I am not a kid person. I make no secret of the fact that I don’t see kids in my future. Of course, I love my nephews and niece fiercely and would take a bullet for any one of them. I make a kick-ass aunt (even if I do say so myself) but I just can’t imagine myself as a mom.
So I’m still trying to understand why I agreed to help teach a whole bunch of children a few times a month.
We had a Meet the Ministries day at Fellowship two Fridays ago. I already serve in ministry so I wasn’t making rounds at the different tables. Suddenly a bubbly American woman named Cheryl approached me while I was talking to some people from my small group. What she said startled me.
“Hi! I was watching you during worship. I think you would be great at leading kids’ worship! You can sign up at the table over there. You will fall in love with the children, you will be blessed by them!” She proceeded to give me a quick description of what the ministry was about: teaching kids about Jesus and the Bible by singing songs, playing games and doubling as a day-care while their parents are attending the service.
My immediate instinct was to take a flyer, tell her I’d think about it, then just never sign up. In a split second, many thoughts flew through my mind.
I’m already serving in ministry with the communications team and I often volunteer for church events. Why should I have to give up any more of my time when there are so many others not doing anything?
I really don’t want to stay for another 2 hours during another church service, especially not with kids!
I’m not a kid person. I’m so awkward around kids who aren’t related to me!
What on earth did this woman see in me that made her think I would be right for that job?
The children’s ministry has been openly asking for help for as long as I’ve been attending Fellowship. They really need more volunteers. But not me!
And then…conviction.
1 Corinthians 7:32-34 – Paul writes:
32 I want you to be free from anxieties. The unmarried man is anxious about the things of the Lord, how to please the Lord. 33 But the married man is anxious about worldly things, how to please his wife, 34 and his interests are divided. And the unmarried or betrothed woman is anxious about the things of the Lord, how to be holy in body and spirit. But the married woman is anxious about worldly things, how to please her husband.
I don’t have to worry about a husband or kids. My only responsibility is to myself. I have more time to devote to the Kingdom than any of the women who have husbands and children.
Will another 2 hours really put that much of a strain on my life? I’m only concerned about having more time for myself to do pointless things, rather than giving even more back to the family that is feeding me spiritually and has given me so much.
I’m sorry for being so self-righteous about the work I’ve been doing. Is this what you want for me, Lord? Then I’ll give it a try.
All of that in just a split second…and somehow I found myself wandering over to the table and filling out a form. There were several options, to work with Sparklers (pre-school age children), Livewire (school-age children) and Surge (teenagers) — aren’t the names cute? I really didn’t know where they needed me most, so I didn’t put a preference. Within the week, they sent me an email asking if I could come the following Friday for orientation and to observe and assist with Maree, the Livewire group coordinator for the 1 PM service.
So after I attended the 11 AM service yesterday I walked to the Livewire area for the very first time. After a quick tour and introduction by Maree, I braced myself for the typical picture I have in my head when told I’m about to enter a room full of children: chaos. And that’s exactly what I got when I went in.
Children were rolling around on the carpet, chasing each other around the room, mashing crumbs into the ground, crawling under chairs and tables, screaming, crying, and basically being my worst nightmare. I wanted to turn around and run away so fast you would see smoke and a Ruby-shaped hole in the door.
But for some reason I managed to walk in all the way and awkwardly place myself at the side of the room while I watched the teacher try to make herself heard, over the cacophony of little voices with varying accents. Some of the kids were pretty quiet and just sat there listening to the story, which was about the birth of Christ. But many of the boys were roughhousing and a few of the preschoolers were getting a little fidgety and distracted.
One of the little girls held her arms up to me and wanted to be lifted onto a chair. Now if you know me well, you know I don’t deal with physical contact the way normal people do, especially with strangers. So I gingerly picked her up with my hands and plopped her down beside me. She beamed up at me with huge brown eyes beneath her tangle of braids. Even though it was an awkward moment for me, I asked her about the nativity scene she was playing with and she expertly pointed out the angel, baby Jesus and the sheep.
In that moment I imagined how God must see us all like that: messy, smelly, mischievous, imperfect and not being able to help it…but oh, how very precious we are to Him.
After the lesson and song, the large group was broken up into smaller ones, segregating kids by age. Maree asked me to assist her with the older kids, so we led them into another room where they were provided with Bibles. Some of the boys didn’t really want to participate, but the teachers never force them to. Instead, they were given some things to draw with so they would just sit still without distracting the others.
Soft-spoken, affectionate Maree reminded me of my old Sunday school teachers, many of whom I still fondly call “Tcher” to this day, most especially Teacher Ethel and Teacher Christine. It made me hope that I can make the same kind of impact on the kids I’m going to teach in the near future. I know I’ll learn a lot from her.
After reading the passage about the birth of Christ in the book of Luke, they played a game where they’d have to run to the opposite side of the room and write down the numbers of the verses that Maree called out. The boys were so funny, tearing down the aisle and almost ripping the paper with their enthusiasm! They reminded me so much of my nephews, especially Job.
After the educational game, Maree organized a few more games just for fun, to kill time until the parents came to pick them up.
One of the games involved wrapping some of the kids in toilet paper. I was wondering whether it would be appropriate to make a comment about it being wasteful but this kid, Archie (the one being wrapped), beat me to it: “Aren’t we wasting so much toilet paper?!?”, he exclaimed.
At such young ages, they already have very distinct personalities. They’ve only existed for less than a decade, and yet they are already such amazing little human beings. Despite my hesitations at first, I found myself warming up to them…even when they dumped all the toilet paper we had put away into a plastic bag out onto the carpet again and proceeded to “swim” in it.
All in all, it was a great first day at Livewire. I’m still a little traumatized by the initial shock of the large group, but the pleasant experience with the smaller group has convinced me to keep going. I only hope to eventually teach them things that will stay with them for a long time…and I’m sure they’re going to teach me even more in the process.
Yep, it’s T-shirt official. I’m on board.
