The Gospel Coalition published this terrific article by Courtney Reissig about ways to live out the Gospel while living under one roof 24/7. What if your kids learned the value of work by watching you work from home? What could happen when creativity meets neighborhood needs? What difference would it make if we admitted our anxieties not only to one another but to God in prayer as a family?

Our children hear, see, and feel our anxiety about the Coronavirus pandemic. This story will remind both you and them that Jesus knows all about this pandemic. He knows that we are afraid. Yet He wants us to remember and believe that He will care for us no matter what. Give you children the gift of God’s words and the reminder of Jesus’ presence in the uncertainties of life.

I’m declaring this Sunday, March 15 Coronavirus Sunday.

As North Americans we are so used to disasters being localized (think hurricanes, floods, and tornadoes) and in other eras (the 1918 Spanish flu or the polio epidemic in the early 1900s) and on other continents ( Haiti’s devastating earthquake, Japan’s earthquake and tsunami, widespread famines in Africa in the early 2000s).

Are you looking to point children to God’s love and care all the while the news cycle warns of significant deaths during the Coronavirus pandemic? In 2 Chronicles 21, King Jehoshaphat is faced with the news of impending disaster as forces from Edom are heading his way, intending to utterly destroy the kingdom of Judah. Written by Jason Seville, an American pastor in China and published by The Gospel Coalition, the article reminds us that Jehoshaphat’s response should be ours. Jehoshaphat knew that only God could save his kingdom. He led his countrymen to seek God by fasting and praying for salvation in the face of impending destruction.

Could it be possible that there is a better way to name and to frame our ministry tot children in our churches? What if we changed the name from Children’s Ministry to something rooted in the temporary yet so precious time from birth to the end of elementary school? What if the name reminded all of us that once this time is passed, it’s gone forever— that the opportunity for spiritual nurture that is unlike any other time in a human’s life has an ending? What if we called it Childhood Ministry?

I love G.K. Chesterton’s poem Gloria in Profundis. He cleverly reverses and augments our praise of God at the Incarnation with the words,“Glory to God in the lowest.” Later Chesterton adds,“Outrushing the fall of man, is the height of the fall of God.” Each year these words remind me not only that God’s ways are beyond our imagination, but that He is a God who “bends down” toward us. He is Emmanuel—our God who lived among us, died for us, was resurrected, and continues to be with us.

Throw out the name Francis Schaeffer in a word association game and you may hear philosopher, knickers, theologian, Alps, and L’Abri Fellowship. It is unlikely that you will hear children’s ministry or Summer Bible School. Yet the early work of Francis and Edith Schaeffer centered on children. Before they formed L’Abri, before they left St. Louis for Switzerland in 1948, in fact with the beginning of their first pastorate in Grove City, Pennsylvania, they were heavily committed to ministering to children, starting with Summer Bible Schools.