Oaks Church Children’s Ministry Vision

Scripture is abundantly clear how important children are to God. The Gospel of Matthew highlights this in Jesus’s teaching about the Kingdom of Heaven. When his disciples were concerned about their status in the Kingdom, they asked Jesus, "Who is the greatest in the kingdom?" Jesus’s response is instructive as he calls a child and places him in the midst of them, saying,

Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 18:3-4)

Later on, Jesus says,

See that you do not despise one of these little ones. For I tell you that in heaven their angels always see the face of my Father who is in heaven. (Matthew 18:10)

In light of this teaching from our Lord, alongside many other teachings from God’s Word, we believe two primary things about the role and responsibility of nurturing and training children to know and love the Lord Jesus fully:

1. We believe that Scripture assigns to parents the privilege and responsibility of discipling their children.

Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up (Deuteronomy 6:4-7)

Because of this reality and this responsibility for parents to train up their children in this way…

2. We believe that it is the church’s responsibility to partner with and equip parents to build a solid spiritual foundation in their children’s lives.

So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ (Ephesians 4:11-12)

In light of these convictions, Oaks Church offers Children's Ministry classes during our Sunday gathering for newborns through 4th grade. All volunteers are known to our leadership, background-checked, and trained according to our policies and procedures for safe, Christ-exalting ministry with minors.