Saying Farewell to the Church Nursery

Church Acadiana has been a family-integrated church for several years now.  (If you are new to my blog, or to Church Acadiana, a family-integrated church keeps the family together for its primary ministries -- corporate worship and weekly small groups -- instead of dividing the family by sending each member to a different age-segregated ministry.)  Even though we are a family-integrated church, we have held on to our nursery on Sunday mornings for children up to age three.  This is because we know that children this age are still in training mode.  But we eventually discovered a kink in the hose.  As long as those children are in the nursery, then they aren't actually being trained.  They are not being taught how to sit still and quiet at church.  Instead, they are taught that church is a place where you go to play with your friends.  So when it came time to transition four-year-olds from the nursery to "Big Church," parents still had a big challenge on their hands.  These children still had quite an adjustment to make.  They were four years old, but they still had no idea how to sit still in church.  On top of that, transitioning from playing at church to sitting still at church is no fun.  Children used to look forward to going to church, but now they dread it.  That's not what anybody wants.

So we've recently made a slight adjustment.  Actually, it's a huge adjustment.  Most pastors won't be able to wrap their minds around it.  We no longer have a nursery.  Instead, we have created an Overflow Room.  In a separate room from the sanctuary, there is a large flat-screen TV with a live feed of the worship service.  Now, parents can actually train their kids to behave in church.  They can bring them into the sanctuary, and when the baby cries, or the child needs to be disciplined, parents can simply take the child to the Overflow Room and train them to behave without interrupting the worship service.  Eventually the child will learn that it is no fun to be disciplined at church, and that the live service is much better than the Overflow Room.

We're looking forward to this new season of ministry as we try out a new approach to training our youngest church members.  And we hope you will join us this Sunday!  If you have any questions about the family-integrated church, be sure to reach out to me.

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