It’s summertime…but for many parents in your church the livin’ is far from easy.
Summer months come with a stack of challenges—especially for working parents. That’s the bad news.
The better news is each challenge is also an opportunity for you to serve those parents and their kids. Not only can you provide relief parents desperately need during the summer months, you can do so in a way that draws parents and kids closer together and closer to Christ.
Let’s start with a look at the challenges…and then explore how you can help parents overcome them this summer.
The better news is each challenge is also an opportunity for you to serve those parents and their kids.
5 Challenges Parents Face Each Summer
Challenge 1: The need for childcare
Summer blasts a hole in whatever childcare plans most working parents have in place. With schools closed kids require all-day supervision—and that can be hard to find. Some parents have nearby relatives able to provide childcare, but that luxury isn’t available to others.
Challenge 2: Summer can be expensive
A Bankrate study found that parents who pay for summer childcare expect to spend nearly $1,000 per child. About twenty percent of those parents anticipate spending more than $2,000 per child during the summer months.
And given that childcare is a necessity, more than a third of parents will accumulate credit card debt to cover the expense.
The reality of summer childcare can leave parents financially stressed as well as emotionally exhausted.
Challenge 3: Routines are detonated
Kids need structure and the summer months often seem to stretch out in front of them as one long, empty wilderness. Accustomed to having a routine centered around the school day, some kids find themselves adrift…and bored.
And nothing is more fun than day after day dealing with a child who can’t seem to find something to do.
Challenge 4: A parent’s “me” time evaporates
There’s truth in that pre-flight announcement: If you don’t secure your own oxygen mask before attempting to care for others, it’s unlikely you’ll be much help to anyone—including yourself.
Parents who during the school year find time to exercise, sleep, and eat properly may struggle to maintain those self-care routines when coping with kids 24 hours a day.
Challenge 5: Church attendance becomes even less frequent
Between vacations, holidays, summer sports, and sleep-over recovery mornings, church attendance often suffers in the summer. Given that only about 30 percent of families attend church weekly or nearly every week, skipping a few Sundays in the summer is significant.
While busy parents may not view sporadic church involvement as a challenge, it is one. They and their kids miss out on the support and fellowship regular attendance provides. They don’t hear the teaching or participate in the worship opportunities church attendance makes possible.
Those are among pain points the parents in your church face this summer. As you consider how to bless those parents—how to pour life into their long summer months—anything you can do to ease that pain will be gratefully received.
And there’s plenty you can do.
For instance…
7 Ideas For Pouring Into Parents This Summer
1. Host a miniature golf tournament
Set up a miniature golf course in and around your building. Invite parents and kids to play together and offer snacks and small prizes to all participants. With red plastic cups serving as “holes” and dollar store pool noodles placed strategically to protect baseboards, a 9-hole course isn’t tough to design.
But remember: No using the baptistry as a water hazard.
2. Participate in a VBS
One upside of Vacation Bible School is that kids receive a hefty dose of age-appropriate Bible teaching in a fun environment. Another plus is many parents are delighted to take advantage of what amounts to the free childcare VBS provides.
Fine—that’s a win-win for all involved.
And don’t let the cost of hosting a VBS deter you. If you lack the resources to do your own, contact nearby churches that host a VBS and ask if you can coordinate with them to provide both budget and volunteers so you can send kids their way.
3. Offer respite evenings
Respite care is often reserved for caregivers of those with special needs. But the truth is many parents are 24/7 caregivers throughout the summer—and even a few hours rest while their kids are safe and having fun is a huge deal.
Organize an evening of activities at your church building and invite parents to drop off kids for a few hours of fun while parents either socialize in the building or head home for a well-deserved nap.
Just remind those snoozing parents to set an alarm so they come back to claim their kids.
4. Create a Summer Skills Program
Ask around your congregation to see who has practical, kid-friendly skills that could become a family field trip.
A retired chef can host a “How To Make The Ultimate Pancake” class in the church kitchen. Handy adults can lead Bike Tune-Up Clinics, where kids learn how to change bike tires, lubricate chains, and inspect and adjust brakes and gears. Basic carpentry, first aid, gardening, sewing, juggling, dancing, nearly any skill that can be learned in a few hours qualifies as a possible summer skill for this program.
The key is finding trustworthy adults with both a skill and a heart for kids, then invite families to participate in a program that’s not only free, but may actually save them money.
Incorporate brief Bible lessons or discussions as kids work on their projects.
5. Dim the lights for a Movie Night
It costs a fortune for a family to go to a movie. Tickets, snacks, maybe a detour to the claw machine—it all adds up.
But stretching out on the floor together to catch a movie in your gym or outside on your church lawn—that’s free. Especially if the church provides the popcorn.
Check to see if your church has a license allowing the public showing of movies. If not, acquire a Church Video License or get permission from the movie’s copyright holder.
After the movie, send families home with a list of discussion questions to debrief the film. What was the moral of the story? How did each family member see love or hope in the film? What are family members’ hopes for the future? How does God figure into those hopes?
6. Fire up a Family Festival
Ask several families to create fun games and then get together to play them. Invite other church families. Serve simple snacks.
And include a story-telling “theater” featuring a brief Bible story told at regular intervals throughout the festival time.
7. Scream for Ice Cream
An ice-cream social may be the best vintage family activity still in existence. A dozen flavors and a table of exotic toppings—not much gets closer to heaven on a scorching July day.
Provide the treats and also serve up a brief Bible story as kids eat.
How you can help parents survive summer is limited only by your creativity and the Lord’s leading. But know this: Your help will ease the pressure felt by parents exhausted by juggling work and childcare. You can provide free or inexpensive activities that make fun memories for families as they play and talk together.
And you’ll have a blast, too!
Wonder Ink’s 3-year, 52-week children’s ministry curriculum offers kids space to fully find their place in God’s Big Story. Children discover they are Known by God, Loved by Jesus, and Led by the Holy Spirit.
Mikal Keefer is an author and a fifty-year children’s ministry volunteer. No, he didn’t know Moses personally. Thanks for asking.
SOURCES:
Check out these awesome resources for parents and kids!
Activity Books for Kids
Kids have Bible story fun with coloring books and activities made just for them—perfect for preschoolers, kindergarteners, and elementary age kids!
The Action Bible
The Action Bible presents more than 230 fast-paced narratives in chronological order, making it easy to follow the Bible’s historical flow and building up to the thrilling climax of God’s redemptive story. This action-packed rendition of the world’s most awesome story will capture and draw you into all the excitement. Shop the collection here.
For Parents
Encourage parents the summer with these books!
