When the activities are a success it is great to see the children showing off their handiwork and equally to know that their time in Church has been spent happily and not with at least one eye on the door waiting for escape or release.

Enthusiasm is a great part of what makes five and six year olds function and this can be very stimulating for those working with them. Curiosity about new ideas and inventive ways of looking at facts in a different light are also often a part of their make-up so sometimes a session will go off in a completely different direction to the one intended but there is nothing wrong in that and life would be boring if it was all too predictable.

Because there is lots of material available from a variety of sources to use to create a session for the children, different people can do any given lesson in their own way. This flexibility also means that there is no correct approach either and so anybody can shape the material to produce something for the children that they are comfortable with –you just have to accept that the kids will have at least two other ways of looking at things too!

Looking back over the time that I have been involved with our Junior Church the list of things that have gone into the Sunday school bag would probably make a strange collection. What has resulted from this very miscellaneous selection is, I hope, a bunch of children whose memories of what they do at Church are coloured in a positive way and, even if they don’t always remember why they have made this, that or the other, that their enjoyment carries them on to a feeling of belonging in Church.

From my point of view, the benefits of having been involved with the Junior Church are that I have had the chance to get to know a host of children. Inevitably some of these have only passed through St. Andrews very briefly but some too I have watched grow from tinies into fully fledged independent adults.

To anyone contemplating helping with the Junior Church in any way I would suggest that it is this contact with the youngsters that is at once the most challenging but also the most rewarding aspect of the business and not one that should be missed by anyone. Everybody has something to offer the children so any and all offers of help are welcome and can be put to good use. The reward is a happy and thriving Junior Church.

Celia