Discipling Children and Youth Using the ConneXions Model
LeaderSource design is transforming children and their families in Indonesia.
One pastor of a church in Central Java first encountered our models as a translator at several trainings in Indonesia. He also translated our Transformational Theology course into the Indonesian language. He runs the Sunday school and youth services in the church, and was so inspired by the trainings that he immediately began applying what he learned there.
In the past, his church had taken on the full responsibility of discipling the children and youth, focusing the roles of church leaders on that work. As a result, parents were not taking their responsibility seriously, and would even blame the Sunday School teachers or youth mentors for any bad behavior in their children.
After receiving training with LeaderSource, this pastor was inspired to change the way they worked with children. He first shifted the discipleship responsibility by requiring that the children discuss what they were learning about in their Bible study with their parents. Then he and his team divided the young people in the church into small groups based on their age and engaged their parents in the small groups. He knew that just teaching concepts was not effective in the long run. His church needed to go deeper.
“The reason we disciple children and youth using the models that I have received from LeaderSource is that we believe that the four dynamics are required for holistic development. Nowadays, many churches (including my church!) have only used the instructional dynamic. We used to think that the other dynamics were not the church’s responsibility.
Our ministry’s focus is now to disciple families, so that the family will become the primary place for the children’s development holistically. The 5Cs connect with the goal that we want to achieve in our discipleship, and the 4Ds are the truly effective way to achieve the goal.”
To supplement the work they were doing at the church, he and his team then developed an app for parents called eDiscipleship, designing the entire structure of the app with specific 5C goals for every stage of life and 4D designs for families to use in building their children. Every family now receives coaching in a team of seven families as they work through the designs. The main purpose behind the app is to involve parents in the life and discipline of their children.
After the families do an activity, they make reports and receive a score. When they build up enough points, they can transfer those points to donations to an orphanage, a poor family, or others in need. This app not only fills a need to build healthy families, but provides a true 4D context for that building. Parents now take a central role in the discipleship.
This was a “turning point” for the church. The relationships between children and parents are now much stronger and more loving – they are growing together spiritually and relationally as families! Those parents that used to be passive have become more engaged. All of the parents testify that they are growing together spiritually and relationally as a family, and the children are excited to learn more about the Bible. By building its members up to build their own families, the church leadership is able to focus its efforts on life-building activities.
After several months of implementing the changes, the attendance in just Sunday School increased from 90 children to 146 actively engaged every Sunday. The youth service attendance is also increasing; the church recently baptized 19 youth, and more join every day!
