It's time for the church to realize that children are the greatest mission field in the world. We see the stats and hear the numbers. We know the vast majority of people who come to Christ, do so before the age of 18.
We've got to shift our attention to children. We only have a short time before they are grown and their hearts are no longer tender enough to hear and respond to God's beckoning for their soul. It's time our actions back up what we know to be true.
It's time for the church to realize that the window of time we have to reach kids has been pushed back from high school and even middle school to the preschool and elementary years. Yes, we need high school and middle school ministry, but if we don't reach children before they hit middle school, many of them will never be reached.
It's time for the church to wake up and realize that with each passing generation, fewer and fewer children are being reached. Church...look at the most recent stats. 13% of children are atheists. This is double the amount of adults who are atheists.
We must spend less time feeding spiritually bloated, complacent adults and spend more time reaching spiritually starving children.
It's time for the church to realize that the best way to reach Millennial families is by loving and investing in their children.
It's time we stop spending so much money on high tech lighting, staging, fog machines and the latest video projection systems in the "big room" and start investing the money in creating spaces and environments that attract kids.
Millennial Dad and Millennial Mom care more about seeing their kids invested in than they do about the "worship show" that we're trying to impress them with in the adult service.
It's time for the church to get serious about teaching kids God's Word. It's time we get serious about giving them a faith foundation that will endure the winds of skepticism, agnosticism, atheism and all the other "isms" that will challenge the very core of what they hear in church.
Cute lessons that focus more on teaching kids to "be good" than on "being a disciple" won't cut it anymore.
It's time for the church to start raising up children's ministry pastors and directors who can step into the many vacant children's ministry roles found across the country. Go to any church staffing website and you'll see the greatest need is effective children's ministry leaders.
It's time for the church to help people called into vocational ministry see that children's ministry is not a "step down" but rather a "step up."
It's not something you do while preparing to be a senior pastor, it's something worth giving your entire ministry journey to.
It's time for the church to begin praying for children. It's time we start covering them with prayers of faith, protection and promise.
It's time nursery volunteers begin praying over the children each week while they hold them and rock them.
It's time prayer warriors walk the preschool hallways before service and ask God to capture the hearts of the children who will be in the rooms.
It's time for deacons and elders to start praying for the children in their local elementary schools to come to Christ.
It's time senior adults start spending time praying for the pre-teens in their church.
It's time for the church to make children's ministry not just a place to serve, but the place to serve.
It's time we fill our children's ministries with the best volunteers in the church. It's time we empty the choir loft and fill the preschool rooms with volunteers.
It's time we make a shift so adults don't have to choose between their own Bible study and leading a children's Bible study on Sunday morning.
It's time for the church to mobilize students to reach back to those who admire them the most.
It's time student pastors move student ministry away from Sunday morning and encourage students to invest in children during that time. It's time to equip students during the week, so they can reach children on the weekends.
It's time success in student ministry is not measured by how many students are eating pizza at an event, but by how many students are impacting kids.
It's time the church realizes if we will spend more time building children, we won't have to spend as much time repairing adults. The more time we spend preparing children for life, the less time we'll have to spend repairing adults damaged by life.
It's time the church helps parents get their priorities in order, so they can raise kids who care more about what's happening on the mission field than they do about what's happening on the ball field.
It's time for the church to realize that God will pour out His blessings on churches that make reaching children a priority. On paper, it doesn't make sense. Children aren't big givers, 10% of most allowances is not enough to pay the light bill.
But something supernatural happens when a church focuses on reaching children. Jesus has promised when you minister to children, you are welcoming Him.
And so when a church invests in children, a special anointing is placed on that church. Families begin to be reached. Finances flow in through unexpected channels. People begin to come through the magnetic drawing of the Holy Spirit's power and blessings.
It's time for the church to wake up and realize that the future of the church depends on us reaching children. When we reach children, we are sending the Gospel to a day we will never see. Churches that are not reaching children will not survive. But churches that reach children will thrive in the coming years.
It's time...it's time...it's time the church stops giving children the leftovers and starts leaning into leaving them a legacy of faith.
