Is Your Calendar Too Full?

What events are on your calendar? And why? This episode will challenge you to think through the events you do, how you are equipping parents to disciple, and maybe even give you permission to take things off your calendar. 

Resources Mentioned in this Episode:

• The Family Ministry Academy - https://familyministry.org/family-ministry-academy/
• Back to School Prayer Kit - https://amberpike.org/shop/ols/products/back-to-school-family-prayer-kit
• Family Discipleship Events - https://amberpike.org/shop/ols/categories/events

Transcript

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Amber Pike (00:00.936)
Welcome back to the Kidmin Huddle. I have a question for you. Is your church calendar too full? Hmm. Okay, so I'm gonna give you a bunch of challenges today. Maybe change the way you think about things and possibly give you permission to do something that you would love to do. Hmm. So take a look at your church calendar.

Maybe maybe the last couple of years, especially when it comes to children and family ministry. What's on this calendar? How many events do you have planned? So, not lessons, we're not talking lessons today. We're talking events, special things. Take a look on it. How often are these special things happening? How often are events happening? Then I want you to think about the why.

Why are you doing each of those things? So this might be a place that you pause this podcast. Please come back to it because I would be sad if you didn't. But look at what you've done, maybe what you have to do, and then the why. Then take a look at the church calendar as a whole, all of the different areas, departments, services, even. So think about like serve teams. think about if.

If one of your parents serves in worship on the worship team, worship band, whatever y'all call them, how often are they at the church practicing? how how many kids do they have in different departments? When is the youth group doing their events? Are there special preschool events? They've got kids in all the ages, small groups, church volunteer appreciation meals, like any of these things, think through how often.

Are families expected to be at an official church something?

Amber Pike (01:55.265)
I bet for a lot of you, it's probably more than you would think. And it's probably too much. Like being honest, it's probably too much. So I, if you've listened before, you know I'm a homeschooling mom. My daughter does ballet and now baton. We're into baton twirling and gonna start classes. my son, he used to do taekwondo, but not now. So we aren't

Overly scheduled. You know, we've been very mindful of our family schedule. We want to spend time as a family, so we're not overcommitted to a lot of things. And my schedule is busy, and I don't want to do all that. So, prime example, it is August. So, clearly, I'm working on Christmas stuff. I'm trying to think through what Christmas looks like, resources I'm sending home, lessons that I'm going to be writing, events, the Christmas event, and

I'm coming up with a plan and I'm talking this over with my husband. And I'm like, no, this needs to be during Sunday school because so I always do my last quarter event is an Advent kind of kickoff. I'll I'll use it the first Sunday at Advent and then I send home the discipleship resource. And I like it on this day because it's it's good for sending off that resource. It is unfortunately like right after Thanksgiving, and I'm very tired after Black Friday shopping for like 12 hours, but that's fine. And

I'm coming up with this idea. And as we've grown, it's a little bit harder. I'm gonna have to ask a class to move so that I can have the space that I need because our church has grown and we've outgrown for all of our families to be in my classroom for this. And he's like, Well, you could do it later. I'm like, No, I don't even want to move it to lunchtime after church because we are that busy. We who have a small family, I'm three doors down from my parents, and there's just his dad on his side of the family a couple hours away.

We don't have an afternoon that I want to spend on a church thing. And we live we we live live a small a small life that doesn't have tons of commitments, right? I don't have a work Christmas party because I've never been to my home office. I work from my house. my husband, they don't have a bunch of work stuff, and some people do. Think about your average family at your church. They've got school for a lot of them, they've got extracurriculars.

Amber Pike (04:14.786)
They've got maybe family obligations if they have big extended families. They've got work obligations, especially if we're looking at that Christmas time that November and December are cr honestly October through December in the church world. It's crazy for families. There's school things and family functions and you know the special things that families do to make the holidays special. And then you're trying to add things. I had a friend who, I think it was last year, her church did a volunteer appreciation thing in December.

I'm like, who does that? That's horrible for your members. Are your church families feeling the fatigue of over calendar scheduling? There's a good chance that they are. So when you're looking at your church calendar, I have two questions I want you to ask about each event on there. Is this event discipleship? Or you could ask, what is its purpose? And

Are the parents so busy at church that they don't have room to disciple at home? Cause this is where we're getting at. If we are over-scheduling our calendars so much, families begin to feel like either A, they don't have to because the church is doing it. Look, they're they're always at church doing the thing. So of course their kids are getting discipled, or B, they don't have time to do it. And I know that sounds kind of silly, like you're telling me like a once-a-month activity.

