Establishing African Sunday Schools

2,333 African Sunday Schools Established through ECM Training
One of the highlights of Every Child Ministries' 23rdyear of service to African children was receiving word that ECM training had enabled local churches to establish 2,333 known Sunday schools in Central Africa as of April 2008 (mostly in DR Congo, some also in Congo-Brazzaville and in Angola).    This is very exciting, because these churches previously had nothing at all to reach children, and we have seen firsthand the excitement of the children.  They are just thrilled to have this opportunity, and they show it.  The level of excitement in these Sunday schools is just indescribable.

Size of Sunday Schools, Numbers of Children Reached
These Sunday schools vary in size. One, in a Gospel-resistant area where the church is struggling for existence, taught only five children the last we knew. Many in the cities enroll hundreds. An average for village Sunday schools seems to be about 80 children. This means ECM training is responsible for about 200,000 children receiving weekly Bible training in Central Africa.

Relationship of Sunday Schools to Churches
Every Child Ministries is a Christian mission that comes alongside churches to help, strengthen, and encourage them, and to offer specialized training in children's ministries to enable them to reach the youth of their church and the surrounding area. Our goal is not so much to start Sunday schools of our own, but to empower local Bible-believing churches to reach children through any means possible. Therefore, ECM is careful never to usurp the authority God has invested in the local church. The Sunday schools and other children's ministries started through ECM training remain always under the control of the local churches.

Where There Is No Church to Sponsor a Children's Ministry?
In some cases, there is no Bible-believing local church to teach the children. In those cases, ECM has done the following:

• Start a Sunday school there to reach children directly. Many times the teaching interests adults as well. One church in Kinshasa grew out of an ECM Sunday school.
• Partner with a nearby church to plant a church in the unreached place, emphasizing children and youth but teaching all ages.
• If that cannot work, in rare cases ECM will send out a church planter directly. ECM church planters work to reach the children and adults of a location at the same time. The church is autonomous or independent and has the right to affiliate with any denomination of its choice or to remain independent.

Developing Africa-Friendly Lessons
There are many African Christians who are willing to teach if only they can receive training and ideas about how to do it.  That is what Every Child Ministries offers, and it has been very successful.

Many of the African teachers find it difficult to use some Western lessons, even if they read English. Often Western materials pull from many parts of the Bible. African teachers often prefer to teach from a single passage. Western materials often rely on the teacher being able to read a lesson written as if the teacher were talking to the students, then, without memorizing it word for word, remember the main ideas and present it to the students in similar fashion. African teachers often prefer to use their own words to express the lesson, and are not practiced in rephrasing written words as their own. Western materials are often too long for African Sunday schools, where reading speeds are often slower. More and more Western materials are based around group activities that require space, tables, and equipment, but African teachers seldom have access to these.

For all these reasons and more, Every Child Ministries has developed a method of teaching that is more attuned to African realities. ECM's method follows a book or section of the Bible in consecutive order, seldom leaving out parts, teaching verse by verse. Each lesson covers a limited number of verses bound by a common theme. Teaching is done from the Scriptures themselves, giving priority to what the Scriptures say rather than to what others say about them.

The lesson Scripture is divided into very small portions, one or two verses or sometimes only part of a verse. That very small section is read aloud slowly by the teacher or by an able student or adult helper. Then the teacher asks questions about the passage to encourage students to look carefully at what it really says. Following Reading and Questioning, the students act out what happened in that portion of Scripture. Finally, they sing and dance or clap or do some other rhythmic activity to a line or two that summarizes what happened in that section. Often familiar local tunes are used with new words, but sometimes teachers compose tunes. Then the class moves on to the next section of Scripture and follows the same pattern: Reading, Questioning, Acting, Singing and Dancing. This pattern is repeated over and over till the class reaches the end of the Scripture passage.  Teachers and students alike enjoy the method, and they all end up being very familiar with what the Scripture teaches in the passages they studied.

The class also memorizes a Bible verse showing the truth of the day's lesson and discusses how the Scriptures studied apply to their lives. The teacher is ready with an assignment to encourage them to begin applying the truths of the Bible right away to their lives.

The exuberance and enthusiasm in an African Sunday School is hard to describe. We at ECM are excited, too, knowing that more and more African children are hearing the Word of God and coming to Jesus.

Pray for the African staff that is training these teachers, and for funds to train more teachers.  It costs only about $32 for training to establish one Sunday school.

Sunday Schools on the Street
ECM's ministries to street children grew out of Bible teaching given to children on the street. Where ECM can't take children to Sunday school, we will take Sunday school to the kids!

Would you like to help advance African Sunday Schools?

To volunteer to teach a one-week seminar to help train African teachers, click here.

A donation of $32 can enable ECM to help one more African church start a Sunday school for children. $100 can provide a bike for a Sunday school teacher who will use it to minister in nearby villages.  Many Sunday schools gather the children for soccer, then teach God's Word. You can donate a soccer ball to an African Sunday school for $10.  Click here to donate.

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 Every Child Ministries, a leader in Christian education, child evangelism, leadership development, Bible teaching and teacher training for children's ministries and youth ministries in Africa
SUNDAY SCHOOL IN EVERY VILLAGE IN AFRICA!  THIS IS ECM'S GOAL!