Christian Education

We continue to emphasize ministry with Our Young Disciples (children 10 and under), and Children’s Church.  We are continually looking at ways to both increase participation and effectively teach this group the stories of the Bible.  We want to accomplish this through repetition of these lessons using stories, music, arts and crafts, and the Young Disciples Message time given by Pastor Tony to reinforce important Bible truths.  We are very happy to see the support this ministry has gotten in the way of volunteers helping with Children’s Church and our other activities. 

• In 2019, we held a week-long Vacation Bible School that drew children from both St. James and from the community. We used the ELCA World Hunger "God's Good Creation" curriculum and the children raised money to buy animals through ELCA Good Gifts to send to people in need. For 2020, we plan to again do a week-long Vacation Bible School program, which will focus on the Lord's Prayer. 
• The children's choir sang multiple times throughout 2019 - at Easter, before and after the week of Vacation Bible School, at the Family Christmas Eve service. 
• Other events included an Easter egg hunt the Saturday before Easter and our annual Truck or Treat in October. 

We have three opportunities each Sunday for our Congregants to study God’s Word, and they are as follows: 

1. Adult Class – Parlor – (Meets in Parlor behind the Sanctuary) Pastor leads the Class and works through the 3 Year Lectionary.

2. Adult Class – Cook Classroom (Meets on 1st Floor ), and primary study is Augsburg Bible Commentary.

3. Adult Class – History Room – (Meets in 2nd floor History Room), and primary study is the Growing in Christ curriculum which goes through the entire Bible in 3 years.