Children throughout the United Methodist connection are learning about the history of the Methodist movement and practicing intentional discipleship with the help of drawings of John and Charles Wesley called “Flat Wesleys.”
Flat Wesleys relax in the Preteen room at Grand Rapids Trinity UMC. ~courtesy GR Trinity Facebook
Grand Rapids Trinity UMC was among congregations receiving laminated copies of the Flat Wesleys to begin the project, which will continue through September, said Melanie C. Gordon, director of Ministry with Children at Discipleship Ministries.
To date more than 700 churches have requested to participate through the children’s ministry Facebook page.
“The end result of this project is for children to have the opportunity to practice compassion, justice, worship and devotion, to really pay attention to how they are doing that, and to be able to share their experiences with other children across the Methodist connection,” Gordon said.
Nichea Ver Veer Guy, Director of Children’s Ministry and Family Life, describes how that has worked at GR Trinity . . .
“Flat John and Flat Charles arrived just as our pastors concluded a six-week sermon series on the Wesleys.” Faith formation classes were also being focused on Methodist heritage.
“So the figures visited classrooms and meetings like Church Council,” Nichea says, “and people had opportunities to tell them how they were living out their faith.”
Some of the younger children shared about their efforts “at learning what God has to say to them.” Older children talked about “social holiness and how they followed Jesus outside the church.”
After a two-Sunday stay at Trinity, Flat John and Flat Charles were sent on to a church in Maryland, as assigned in the material that brought them to Grand Rapids. The figures were accompaniesd by a letter penned by Trinity children.
“Our hope is that the teachers (at the church receiving the letters) will then read about what the Flat Wesleys did where they were before to their children, and then the process will start again,” Gordon said.
The idea for Flat Wesleys, which is based on the youth literature character Flat Stanley©, came from a desire by children’s ministry leaders to inspire covenant discipleship with children.
The children in participating churches make their own Flat Wesleys. “They will have the Wesleys with them in prayer, and they will take them when they go out and do an act of service in the community,” Gordon said. “This offers them something concrete to help them look for ways of living out their faith.”
Later this year, Discipleship Resources will release a resource for covenant discipleship with children, and the experiences of the children who participate in the Flat Wesleys Project will become part of that resource.
Flat Wesleys met people of all ages at Church Meeting Night at Trinity. ~courtesy GR Trinity Facebook
“Covenant groups are at the root of Methodism,” Gordon said. Members of covenant groups support one another and hold one another accountable in the areas of justice, compassion, worship and devotion and in practicing those daily and weekly in their lives.
“I believe that our church as a denomination has a very strong and unique history, especially when you think about the Methodist movement was a movement, not a church,” Gordon said. “And it started with young people getting together trying to hold the church accountable to holiness.”
By participating in the Flat Wesley project, children in United Methodist congregations hopefully will be encouraged to learn that the Wesleys were “young people who believed that the church could do more, and they pushed the church to do more,” she said.
“It’s an amazing story. I think it’s a story that we don’t look at enough, and we want children to know it, so that they understand why we live out our lives as Christians in this way.”
United Methodist children should know “that God equips them with what they need, and the adults are here to guide them on that journey – to guide them and to help them to use those gifts that God has given them,” Gordon concluded.
And there’s more than one itineration taking place! We’ve learned that another set of Wesley Brothers is currently ministering at Holland UMC, with their next stop Texas. Any more out there in Michigan?
Congregations interested in participating should contact Discipleship Ministries by email at [email protected].
Last Updated on February 2, 2024