At Christian Life Church, we are all about "Loving God, Loving Others, and Living It Out," which we do on Sunday mornings through Connecting in our 9:00 classes and Celebrating in our 10:30 service. This dual purpose for Sunday attendance can also be described as the small group POW, which has a meaningful effect on our lives, relationships, and personal growth, and the large group WOW, where we experience God and His Word with others. All of us who attend CLC, kids who come to our classes, adults who have children, and we as children’s and nursery workers benefit from both.

Because of the significance of the 9:00 Connection time, there is a need for Nursery and Children’s Ministry during this hour. The need is especially great in the nursery and early childhood areas because it is extremely difficult to accomplish the POW when babies and little persons have to attend adult classes with their parents. Signing up to teach the elementary 9:00 class is also important because it is a valuable opportunity to achieve the POW of deeper interacting and learning that we do not have in a larger Children's Church service.  Do not underestimate how valuable your contribution is when you are coming out that extra hour earlier to make an impact on kids and their spiritual development.

Our September Team Meeting will be tomorrow night, Wednesday the 23rd, after 7:30 p.m. following the church-wide Prayer & Planning Meeting with Bishop Jay for the upcoming Back to Church Sunday, this Sunday, the 27th.  Make sure to attend the meeting so that this "big day" will be a success.

Do not forget that big events like this cannot happen without your participation, and there are lots of areas of need for this Sunday, including our Children's Ministry.  Back to Church Sunday is not just a filler on our church calendar but an opportunity for our church to invite unchurched persons to our service.  It is "easy evangelism"--we invite others to meet Jesus at church instead of having to figure out a way to lead them to Christ on our own, AND we offer them the best church experience possible by participating in areas of ministry, like our nursery and childcare, that tells guests they matter to us and to God.

Come out tomorrow night to make sure you know what is happening and how you will participate.  Be involved so the event will be a success and we can make sure that the many guests that come feel loved and connected to Jesus.  Invitations for your unchurched family, friends, and neighbors are still available for you to pick up tomorrow night and give out before Sunday.  Be the person who cares where your loved ones spend eternity.  Invite them to church and be involved in ministry so that they can have a good experience.

This coming Sunday, August 23rd, is going to be a "big day" for our church, Back to School Sunday, in which Christian Life will be giving away food and backpacks of school supplies to our congregation and community.  Flyers and invites have gone out, and a crowd is expected at our Sunday Service.  Bishop Jay has instructed our team to provide childcare and nursery, so help is needed!  Like Friend Sunday, this should be an "all hands on deck" event.

The following Sunday, August 30th, will be another event, Reconnect Sunday, in which Ministry Teams will have tables set up in the church foyer to encourage persons to connect at Christian Life through our church's various groups and teams.  Let us prepare to have welcoming persons, who can talk about our team, be at our table to help people connect.  Additionally, we will still need nursery and childcare workers that day in our Children's Ministry facilities.

The next event will be in September, Back to Church Sunday, on the 20th, for which team members must start making plans to be involved in the Nursery and Children's Ministry and to invite their unchurched friends and family because they care about those persons eternal future!  This day will be very similar to Friend Sunday and invitations for neighbors and loved ones will be available soon.

Our finale team meeting before the summer will be Wednesday, April 29th, at 7pm.  We will start out in the main sanctuary with Bishop Jay, for the Church-wide Prayer & Ministry Team Members Meeting, before we split into teams to have our individual meetings.  Make every effort to attend.

Make it a priority to be at our finale Church-wide Prayer and Planning Meeting for Friend Sunday, March 15th, at 7pm this Wednesday, March 11th.  This coming Sunday is an important event at Christian Life Church that will enable us to accomplish our mission of "Loving God, Loving Others, and Living It Out"  while this Wednesday's meeting will help us accomplish this goal successfully.  We do not want to risk being unprepared, disorganized, frustrated, or undermanned on such a significant day!

Bishop Jay has told the entire church that all members are to be mobilized that day to make a difference in the lives of those who come on the property.  When you have guests to your home, do you just show up and sit down or do you spend time preparing and then serving when guests arrive so that you are not embarrassed?

