When I was a parent of growing sons, I used to be impressed by the public service announcement on television that featured the question, “Do you know where your children are?” When my sons became adolescents, and Melba and I gave them more and more freedom, that question used to bother me occasionally. We tried to make arrangements so that we would always know where our children were. If we didn’t know where our children were, then the risks of them getting hurt or into trouble would increase.

I think this is also a good question for congregations to ask. Congregations, do you know where your children are? Of course, the question depends upon our knowing who our children are. They are the children for whom we are responsible. They include not only the children involved in our congregational life, but also those in our community. Do you know where they are? Do you know how they are doing in school? Do you know if they have adults taking care of them after school? Do you know if they are learning how to trust in the living God whose love has been revealed in Jesus? Do you know if they are being fed, clothed properly, loved?

In 1996 The Council of Bishops announced the Bishops’ Initiative on Children in Poverty. The bishops challenged United Methodist Christians to embrace ministry to children, especially poor children in our communities, as the focus of our ministry. To give guidance to local congregations the bishops provided a checklist for every congregation to use to assess its ministry to children. [This checklist can be found at http://www.umc.org/initiative/cfagc/.] Every congregation should commit itself to a process of evaluation and planning for ministry to children using the checklist as a beginning guide.

Ministry to children is not just one aspect of a congregation’s program. It should be at the center of every congregation’s mission. This theological assertion is warranted by the way in which children are included in God’s covenant with God’s people and also by the way in which Jesus made the blessing of children an integral part of his ministry in the world. The transformation of many congregations involves the creation of intentional ministries to children in their communities.

I was a pastor when the Bishops’ Initiative on Children in Poverty was first announced. I heard in the bishops’ call a summons of the Spirit of God to the Christians called Methodists. I still believe the Spirit is summoning us to embrace the children in our midst with love.