-
- iStock.com/Kharoll Mendoza
-
- Nolan Rothe is one of Little Lutherans’ biggest fans. The program teaches children and youth about the ministries of Calvary Lutheran Church in Richland Hills, Texas. Photo: Courtesy of Calvary Lutheran Church
Nolan Rothe was so eager to attend his first Little Lutherans congregational meeting at Calvary Lutheran in Richland Hills, Texas, that he could barely comprehend the idea of his older brother being ill, which jeopardized his chances of attending. But it all worked out, and today the 8-year-old remains one of the group’s biggest cheerleaders.
“It’s a lot of fun,” Nolan said. “We get hot dogs and pizza, and we put our fingerprints” on an art project.
Janelle Miller, Calvary’s director of youth and family ministries, held the first Little Lutherans meeting in 2022 after church leaders decided that this would be a way for her team to bridge the gap between kids and adults in the congregation. The group meets once a year, at the same time as the annual congregational meeting.
Sharon Bartells and her husband have been members of Calvary since 2011. “As a senior member, I don’t have children in the program,” she said, “but when the kids come to our annual meeting during their budget planning to ask for help, I get to interact with them and support the work they are doing. This program is one of the many ways that Calvary [strives] to give the kids a sense of ownership of their church. They are invested in and participate in worship and service projects all year. These kids are the future of our church.”
Miller said the meeting had a couple of goals. “First, we wanted to start teaching our kids about the various ministries of the church, and celebrating them,” she said. “We also wanted them to see a little [of what] happened within a congregational meeting. And we wanted to enable parents of young children to attend the congregational meeting and be able to focus on the business of the church, knowing their children were cared for and learning.”
The Little Lutherans meetings are open to youth from age 3 to confirmation age. Some high school students help, and youth who have been confirmed can attend the congregational meeting as voting members.
Call to order
As the youth arrive, each brings an offering that goes in a basket. Then they add something to the group artwork. (Parents can too). Older youth sit with younger children to help them with the activities. The first year, the children added colored pieces of paper to a large black cross; the second year they left their fingerprints on an outline of the church; and this past year, each added a leaf to a paper tree trunk.
“We do this to symbolize that we are all a part of our church family,” Miller said.
After lunch, children and their adult leaders spend the first part of the meeting talking about each of the church committees and celebrating Calvary’s ministries. “This past year we added ways kids and adults could get involved in each one of them,” Miller said. “As we talked about each one, we cheered and created something to celebrate.”
The first year, everyone got a stick and tied onto it a different-colored ribbon for each committee; the second year they received a jar and added a colored jewel for each committee; and last year, they affixed a branch and a colored leaf to the tree trunk, one for each committee.
“We do a lot of cheering during this part of our meeting,”’s budget. “We have signs for major budget areas and areas that are important to our kids,” she said. These include staff, mortgages, utilities, bus maintenance, summer camp, mission trips and day camp.
In the budget discussion, adult leaders stress things that the children participate in while also talking about where budget money goes.
In the budget discussion, adult leaders stress things that the children participate in while also talking about where budget money goes. “There are bowls by each of these signs,” Miller said, “and during the committee part of the meeting, we have a ‘banker’ who counts offerings and figures out how much we need to ‘pay’ for each of these bills. It is proportional to where our budget monies go. The banker makes sure that we do not have enough to pay our last bill, which is always one of the camps.
“We talk about how everyone in the church helps pay for things through their offerings, and we tell them that they are going to use their offering to practice paying the bills. Pairs of kids come up to ‘pay the bills,’ one bill at a time. When we get to the last bill, there is not enough money, so the kids vote whether they want to cancel the activity or find more money. We teach them the word ‘deficit.’
“The first year they were in a true panic that we would have to cancel day camp. They decided to ask the grown-ups to help and rushed into the congregational meeting asking for the money. They returned to our meeting, and the older kids worked with the banker to count it all.”
The kids needed about $2 for the simulation and gathered a couple hundred. So they talked about surplus and discussed what they should do with the extra funds. “The kids get to nominate things to do with the money, and then we have a vote,” Miller said. “Once they decide, they report back to the congregation at their meeting.”
“This past year we added the element of figuring out how to earn money for their deficit instead of just asking for it” because money does not grow on trees, Miller said. The kids voted to take out all the trash from the Sunday school rooms, sweep the church’s Family Life Center and bus tables at the adult meeting to earn money.
Before they adjourn, the Little Lutherans close with prayer.
