A huge part of the HARRAHkids and Orange Strategy is to reactivate the role of the parents in the spiritual development of children. Pastor Jimmy Holbrook’s book Shelter is a part of that effort. In the book Jimmy discusses how to build a shelter where you can raise little warriors and princesses who will one day leave the home and enter the world on their own. We believe that it is the parents primary job to educate children in following Christ and that we as the church are here first to support parents with resources, guidance and programming.
We provide parents with take home materials that they can use at home to reinforce the lessons that their children are learning in our children’s programming. FamilyTimes.org is a resource that we direct parents to which provides grade school parents with some incredible tools to use in the home. Small Talk is a resource we provide for parents of Preschoolers each month with activities that they can do during the month to reinforce our lessons and to keep them up with the Bible stories we are studying.
The church has about 50 hours each year to work with a child. A parent has more than 3,000 hours to work with their children. When the church and the family begin to work together we multiply our impact in the life of the child.
Another way we are working to reactivate the family is by providing Family oriented ministry events and activities so that parents can serve beside their children. I think that one of the best things we can do for children is allow them see their parents experience and worship God. We are working on breaking down the programming walls that prohibit children from seeing other generations worship and serve God. By doing this we are seeing the family develop together in Christ.
