As kids ministry leaders, we’re here because we care about the faith and future of the next generation.

To properly invest in our kids, we know we must engage all parents everywhere.

Because if you care about a kid’s future one day, it means you have to care about their family right now.

And not just the parents in our ministries, but the ones in our community as well. The ones in the carpool line, the ones searching for a counselor for their child, and the ones at the doctor’s office.

Every parent, everywhere—even if they’re doing some of those things on a Sunday morning instead of going to church.

What’s at stake if we don’t engage parents?

Sometimes, we might forget the influence that engaging parents has on the kids in our ministries. We believe it’s the key step in developing the faith of our next generation, which is why there’s a lot at stake if we don’t get it right.

Parents’ trust in the church is at stake.

Many parents need guidance on talking with their kids about faith. When we don’t engage parents, chances are they will start to feel unsupported by the church. As a result, they will miss important opportunities to talk about faith with their kids weekly.

The church’s influence in the community is at stake. 

If we want to connect to kids’ everyday faith moments, we must get a sense of what they’re going through on a daily basis. This understanding comes from parents who have access to them daily. If we don’t engage parents, a generation will grow up believing the church is irrelevant to their family’s needs.

The effectiveness of our kids’ ministry is at stake. 

In order to truly invest in the lives of our kids and teenagers, we must involve parents. It is not only critical for the health of the overall global church, but also for impacting the next generation.

What’s preventing us from engaging parents?

If there’s one thing that prevents us from engaging the parents in our kids’ ministries, it’s trust.

Some parents struggle to trust the church. Maybe they assume leaders are judging them or don’t understand their situations. Perhaps they doubt their place in the ministry or fear that their unique family dynamic will not be accepted. In the midst of these fears, parents might start to think that they don’t need the church.

This is where engaging parents comes in.

To engage every parent, we must consider ways to rebuild trust with parents in our communities. It’s important to be honest as a team about the ways you may have broken trust and brainstorm ways to rebuild it. When you come together as a team to address these areas, you will become a more effective kids ministry.

How To Build Trust With Parents: Using the Parent Cue App to connect with parents in your church

Here are four ideas to improve your ministry’s ability to partner with parents and effectively engage them in your ministry.

Connect to engage every parent.

Imagine every parent in your community saying . . .

“I feel alone. Can you connect me to someone?”

The one thing that can help parents truly be better parents is knowing someone who supports their parenting. What if your ministry strategically positioned itself to connect parents with someone who can support their parenting efforts? Connection could be a game changer.

We’ve developed Parent Cue App Customization so that at the click of a button, every parent has access to important ministry information like the name of your ministry, the name of your church, your director’s name, your website, your social links, and your giving button. Anything that you want a parent to know so they can better connect with your church is right there on their phone.

Communicate to engage every parent.

We know communication is a daily task on your ministry list. But imagine for a moment every parent saying . . .

“I feel really busy. Can you make it easier for me to just know what’s going on?”

Parents receive communication from a multitude of places – school, sports, the pediatrician, and the list goes on. What if there was a way you could consolidate communication to one location so that parents always know what’s happening?

The Parent Cue App Customization helps make it easy to simplify and consolidate your communication all in one place. Every ministry’s communication can be housed in the same location right on a parent’s phone, so that it’s accessible at the tip of their finger. They have access to notifications, registration links, any announcements that you want to make. Parents will never have to wonder where that information can be found again. What better way to engage all parents?

Cue every parent.

Imagine parents in your community saying…

“I feel overwhelmed. Can you cue me, so I just know what to do this week?”

The reality is that most parents don’t want another huge resource book with ideas to become a better parent. That’s just too daunting. What parents often need are small cues that will move them to connect relationally with their kid. This connection will help create a relational rhythm in their homes so that they can be better parents. With just the right encouragement and motivation, a small cue could be just what they need to thrive.

We named it the Parent Cue App for a reason. It comes already loaded with cues every week for kids just to help parents create that relational rhythm so that they can speak encouraging words to their kid every morning. So that they can rediscover their kid as they travel along the road together. So that they can elevate their conversations at mealtime and connect with the heart of their child. With app customization, you get full control to customize every cue each week.

Coach every parent.

Every parent feels like they need help sometimes, especially when it comes to their child’s spiritual growth. When parents feel unprepared to have these spiritual conversations with their kids, you can build trust by coaching them. This is our specialty, after all!

With app customization, you can coach parents to have better faith conversations every week. The app comes already loaded with Orange content from birth through age 18, so that means there’s access to memory verses, Bible story videos, and daily devotionals that parents can leverage in order to have faith conversations at home. You can simply push that content directly to parents so that they can access it at any time, or you can customize the graphics, the videos, and the content to best reflect the message that you’re sharing every week in your kids ministry environments.

You don’t have to have a family ministry app to engage every parent everywhere. But we just think it makes some things a little easier. That’s why we built the platform, so that you could focus on the relationship. The best way to learn more about the app is to try it free at ParentCueApp.Church.

Whatever you do, don’t stop in the challenging and transformative work of engaging parents everywhere. It’s the most important thing we can do if we want to truly influence the spiritual formation of our kids.