow into Youth over the next few years, there’s plenty of enthusiastic children in Team Bay Junior, as well as a growing Bay Preschool area too. Our formational practices and curriculum foundations build through each of these age levels and it’s really lovely to have this continuity across such a large developmental age span.
Framing up Church. It’s our job to frame things up for our children. We actually naturally do this all the time. We carefully answer loudly asked awkward questions about the physical appearance of complete strangers - usually in supermarkets. We explain other family’s choices or decisions or hardships or use of time politely and diplomatically. And we intentionally set our children up for positive new experiences by having family meetings in the car prior to visiting a new friend or starting a new school. As parents we are Framers, and although our children have excellent observational skills, they need support with how they interpret what they see and feel.
So with that in mind, here’s some helpful advice from parenting for Faith,
‘‘If we want our kids to be actively involved in church, then framing church services for them is so crucial. Whether it’s telling them what’s coming up, or why something is happening, or how others are connecting to God, framing is a brilliant tool that we use naturally as parents all the time, through the week, in all sorts of different contexts. Framing in church is necessary too!”
So this might look like whispering during the worship about what's happening for different people that they can observe or what they might be feeling themselves. It can be chatting through in advance the rhythms of what happens every Sunday morning - the welcome, the worship, the prayer, the offering. Or it could be having a quick question time in the car on the way home to talk through anything that was going on and why.
Framing up Easter. This year in Bay Kids I have framed up Easter in three parts. 1st When it's sad, 2nd When it's happy, and 3rd All that happens next. This is to make sure that we don't just rush through the story, that we actually slow down and take a good look around, and it also gives us some time to explore all the different events and emotions, learning to see them in a bigger context, making sense of why Jesus died and rose again and what it means for the rest of the New Testament narrative and our lives. We will carefully journey through sadness, reflect on the waiting and not knowing, celebrate joyfully on Easter Sunday, and then learn about the next chapter for the disciples and us.
I really want our children to know the power of these words from John 3 verses 16 and 17 over their lives this Easter Season. They are so very loved.
“God so loved the world (and _______ your name) that he gave his one and only Son. Anyone who believes in him will not die but will have eternal life. God did not send his Son into the world to judge the world. He sent his Son to save the world through him.”
I also love this Easter language from Meredith Miller which is helpful for framing up the meta-narrative of Easter.
“About 2000 years ago, God came to be with us, to be a person just like us, named Jesus. Jesus shows us what God is like, how loving and good God is. And we needed that, because the world was full of sadness and sickness and hard stuff, even death. Jesus came so we would know that God felt sad about all this too. And not only did God feel sad, God was going to fix it.”
This language comes from her great Easter resource, particularly useful at home over Easter when navigating The Easter Story with 1 - 5 year olds.
SAD DAY, HAPPY DAY! HOORAY! Here's your Easter Story Guide, written just for Kids ages 1-5.
The lost art of plodding. Here’s some very simple discipleship wisdom from Jon Tyson that I think is so important for us as families in the midst of the everyday ordinary moments of boring and busy life - just keep plodding. Know the persevering grace of Jesus in your life, and keep plodding, keep moving forward, even when it feels like very small sluggish steps and uninspiring momentum. Trust Him. Look to Him. And get yourself near encouragement, the encouragement of others in this with you and also the encouragement of those who are just a few steps ahead.
Hear these beautiful words from Jeremiah 17 verses 7 and 8 as an encouragement to stay planted and to grow, nothing massive, just deep roots and green leaves.
“But blessed are those who trust in the Lord and have made the Lord their hope and confidence. They are like trees planted along a riverbank, with roots that reach deep into the water.
Such trees are not bothered by the heat or worried by long months of drought. Their leaves stay green, and they never stop producing fruit.”
Happy Easter Bay Kids Whanau. May you be warmly reminded of the joy and life that is in Jesus as your journey towards Easter Sunday.
Arohanui,
Charlotte