Children's Ministry
Vision
Connect with families to lead each child into a relationship with God through Jesus Christ and equip them to become life-long followers of Christ.
Core Values
- Safety. Every child will be emotionally, physically, mentally, and spiritually safe.
- Fun. We teach the Bible in exciting, creative, and hands-on ways.
- Relevance. We teach Biblical truths in ways the kids can understand and then live out in their daily lives.
- Relationships. We build relationships through intentional small group shepherding.
- Biblical Truth. All lessons taught come from the Bible.
What You Need to Know
Check-In/Check-Out
To ensure the safety of children participating in our Children's Ministry programs, we use a secure check-in/check-out system. First-time guests are asked to register each child at the Children's Ministry registration desk. (Our Welcome Center hosts in the lobby will be happy to direct you!) We'll then print two, matching tags: one serves as your child's nametag, and the other stays with you while you're on campus.
The matching tags serve multiple purposes. First, it allows us to match parent and child tags on check-out. Second, it allow us to communicate with parents. Each child is randomly assigned a number each week, and that number is printed on the tags. If we need to reach you during service, we'll flash that number on the LED displays directly under the large screens at the front of the auditorium. Finally, the registration and tag system allows us to easily keep track of how many children are in each room so we can maintain safe and effective adult-child ratios.
Safe Sanctuary Policy
Morning Star is a Safe Sanctuary Church. We conduct national background checks on every volunteer who works directly with our children. We provide local training for those volunteers who will be working with the children inside of our facility, and we have guidelines in place to protect both workers and children.
Ages and Stages
Kid Connection Nursery
MSC provides a loving, caring, and nurturing environment for our littlest ones. Our focus for this age group is to share God’s love through nurturing, playing, and encouraging. It is our goal that when they leave this area of their journey, they have heard the word Jesus many times and that it becomes a natural part of their language development. We also strive to ensure they are safe and cared for.
Kid Connection Twos
Our focus for this age group is to share God’s love through nurturing each child’s needs, playing, singing, puppets, crafts, and hands-on Bible lessons using Hands-On-Learning (Group Publishing). The children are engaged in a Bible story each week, and they have prayer modeled for them. The children are also offered a snack. (We serve only teddy grahams and pretzels because of allergy concerns.) Our goal in this age group is that the children connect the word Jesus with the word love. The kids transition out of this room when they turn three years old and are potty trained.
Kid Connection Preschool and Pre-Kindergarten
Our focus for the preschoolers is to share stories about who Jesus was and what He did. We use the Little K Curriculum, which is video-based. No worries: We don’t just sit them down in front of a TV. If you've ever watched Blue's Clues and love it, you’ll love this program! Little K highly engages the kids and encourages lots of interaction. Program components include music and movement, Bible story, Knock-Knock Jokes to reinforce the story, and actions with the Bible verse to help them remember it. We also send "homework" with the kids so that you can revisit the story through the week as a family. Kids love it, and so do the parents. Our preschoolers also enjoy a craft project and snack. Our goal for this age group is that they will want to know more about how Jesus lived and be curious as to how they can become forever friends with Him!
Kid Connection K-3rd Grade
In our Kindergarten through Third Grade program, we use 252 Basics curriculum. Our first 20 minutes together is spent in Worship with music and movement. We then transition to our Bible story of the day, where the kids both listen and participate with our high-energy drama team. The last part of the experience is spent in small groups, where we reinforce the day's Bible point through games and discussions. (Just like "big church," we feel small groups are vital to our spiritual health and growth; we want to build community and small groups into our kids' lives, too!) At this stage, our goal is for the children to have entered into a personal relationship with Jesus and have Him as their forever friend.
Kid Connection 4th-5th Grade
Our fourth and fifth grade programs use 252 Basics curriculum. As with the early elementary age groups, we spend time in worship with music and movement, in large-group teaching, and in small groups. Our goal for these kids is that they have entered into a relationship with Jesus, are walking with Him daily, and are being disciples for God.