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Leaders find preschoolers tender toward missions


BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (BP)–When Jonathan Brown became pastor of First Baptist Church in Perryville, Mo., nearly four years ago, he found the missions program had become neglected and needed rejuvenating.

He immediately set about to do just that and took on himself what he considered one of the most important jobs — Mission Friends teacher.

“I love kids and I love missions, so this is a natural place for me to be,” said Brown, whose Mission Friends group has grown from zero to 10. “As the pastor, I like to show the children that I’m interested in them at that level and the parents like to see that I’m involved.”

Brown helps the preschoolers learn the names of missionaries and what they do. He uses maps and games to help them learn about the country or state they are studying. “I can’t tell for sure how much they’re learning, but I do know that they have all moved up to Royal Ambassadors or Girls in Action,” said Brown.

At Horsepen Baptist Church, Gilbert, W.Va., pastor Bob Worthy has about 10 percent of his average Sunday morning congregation in his Mission Friends class. Horsepen averages about 30 in Sunday school.

Like Brown, Worthy came two years ago to a church with no Mission Friends and he immediately volunteered to teach a group of two boys.

“I consider myself a missions-minded pastor and when I came here I saw that we weren’t teaching our children to do missions,” said Worthy, who is a home missionary through the church growth assistance program of the Home Mission Board. “So I started working with two boys in Mission Friends who then moved up to form the nucleus of our RA group.”

For Worthy, teaching Mission Friends has helped him form a rapport with preschoolers he says most pastors don’t have. “This has helped our whole church because the preschoolers know who the pastor is. He’s not a stranger to them. We’ve also shown the church that our preschoolers can learn about missions and that Mission Friends class is not just a place for baby-sitting.”

Also, Mission Friends is an outreach tool of Horsepen church, Worthy said. “None of the families of the three children we have in Mission Friends this year are members of our church,” he said.

But the best result of Mission Friends, said Worthy, is that young children are learning missions. “A lot of what I learned about church I learned as a preschooler,” he said. “When you learn missions as a young child, you remember missions for the rest of your life.”

At First Baptist Church in Moss, Miss., Jennifer Smith is using the Mission Friends class to teach a basic principle of Christian living: that Jesus loves all people, no matter who they are or where they are. She teaches her Mission Friends what missionaries do, and by the end of each unit they can remember the name of the missionary they have studied and what he or she does.

After each class, the Mission Friends share with the whole congregation what they learned that night. “They have an unbelievable understanding of what missions is,” said Smith, who hopes her Mission Friends will move up to be a part of the first RA/GA program at her church.

At First Baptist Church, Nashville, Tenn., the numbers are bigger but the goal of Mission Friends is the same: to teach children early what missions is, said Carol Worsham, Mission Friends director. “We want our parents to realize how much these children are learning,” said Worsham, “and how much more they could learn with a little encouragement at home.”

In Oklahoma City, Carla Young often gets the whole congregation and especially parents at Emmaus Baptist Church caught up in Mission Friends. She produces a schedule showing what the Mission Friends will be studying, and when, offering tips on how the parents can reinforce what the children learn at church.

Young believes preparation is the key to a successful Mission Friends program and she always has a plan to keep the youngsters busy, entertained and educated. Once, when the unit of study was on missions in Texas, she decorated the room with a western theme, emulated a campfire, served up a stew and roasted marshmallows. On the ceiling she had placed stars and the kids scattered around the room on sleeping bags, looked up at the stars, heard a guitar playing and listened to a story about missions work in Texas.

“Missions is what the Lord called us to do in the Great Commission. And I want these young children to learn that,” Brown said. “When the opportunity came for me to teach them, I took it. You’d have a hard time getting this class away from me now.”
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  • Sue Poss