Children’s Worship University trains leaders to “raise disciples in the area of worship”

Selbie Fountain, preschool children’s choir leader and Sunday school teacher at Mount Sylvan Baptist Church in Tyler, returned to Children’s Worship University (CWU) for the second time looking to gain tools to incorporate into her first year of teaching preschool children’s choir. 

“The collaboration with other churches and meeting other people that are in preschool choir roles is super important, to get to know them and what they do at their church and what works for their church in order to incorporate it into my smaller church,” said Fountain. 

Jan. 30-31, 137 children’s choir and worship leaders gathered at First Baptist Church Richardson for training from experienced clinicians through workshops and general sessions and a chance to network with other leadership throughout Texas and the United States, with Arkansas, California, Louisiana and Oklahoma represented among attendees this year. Several more states were represented by clinicians. 

Tom Tillman, director of Music & Worship at Texas Baptists, welcomed attendees following an “Early Bird” session led by Whitney Head, music and worship director at South Marietta Street Baptist Church in Gastonia, North Carolina. 

Head shared encouragement and exercises on how to “get Scripture and the truths of the Lord into children’s hearts.” 

“We have such an important task,” said Head. “It's an honor to get to place those words in their heart and help them grow and have those [scriptures] when they need them… When they need God's Word in their adulthood or when they're a teenager, it will come back to them through music.” 

Intentionally discipling kids in worship 

With the theme “Deeply Rooted,” attendees had the opportunity, over the two-day training, to attend more than 25 unique breakout sessions on topics such as strategies for teaching upper elementary, cultivating worship programs, time management, incorporating movement and scripture into choir rehearsals and more. 

Fountain said learning the five Hebrew words for “praise” in a workshop session led by Yancy Richmond, worship leader, songwriter, NextGen worship leader coach and author of “Sweet Sound: The Power of Discipling Kids in Worship,” will be helpful in teaching kids “what praise really means.”

“I think being able to teach, even starting at preschool, what praise really means, and being able to back it up biblically, will make a huge difference in their adult life, and doing worship as adults,” said Fountain. 

Richmond explained, in her workshop titled “Growing Worship the Bible Way,” that the five Hebrew words for “praise” are Yaddah, “to worship with extended hands;” Barak, “to kneel, bless God, praise, salute and adore;” Shabach, “to shout, to address in a loud tone;” Zamar, “to make music, celebrate joyfully in song, pluck the strings or parts of a musical instrument;” and Caphar, “to count and number, to recount, rehearse and count exactly.” 

Richmond said these words can help children understand worship and “lead them from just being spectators to participators.” She encouraged attendees to consider, “How can you become more intentional to disciple kids in worship?”

“I would encourage you to take that to heart and lean into it,” said Richmond. “You can invite [the kids] to take a [next] step [in worship]… We're all at different parts of the journey, but each one of us can choose to lean in and try to grow our roots a little bit deeper every single time we're given the gifts to worship the Lord and build up our relationship with him.” 

First-time attendee Wendy Caplinger, children’s worship minister at 121 Community Church in Grapevine, said a workshop on teaching with novelty, led by Kelly Jo Hollingsworth, assistant professor of Elementary Music Education at Baylor University, “gave me new ideas to help the kids engage [in worship].” 

Hollingsworth gave attendees different strategies for adding novelty to teaching a song, including immersion (adding novelty through repetition, movement and asking questions), phrase-by-phrase, movement, picture cues, games and more. 

“I really learned the immersion style of teaching the kids [that] I did not know [previously],” said Caplinger. “Also [Hollingsworth] said, ‘Adding novelty in each lesson, helps the kids see that God can meet us in fresh ways, even in familiar practices,’ and I think that's really special.” 

Helping kids grow deeper roots of faith

Richmond expanded on the idea of teaching kids what it means to worship in the Jan. 30 closing general session. She told attendees, “We have a responsibility to disciple and raise disciples in the area of worship.” 

“Kids matter to Jesus. We know that [in] Matthew 19:14, ‘Let the little children come unto me and do not hinder them.” Worship is a way that they approach the throne,” said Richmond. “[Leading worship] looks like having teaching moments about what worship is, giving them practical instruction of how to get involved… and engaged in your song sets.”

Richmond encouraged attendees to “help [kids] to grow roots that will carry them through all the seasons of their lives.”

“What if we changed our motivation from ‘How do we make the whole room appear to be all in and engaged?’ to ‘How do we raise them up to be more like David, [after God’s own heart]? What if we stop doing songs and we start to worship? What if we make time and space to leave them to sit at the feet of Jesus with the songs that we put on their lips? What if we prepare a table and invite them to feast on the presence of the living God?’” said Richmond. “I believe that every single one of those things would help our kids to go deeper in their faith.” 

Bonnie Webb, kindergarten kids praise co-director at Denton Bible Church and first-time CWU attendee, said leading children’s worship has been “a new experience” and she is grateful to “learn how to engage the kids more.” She said the workshop and general sessions helped give “a deeper meaning of what my purpose is.” 

“[My purpose] is not just to teach [kids] the songs, but to shepherd and disciple their heart. It's been really encouraging to experience that,” said Webb. 

Children’s Worship University 2027 is scheduled to take place on Jan. 29-30 at First Baptist Church Richardson.