Intergenerational Ministry: More Radical than We Realize
Our next Ministry Forum webinar takes place on Wednesday, September 18 at 1:00pm ET. This one focuses on intergenerational ministry, and the questions it invites us to ask about the shape of our worship, our formation practices, and our life together.
We’ll be joined by Dr. David Csinos, a researcher, writer, and educator who has spent years thinking with churches about how people grow in faith. David brings a thoughtful and grounded approach to the work of helping communities include all ages in meaningful ways. His experience is rooted in both theology and practice.
This webinar is designed for anyone exploring how to bring people of all ages into deeper relationships of faith and belonging. Whether you’re already experimenting with all-age ministry or just curious about what’s possible, we hope you’ll join us.
Intergenerational Ministry: More Radical than We Realize
In the midst of an awareness of growing diversity and declining church attendance, many congregations are considering shifting their worship and formation practices to better include people of all ages. Intergenerational ministry is more than just putting people of different generations in the same room. It is a call to reimagine the practices by which faith communities engage in worship and become formed as disciples of Jesus. In this webinar, we will consider theories and practices that help congregations bring the generations together, focusing especially on how leaders can implement gradual changes as they experiment with all-age ministry.
Click Here to Register
About David M. Csinos
David M. Csinos (www.davecsinos.com) is Associate Professor of Practical Theology at Atlantic School of Theology in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and founder of Faith Forward (faith-forward.net), an ecumenical network for innovation in ministry with children, youth, and families. Dave also serves as research director for Family Faith Every Day, a project of Chalice Media Group. He is author of several books and resources, including A Gospel for All Ages, Children’s Ministry in the Way of Jesus, and the upcoming book Church Together: An Essential Guide to All-Age Ministry, with Traci Smith. Dave is a sought-after speaker on topics related to children’s and youth ministry, faith formation, and ministry innovation.
A Gospel for All Ages | 2022
A Gospel for All Ages lives at the intersection of two conversations--preaching and intergenerational ministry. By integrating these two topics, an entirely new conversation emerges, one that draws from both, that interrogates both, and that births something new in the process, creating fresh possibilities for a sleepy church.
The fields of preaching and intergenerational ministry rarely cross paths because they are championed by two different sorts of ministerial leaders. On the one hand, preaching and homiletics has largely been a field for teaching pastors, senior ministers, and other pastoral practitioners who are tasked with the important work of proclaiming the gospel to congregations of adults every week. On the other hand, the cheerleaders of intergenerational ministry have tended to be ministry leaders who find their primary vocation within the formation of adolescents and children. Increasing numbers of Christian educators and leaders who work in children's and youth ministry are lifting high the banner of intergenerational ministry.
Wherever your tent is planted in one camp or the other, this book is for you. If God has called you to the work of preaching, you find within these pages wise words and best practices for improving and expanding your homiletical practice in light of the eight-year-olds and eighty-year-olds who share a pew on Sunday mornings. If your vocation is Christian education or intergenerational ministry, these chapters will spur you toward that final frontier of all-age worship as you consider how your vocation can include the preaching of the gospel to young and old alike.
Six creative ministry professionals join author David M. Csinos in providing intergenerational best-practice resources. Each chapter includes discussion questions and exercises for future practice.
Children's Ministry in the Way of Jesus | 2013
Attract kids to church, the logic often goes, and you get parents in the pews. All that's left, then, is to get the kids out of the way. Here children's ministers David Csinos and Ivy Beckwith draw on research in human development and spiritual formation to show how children become disciples and churches become centers of lifelong discipleship. For too long, the local church has focused primarily on programs for children rather than ways of doing ministry with children. But in light of emerging missional movements, the church is changing and forming a new kind of ecclesial culture. And children's ministry must follow suit. Csinos and Beckwith propose a new way of thinking for these modern churches―they suggest that children can contribute to our theological understandings, as well as invest in and practice Biblical justice just like adult church members. Here is a unique resource that explores children's ministry in light of true spiritual formation and discipleship.