Our Ministry Team has been asked to do the following:
1.  Have our own team breakfast at 8:30am (so we are able to do our ministry the rest of the day),
2.  Nursery and Sunday School at 9am,
3.  Nursery and Children's Church at 10am (including children's Breakfast Time), and
4.  Hallway attendants to direct first-time guest children to classrooms.

Note:  The whole congregation has been asked to invite three un-churched family or friends to service that day so that our attendance could possibly, not double or triple, but actually quadruple.

Knowing how crucial our ministry is and how many things are involved, make sure to attend the Prayer and Planning Meeting.  Remember that we want to "make the most of every opportunity" (Colossians 4:5), and Friend Sunday will be a big one for us to potentially influence the lives of numerous children and their families and help persons--including little ones--who might not normally go to church become connected to Jesus.

Bishop Jay has told the church that as part of our goals to "Celebrate," "Connect," "Serve," and "Reach" in 2015, we should be connecting during our 9:00 a.m. Connect Time on Sundays and that Ministry Teams can do this by meeting with their Teams for connection during that time.  Our Children's Ministry 9:00 a.m. Sunday Team Meetings work well with allowing us to following these instructions.

As a Team, we had originally only been asking Team Members to attend on the day they were working, but with Bishop Jay now asking Teams to provide Connect Groups for their members every Sunday morning during the 9:00 hour, Team Members can now attend weeks they are not signed up since we will be including portion of Bishop's Connect Group materials in our meetings in addition to any Team business we need to cover. 

Team Members should continue to sign up for children's classes during Connect Time and plan to be in their classrooms during the hour because we expect to see kids coming out in larger numbers for Sunday School as an increasing amount of parents start getting connected this year.  Our meetings will now be in our Children's Church Assembly Area.

This past Sunday, January 11th, our 9:00 a.m. Elementary Sunday School Class, for grades 1-6, relocated upstairs to join the "Grade School Area."  This move will allow for the start in February of the new class divisions of 0-1's Nursery, 2-3's Preschool, and 4-5's Kindergarten with the hallway containing the Nursery and the two classrooms off from it, as the Preschool and Kindergarten classes, becoming our "Early Childhood Area."  Breakfast and Children's Church at 10:00 will remain in our "Assembly Area."

Breakfast has revealed itself to be a very effective ministry to kids over the time that we have added it to our Sunday morning schedule. It has proven to encourage kids to attend church and allow them to eat when they might not have otherwise gotten to on a Sunday morning. What a great way for us, as the Body of Christ, to be like Jesus who met people’s real needs, feeding or healing them. When He was teaching, He felt compassion for His listeners, not wanting them to go hungry (Matt. 15:32; Mark 8:2-3).

Making donations or serving in breakfast shows kids that we really care about them and that Jesus does too. Our team is always in need of persons to participate in this area. If you can assist with contributions or distributions, make an effort to do so. Jesus gave you a promise in Matthew 10:42, "And whosoever shall give to drink unto one of these little ones a cup of cold water only in the name of a disciple, verily I say unto you, he shall in no wise lose his reward."

During the month of October we will be trying a new meeting format in which all team members who are working on a Sunday will come out for a meeting at 9:00 that Sunday, including those signed up for 9:00 and 10:00.  Persons will only have to come to the meeting on the day that they are signed up and can choose to attend adult classes at 9:00 or only come at 10:00 on all other days.

As infants or children arrive during the 9:00 hour, the team members responsible for them will leave the meeting to go take care of them.  The meetings will start in the 6-11's Sunday School classroom in order for us to be aware when the kids arrive, and we will move from there to the 3-5's or 0-2's rooms if necessary, depending on what kids arrive, and then to the Assembly room once all the classes during the 9:00 hour have started in their rooms.

These meetings will be used for prayer, preparation, training, taking care of any team business, and assuring that all team members for that day are present.  The plan will give us the opportunity to redeem the time when teachers or workers come at 9:00 but babies or students come later, yet will assure that there are team members there when infants or kids do arrive and hopefully encourage kids and parents to start or continue coming out at 9:00.

Once all 9:00 hour classes have started and all business is covered, it will give 10:00 teachers and workers the opportunity to do preparation and setup, which is always needed, whether for a class or for breakfast, as well as be there and ready when kids are dismissed from classes shortly before 10:00.  At 10:00, the 3-5's and 6-11's can meet together for breakfast and worship before the 3-5's return to their classroom.