Preparing Children for Worship

One of the books I read when we first began bringing our children into the worship service was Parenting in the Pew by Robbie Castleman. She writes that worship is “the most important thing you can ever train your child to do.” She goes on to encourage parents that having children in the worship service should be about much more than keeping them quiet and entertained. It is about coming before our Father together, as a family. We need to train our children to be participants in the worship service, not merely silent observers of it.

Twoof our children are either non-readers or emerging readers. This can make it a challenge for them to participate during the worship service on Sunday morning. Here are some things that we are doing to help bridge the gap.

First, we work on memorizing one hymn each week. We never know which hymn will be chosen on a given Sunday, but by learning dozens of hymns each year by heart, we increase our chances of knowing something that was selected. We work on the same hymn every day for a week. Often I say the words to one of the verses aloud before we sing it. We may repeat that verse, or move on and learn words for the second verse. We started this method for our preschooler’s benefit, but we all enjoy it. Periodically we allow the children to choose what we will sing by way of review.

Our church also chooses one Psalm that we sing morning and evening every Sunday for the entire month. This is another opportunity for the children to learn a song well and then sing it several Sundays in a row.

There are certain predictable elements in our weekly service. I use Talk Shoe to record all my teaching podcasts, and recently I realized I could use this free service for my kids’ memory work, as well. Once you sign up, podcasting is a simple as using a telephone.

I’ve been recording elements from the worship service such as the Apostle’s Creed and the Ten Commandments, as well as other memory work including the Children’s Catechism and the Lord’s Prayer. After recording, I can download these MP3 files to my computer and burn them onto a CD. The children are able to listen to me reciting their memory work during reading and rest time or just before bed. Burning to a CD enables me to make different tracks, so they can focus on their particular area of need. Scripture memory could also be done this way!

Tithing is another time when children can participate in the service. If your children earn an allowance, do you encourage them to set aside a tithe to put in the offering plate?

These elements help our children to participate in the first half of the worship service. Sitting still and paying attention during the sermon are difficult to teach at home. We work to teach our children to listen attentively and to sit quietly during our daily family devotions. When our youngest son began coming into the worship service he came just for the singing and prayer time. Eventually, as he learned to sit quietly during the prayers, we began bringing him in for the whole worship service.  Now our two year old daughter sits on my lap during the songs and prayers.  Our church has a nursery for these little ones so she goes there once the sermon starts.

We allow our younger children to draw quietly in a notebook during the sermon, and our older kids take notes. Everyone is expected to pay attention, and we frequently discuss points of the sermon over lunch. When my oldest first began taking notes, near the end of third grade, we made a game of asking one another questions from our notes to see if we could stump each other. This gave him extra motivation to take good notes!  My younger boys weren’t good enough writers or spellers to take notes in 3rd grade.  Note taking made it harder for them to pay attention as they couldn’t keep up at that age, so when to begin with that is individual to each child’s ability.

We also talk about the worship service during the week. We talk about why we worship the way that we do, and what our attitude should be during worship. We are working to have everything ready for worship on Saturday night so that there are less problems getting out the door on time and in a good frame of mind on Sunday morning.