It’s easy to forget the power our words have, and we need to remember that what we say to our kids matters. And I’m not just talking about the negative things we say. The way we praise our kids—where we do it, why we do it, and how we do it—is important to think about. Here are three things to consider when praising your kids…

In the newest issue of Children’s Ministry Magazine, we’ve got the results of our 2013 Salary Survey. No one else does a survey like this, so the results are exclusive. We’ve asked paid children’s ministry professionals to tell us how they are compensated for what they do. The results are up on our website. After reading through the data, I thought I would point out some of the more unexpected findings and talk about them here. Here are seven surprising stats from the 2013 salary survey…

Love is in the air! Valentine’s Day is here! If you are still searching for ideas to use in your ministry, search no further. We’ve got you covered. A few weeks ago, we came up with 7 Children’s Ministry Ideas for Valentine’s Day. Now here are five more ideas to add to the hopper, giving you a dozen delightful, quick, and easy activities for Valentine’s Day…

I don’t think anyone would disagree with the fact that we should strive to help families overcome obstacles. But, we should all be prepared in the event that a separation does occur in one or more of our ministry’s families. Divorce seems to touch all of us in some way. I’ve seen church families who had children in my ministry go through a divorce. And being a child of divorced parents myself, I know personally some of the hardships these families face. But what do you say? What steps do you take? Here are some tips and advice to help you deal with divorce in your ministry…

As we were discussing our favorite ads back at work on Monday, something started to interest me. Just like the advertisers, children’s ministers put their time, energy, and money into programs to try to get a message to stick in the minds of their audience in just a short amount of time. What makes certain ads better than others? Why are we still talking about some ads? And what can we learn from Super Bowl ads that we can apply to Christian education?