Is gonna give parents permission not to disciple? Well, realistically, it's more than once a month. There's small groups, there's midweek service, you know, serve obligations if you're on different serve teams, that event, yeah, it's giving parents permission in a sad sense to not have to disciple at home. So what's on your calendar matters. In Deuteronomy 6, we we need to refresh ourselves.

Silly as it sounds, with this calendar conversation, we need to refresh ourselves on biblical jurisdiction and whose job it is to disciple these kids. Deuteronomy 6 clearly shows us it is mom and dad's job to disciple. It is not our job at the church. And my friends, I say this as put my hand up first in line. This is the pot calling the kettle black for sure and admitting that I'm the pot. We do this.

Amber Pike (06:37.034)
We take that responsibility on ourselves and say, No, I, the church leader, I, the ministry team, it is my job to make sure these kids are discipled, and I'm gonna equip moms and dads as I do this. We get it backwards. But it is the church's job to equip believers, equip the saints. We see this in Ephesians 4:12. But first and foremost, moms and dads are given the command to disciple their children. This is how faith is supposed to be passed on. So, church.

Children's ministry, it is not our job to be the primary disciple makers.

Think about this with your events. But I also challenge you to think, children's ministry, it's not our job to be the entertainment.

We are still in this attractional entertainment model of ministry. And we need to get away for it from it. I get some flack when I go online and I say I think movie days are a waste of time. I'm sorry if you disagree with my stance. Awesome part about life. We can have different opinions, sure. But here's my reasoning behind it for so many. I have a whole podcast if you're like, what are you talking about? Go back a couple episodes, listen to that podcast. But

I think so many times we're popping in a movie to either entertain or because we need an easy button. So why? Why have it? This is how I felt about fall festivals and Easter egg hunts. I have moved to that team. I'm I'm like an old cranky lady now. No, we don't need Easter egg hunts for kids. It's a waste of time. No, we don't need fall festivals. I think they're a waste of time. Because

Amber Pike (08:23.638)
The way that I was doing them, despite making sure the gospel was being given for sure, the area that I was in, the people that that were coming to my events, it was just free candy and fun. And I realized that I could better use my time to disciple. Now, I say this as someone who, if you go back to the start of my ministry, I was an every month event kind of gal.

But you know, I also didn't have kids. I started out my first Sunday in ministry, officially on staff after that degree. I was 21. It was my 21st birthday. fun story. I don't know if I've shared this or not, but you get to hear it now. Little side rabbit will I'll take you on a little trip. first Sunday, I'm going from a Southern Baptist traditional church to a non-denominational church in the city. I'm 21. I'm like brand spankin' new as church staff, literal first day, first Sunday.

And it's communion Sunday. And I did not know that in this non denominational church that they served wine. I just thought it was there was white grape juice on the outside and there's purple grape juice, I thought, on the inside rose. And I'm like, Well, I like grape better than white grape, so I'll get this. So my twenty first birthday, the only alcohol I had, because I'm not a drinker, was the communion wine that I thought was just purple grape juice. So there you go. There's a fun story about me.

But I did. I did all the events. I mean, I'm talking like we would just have a trip to the zoo just for fellowship. I truly believed that I was accomplishing purpose by having fun events for the sake of fun.

Fast forward like twenty years and Amber is a little bit wiser now. And I see the error of my ways.

Amber Pike (10:22.872)
Fellowship is important, sure. But it's not as important as discipleship. We're not at church to have fun. We're not at church to provide fun. Now, fun can and should be happening. These are kids, right? So things should be fun. But I'm there to make disciples. I'm there to equip mom and dad to disciple at home.

Why do I need an event just because it's a fun event? Now, as a true Southern Baptist, I'm great with a church potlock. I think that should happen. you should be fellowshipping with the whole church. There should be times of that. But from a children's ministry stance and a schedule, I have eliminated events that are just there for the sake of fun.

