![]() ![]() Your definition is foundational and will help you know how you’ll set up your program, what curriculum you’ll use, and so on. Once you have a definition, you can use it to steer your Sunday school ministry. ![]() And faith communities are God-designed places for these self-child, others-child, world-child, and God-child relationships to be uniquely nurtured. God has created human beings as relational spiritual beings so a child’s spirituality is his or her innate desire and need to connect with self, others, the world, and God (including each personality in the Trinity). When I combine these common elements, I come up with a working definition of children’s spirituality from a Christian perspective. The common elements of spirituality that experts pull out have to do with the relationships between a child and self, others, the world, and God. In the book Young Children and Spirituality, Barbara Kimes Myers writes, “Spirituality is a ‘web of meaning…connecting self, other, world, and cosmos.’ ” And Rebecca Nye writes in The Spirit of the Child that children’s spirituality is the child’s consciousness or perceptiveness about “how the child related to things, other people, him/herself, and God.” But it doesn’t hurt to look at what some experts in the area of spiritual growth have determined. Basics of spiritual growthĪs you look into the methods and approaches you’ll use when pointing kids to Jesus, you’ll have to decide with your team where God’s leading you. Let’s look at the two interrelated goals with the higher goal of “spiritual development” being to grow kids in their relationships with God. So the two are interrelated-kids have to know about God to be in relationship with him-but it seems that the ultimate goal has changed. But now it has more to do with being in relationship with God. In the past, faith development had to do more with believing certain things about God, the church, the Bible, and other theological issues. ![]() But the change in name may have to do with a shift in perspective or focus. People used to call it “faith development,” but now it’s typically referred to as “spiritual development.” Whatever you call it, it’s still the process of children’s growth in faith-and pinnacle to our ministries as Sunday school leaders. ![]()
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