There is one room in every church where only the bravest of souls dare to go. In some churches, you might find items dating back to 1950, whether it’s a flannelgraph or teacher Ethel who wandered in there to find some popsicle sticks and googly eyes in the late 1900s.
That’s right. Today we are going to face our fears and enter …
The Children’s Ministry Supply Room.
This combination of “hodge podge” and treasure trove is not for the faint of heart. Only the strong and organized survive. But if you can tame the pipe cleaners, rice bins, old VBS curriculum, and (gasp) glitter, you’ll see the benefits. You can show your volunteers great appreciation by supplying their every need, and you can save your time, budget, and sanity.
There is likely someone in your congregation who would love to organize your supply room.
I will admit, I am not the person who gets a thrill out of organizing things. But I love and appreciate organization. And I am really good at finding people who actually love to organize. For every supply room, there is someone in the church who looks at that room, dreams of well-ordered shelves and bins, and starts printing labels in anticipation of all that they will put away.
So, while I cannot give a first-hand account of organizing a supply room, I can share some principles that may help your own frame of mind and the state of your supply room.
4 Principles for The Children’s Ministry Supply Closet
1. There is likely someone in your congregation who would love to organize your supply room.
It may be someone who feels useless in other ministries, but when you give them the trust and freedom to set up a great organization system, they will have found their place in the church! You know your student ministries has a “black hole” of a closet as well, so this volunteer clearly will not run out of things to organize.
Give them a budget for any organizational supplies and give them freedom to come up with a system. Before they get started, it could be good for them observe on a weekend to see how staff and volunteers use the room.
Ask if they would like you to recruit a team of “Clutter Buster” volunteers to help them, and if they would be willing to come in once a week (or month) and make sure things are staying under control and are stocked. Be a leader of leaders, and empower them to own their role.
2. Organizing your supply room shows value to your volunteers, your kids, and your church.
Volunteers have limited time, so having their supplies ready for them shows you value their time and talents. When you have age-appropriate supplies readily available and you spend the budget allotted to you, you show value to the kids in your ministry.
Remember that your church generously gives to allow you to buy crayons, markers, and glue. We always like to think that for every $20 we spend, someone had to earn $200 and choose to tithe on that, in order for us to have what we need to teach kids. So, taking care of and stewarding those resources shows that you value your church members.
12 Awesome Bible Games for Kids of All Ages
12 Awesome Bible Games for Kids of All Ages
12 Awesome Bible Games for Kids of All Ages
3. Sometimes, the value of items changes in the supply closet.
If you have a lot of old curriculum that you’ve been holding on to just because you spent money on it years ago and you might use it again, it’s probably not worth the storage space it is taking up. You could give away or throw away that curriculum and use the space for something your kids currently need.
This also applies to supplies that can be readily obtained, such as milk jugs or water bottles. One simple request to your church or even just to a few small groups will fill a need for empty water bottles or paper towel tubes without filling that space you may be using to store such supplies.
You also may sometimes have a few leftovers from craft kits you’ve purchased. While those were valuable when you were using them for a classroom, just a few leftovers don’t have the same value.
Take all of those extras and store them in one cabinet or bin. Use those few for times when you don’t have set children’s programming or set them out and let the kids “freestyle” craft using the odds and ends.
Sometimes, the value of items changes.
4. It is OK to throw things away!
Repeat that one more time. If throwing things away in the children’s ministry supply closet is really hard for you, let me pass along a tip I received from one of those amazing organizing volunteers I mentioned before: use black trash bags.
If you have someone clean out your space, give them good parameters, full freedom, and a roll of black trash bags. This way, you can’t see through the bags and drag things back in.
Sometimes being a good steward means letting go of things that are broken or can’t be used anymore. Also, when we take donations “in kind,” meaning donations of goods or services, that may not be what our ministry needs.
When someone offers a donation of toys or supplies, it is OK for you to preface your reception of the donation with, “I appreciate you thinking of us, so I want to let you know that if we cannot use the items, we can either return them to you, donate them to another church or organization, or dispose of them. Which would you prefer?”
Let’s eliminate these children’s ministry supply closets of fear and darkness and restore order with a team of Tidy Titans! And if you find teacher Ethel in that closet when you’re finally cleaning it out, make sure she has her popsicle sticks and googly eyes, and take her out for coffee!