Now, I say this was little caveat. we did a park meetup. we have a splash pad in my town, and I'm like, hey, I'm going to the splash pad with my kid if anybody wants to come. But I also did a I'm not watching your kids, so you have to come. And it was a time to connect the parents who weren't yet connected. So I did that for for a purpose, right? I had a purpose. It wasn't just we're having a movie day because movies are awesome, or we're all going to the zoo.

Because we need an event this month. I really challenge you to think through what's your purpose for this event and can you be doing it for discipleship? So for me, when I see children's ministers come on and they'll share, like, hey, I'm looking at this job, and this job description says I need to do an event a month, that is a huge red flag for me. wait, I have one over here. Here we go. Red flag, event a month, red flag. Because

My friend, families are busy. And for your committed church family, this feels like, okay, now I gotta fit this in. Especially the Burr months. Friends, don't add extra on the plate in the Burr months, please. September you can, October, November, December. Be very, very, very intentional about what you're putting on the calendar because families are busy. We want them to have time to disciple at home. I'm gonna give you a prime example. Back to school. It is back to school season if you're watching this.

Amber Pike (12:42.354)
when it's like live-ish first airing. A lot of people will do a back to school event. They will have a back to school thing, jumpies, you know, whatever. Maybe it's during your service time. If so, kudos to you, your respecting family's calendars. But instead of a back to school event, which honestly, I just kind of feel a lot of back to school events are for the purpose of just giving people stuff. Now, if this is an income thing and your families need the stuff, by all means, please do that. Continue doing that.

But a lot of families, do they do they actually need the folders that you're giving away or the notebooks? Is it a is it a true need? Or could we be discipling parents something else? And I should have brought it down here. You're just gonna have to go to my social media. This is my basement, by the way. Go check out my social media and you can see what I'm talking about. Instead of an event, I sent home a kit. It was adorable. I made a back to school family prayer kit. And of course, I use donuts because I love donuts.

So I'm holding up a picture so you can see, but go check my socials. I made these cute little boxes. I made the kit, it says donut, forget to pray. And then they got these prayer cards, these little packs. I printed them out, put them on a book ring clip, and they're praying scripture over their school year. So it one was easy. I printed, you know, I made it. So if you're like buying it, you just download print. But I was making it, you print, you cut.

You clip. Assemble boxes of donuts. Really easy. And and there's a girl online, Bethany, made it like even simpler. You could honestly just buy the bag of hostess and tap on the tape on the thing, right? You could make it super easy, but it's intentional. So I'm giving families something to do at home. They don't have to stay at church. This is not an event. Cuts my expense down. I'm not having to provide a meal. It's getting them in God's word. It's teaching them prayer. It's showing them the importance of prayer.

But then also one of the prayer prompts is instructing parents to pray scripture over their kids. So it's an easy touch on hey, moms and dads, pray scripture over your kids. I accomplished quite a lot with a simple take home that they got to do at home that mom and dad got to be the leaders in charge instead of me having an event. How can you do this? How can you take your existing event calendar?

Amber Pike (15:08.448)
And make some swaps to instead of a fun event or a kids only event, it becomes a family discipleship event. So here's the permission part. I told you in the beginning I'm gonna give you permission. If you feel this, you feel it in your bones, there is too much on your calendar. I give you permission to cut things from your church calendar. and if your church is mad, be well, Amber said I could. I'll take the heat. It's fine.

But I give you permission, cut things from your calendar with this mindset that we need to provide moms and dads the space to disciple at home without having to feel like they're constantly at church for one reason or another. And you can do simple switches like this. Prime example instead of a back to school event, I sent home a back to school discipleship kit. My friends, there are things like this all around the internet. Definitely check out Family Faith Builders by Vanessa Myers.

Check out Deeper Kidman, check out Kidman Corinne. those are the top ones, other than me. Go check out amberpek.org, renewation, family ministry.org. Check out these places for these discipleship kits that the the legwork's been done. So you purchase, you create, and you send forth. So here's another example: Christmas party. I logged years and years and years of doing a kid's Christmas party because the kids liked it. It's fun, they get a little gift.

I went from a separate Christmas party to only doing my Christmas party during my midweek service. I'm not adding something else for families to do because they're busy, Christmas. and then I even scaled that back further as I grew. I would I did the gift exchange because the kids wanted it, yes? And then I realized I'm like, I've got a mom who's got like three kids in my ministries, even though I'm doing a $5 gift, which is

Honestly, the kids were starting to get a little like, we don't like what we're getting because it's a cheap gift because yeah. I'm like that's that's a big expense and it and think church is asking them to do that. Some of their clubs or their sporting things are asking them to do that. their schools are asking them to do that. I'm like those those five, ten dollars each kid and all the places are really adding up. So I cut that out.

