Children’s Church Report 
Colin Beattie
May the Lord be glorified - in His name we have continued to be blessed with an abundance of people willing to participate in this Children’s ministry. We have welcomed into the fold Leighanne Katsimberis, Keith Duvenage, Sarah Macmillan, Vimbai Chinyadza and Michelle Oftebro (back!) - may the Lord enrich your ministry. Next term, Sue Williams and Cheryl Heath will also be joining the team, what an awesome blessing! Peta Beattie has continued to oversee teacher "training" with positive results so far.
We have adopted the theme "Making Children's Church the best hour of every kid's week". Although "a tall order", nothing must be too much to ask for the Lord. The aim is to make Children's Church really a place the kids want to attend and make it an experience they enjoy enough to invite their friends. We will strive to achieve this goal by never letting "any difficult circumstances dictate compromise" and, most importantly, to teach as creatively as possible in a fun way.
New material called Bubbles (by Scripture Union) was introduced in the pre-school class to good effect, we just felt the material was more age-appropriate for the toddlers than the corresponding Scripture Union SSALT material. This has now been also introduced into crèche, where Tarryn Hall has moved to continue her amazing service to the Lord. The Teens Turf class has wonderfully grown out of all proportion so had to be moved from Pastor Chris' Office, this has meant though that the smaller class of Grade One's have been relocated to the wooden "shack" - may the potential building/re-development plans soon come to fruition! Although this “classroom” is not ideal, it is a good 'problem' to have and we trust the building extensions to the Lord.
The only ongoing gripe is the lack of willingness by the general congregation to supervise Holiday Club on a purely ad-hoc basis (one Sunday a year!) - it does not have to be a "calling", you do not have to be a "qualified teacher" etc, etc, you just have to want to help.....just a little bit....and there is the added benefit of not having the services during the holidays disrupted by kids!!
More attention is being paid to Kids Worship in an effort to appeal to the slightly older kids and all those boys who have reached the age where they think singing is "uncool"! Our existing team of worship leaders (Karl, Danni and Peta) provide invaluable leadership week in week out, and we have benefited tremendously from the additional input and assistance of Jean Miller and Becky Fowlds (whose will, passion and love of the Lord through music are both so clearly evident in main worship).
Sincere thanks must also go to our ever faithful Family Service storytellers Sas Kirk, Barbara Rowley and Wendy Wheeler (who continue to delight us all!) as well as all our relief teachers (who diligently serve in the background).
