by Pastor Victor Chen

For over six months, much of my interaction with the children of our church came through the screen. Though not quite the YouTube star, I would appear each Sunday shortly after 9am to a regular audience of church school students ranging from PreK through 6th grade at home.

There was the familiar opening music, blue backdrop, special guest appearances from other Church School teachers and animated lesson videos from “The Gospel Project”. I made sure to stay energetic and to the point, all the while speaking as if the students were in the same room.

The true star of the videos was our media director, Garrett Inouye, who made the videos come to life each week with careful editing and production. We tried to stay ahead of schedule by recording one week in advance, but with holidays and vacations, there were some days where we would record multiple videos in one sitting. 

At the same time the videos were being shown on Zoom, I was teaching in-person to a group of church school students first outside the children’s ministry office and then in the MPR. The reason why we pre-recorded the videos for our students online was so that I could focus on one audience at a time, both online and in-person between two departments, 1st/2nd and 5th/6th grade. Initially while trying a hybrid model, I wasn’t able to focus on either audience as my attention was split.

Over a month ago, we made the decision to end our pre-recorded church school videos. Recording videos weekly was beginning to take a toll as more ministries were reopening. By God’s grace, we were able to begin live streaming my main teaching from the MPR allowing students at home to tune in and follow along.

On 9/12, we will relaunch our church school in person. All grades through 6th grade will meet in the MPR at 9am for a main teaching session and breakout to their respective classrooms for lesson review, activities and small groups. Parents have the option of requesting an online option, which will be a link to view our livestream of the main session along with other resources to access with their children.

This also coincides with our launch of a unified curriculum, “The Gospel Project”, from the very beginning of a three-year cycle through the Bible. On 9/12, we will begin from Genesis 1. 

As I look back on church school during the stay at home order, I see so many changes and transitions. We went from nothing to Zoom to hybrid to pre-recorded videos and in-person outdoors to livestream and in-person indoors. 

The Lord has brought us so far.

I’m excited for where the Lord will bring us next.

Join us as we relaunch Church School in-person on 9/12. Parents can check in their students up through 6th grade in the MPR beginning at 8:45am and stay for a special parent orientation following the main teaching session.