Amber Pike (17:27.32)
I don't do a Christmas event now. I don't have a Christmas party. Now, granted, we don't have midweek at the church that I'm at now. So I might do a special fun Christmas something. if I had midweek, but I don't. So I'm using my lesson time as lesson time. I send home a Advent resource that they use as discipleship at home. Now I do kick off with a family event, that first Sunday of Advent. I'm trying to figure out what I'm doing.

That's what I've been planning. I have an idea. I just have to figure out how to make my idea work. So stay tuned if you're looking for a fun Christmas event. But how can you do this? I went from back in the day, monthly events, to now I have max of four events a year. And three of them are family events and one is VBS.

So this year I did a family game night. it was a Bible trivia thing. I did VBS. I'm going to do a cooking event based off my cookbook, the family cookbook devotional. And then I'm gonna have my Christmas advent event. That's it. But I send home resources for discipleship. What can you cut? What needs to be cut?

Amber Pike (18:42.804)
What isn't serving a purpose? What no longer serves a purpose? What isn't meeting the needs of your families? What are your families wanting? Have you talked to your families to where you can see? So I have a newer family coming and they're wanting more. So I'm having to go to the drawing board and think, what what more can I do?

in what I feel like I can do too. Because this not on my notes, by the way, so it must be someone needs to hear this. If you are a parent, your first job is to disciple your kids.

church comes second. So I ask for this person who needs to hear this. Are you neglecting your family because you're so busy putting on events at church?

For years, my last church, it was in downtown of my little town. And there was we have a day, Oldham County Day, and it's big parade and candy and booths and all that jazz would have been the perfect time to advertise for my VBS that I intentionally scheduled for the week after Oldham County Day. Like that was my set date. I'm a I believe in set dates for VBS. They work. One year. One year out of ten there did I do an event at Oldham County Day. Didn't do the parade.

But I did have jumbies. Maybe two. Might have done two.

Amber Pike (20:18.85)
But I did the parade with my kids. I wanna be mom. I love Oldham County Day. It it's it's silly, right? The shirt was super hot. But I want my kids to have those memories that I had. I put them first.

Are you having to neglect your family and things that you want to be doing because you're so busy running church events? If so, you've got too much on your church calendar. And I challenge you to sit down with your leadership team, whether that's your children's ministry leadership, your full church, look at that calendar and what needs to be taken off or shifted so that families have room to disciple. If you're just like, wow.

I I don't, I don't know. I don't know what to do. Hey, come talk to me. Send me a message. Find me on social media. I would love to like work through this with you, see maybe what could be shifted. Reach out. If you are feeling like, yes, this is what I needed to hear. I really encourage you to check out the Family Ministry Academy that we do at Renewination. Our next class starts October 1st. And we talk about this on there in the Family Ministry Academy. We give you permission to cut things from your

your calendar because families need time to disciple. so if this has resonated with you in how you feel you need to be structuring your ministry, please check out the family ministry. family ministry.org, there's a tab, Family Ministry Academy, reach out to me. The amazing part about this is right now, because of a grant that we were given, we can scholarship this down to $100. So you are getting, it's the equivalent of one fifth of a master's degree. You are getting this amazing level of training

For a hundred bucks, your whole church could take it for 250, all your church leaders, whoever that might be. I just had someone in an email to me said, as a as a newer to ministry person, this course was amazing. If you're new to ministry, if you were like me and you've been doing it for a long time and thought, I got it all down pat, I'm gonna challenge you to think think differently in a couple of ways that honestly gives you more time.

Amber Pike (22:27.8)
We're telling you not to add a new program, but to to cut some stuff, to do less. And my friends, that is so freeing. I promise you, so freeing. So reach out and let me know. What are you cutting from your calendar? What shifts are you making? Maybe you're gonna take some baby steps and you're gonna take something like your fall festival. And instead of a kids-only event, you're gonna switch it to a family discipleship event. Maybe you start with the switch and then you do the cutting. Let me know what you're doing, what your plans are, where you're stuck.

My friends, remember what you do matters.