What’s been happening in Illuminate?

From 9 days old to 90 years old, we love and cherish each member of our family.

For us adults, it has been such a joy to see our little people back in our Sunday Services again as we worship together. But when they disappear after the first few songs – where do they go?

Well here is your Illuminate Kids work catch up:

Spark

Spark is the group for our primary age group. It is run by a team of 32 volunteers, who each enjoy the opportunity to explore faith with our 5-11 year olds. Each team member commits themselves to specifically raising faith in our children, in a Spark session, roughly once a month. Some weeks we have had up to 50 children with us as we enjoy fun, games, making friends, getting creative and engaging in discussions; all with the aim of going deeper in our faith.

This term we have been looking at “One Big Story” and we have not shied away from some pretty deep theology as we have explored everything from the patriarchs to the divided kingdom. Our favourite week was perhaps ‘The Gospel’ when we talked about what Jesus did for each of us and 26 of our children decided they they wanted to choose to follow Jesus for themselves.

We have an amazing opportunity at the moment as God is bringing us so many new children each week. Sometimes at least half of the children at Spark are new to us and so we can never presume that anybody has any prior Bible knowledge, so we are exploring the things of God together from scratch! At the end of one session, we asked the children “What did you learn at Spark today?” and we loved to hear “I learnt that God is real”. For this child, it was the first time that they had ever been spoken to about God.

Fireflies

Fireflies is our pre-school group and is aimed at children aged 2-5. We have recently been able to up our capacity to 24 places, as earlier in this term, spaces had always gone by Monday each week – such is the demand! We are so thankful for the increase in team members this term which has made this possible, We now have a team of 25 volunteers who each take their turn to enjoy the company of these tiny little Jesus followers!

Following the Toddler Bible Curriculum, our Fireflies have had a whistle-stop tour of the Old Testament this term, focussing on how God helps His people. Each week, we worship together, we pray, we read the Bible and we craft – as well as loads of play and friendship building in our special Under 5’s room (which you can find squirrelled away at the back of the sports hall).

It has been such a joy to see how excited the children are as they arrive at Church each morning. This is truly amazing when you think of what the past 21 months has meant for them! They have engaged really well with the activities, crafts and the stories. It has been particularly rewarding to be able to have conversations with the older ones, especially about how God helps them overcome fear and helps them to make good choices. Next term we focus on the life of Jesus.

Twinkle

We were thrilled to launch our twinkle group this term!

Twinkle is the name for the smallest members of our Church family. Though many of our 0-2 year olds stay with us in the auditorium for our Sunday service, sometimes they need a little more space to express themselves or to feed or change or some of the other things that need to take place whether there is a service in full swing or not! And so our twinkle team are on hand to welcome them to the twinkle hub, which is set up in the lounge area of the foyer each Sunday morning. It is here that our weary parents can find a comfy spot and a friendly face, while they meet their children’s needs – but can still access the service via the live link.

It has been wonderful to meet these precious little ones and their parents and to support them as they make their first steps in the family of God.

Whether in the twinkle area or in the auditorium, we want our smallest family members to know that they are cherished by God and by His people.