A recently formed staff group of the South Carolina Baptist Convention will help churches implement spiritual-formation concepts for children from preschool age through college.

The “Generations Group,” approved at the December meeting of the SCBC Executive Board, will provide a comprehensive approach to age-group church ministry support, intentionally building a framework of spiritual formation concepts for children of preschool age and carrying through their college years.

Steve Rohrlack, director of the Generations Group, said he is excited to build a team of leaders who can help create a new approach of encouraging churches to view children, parents and families in a more holistic way “rather than a Sunday-to-Sunday approach.”

“This is an intentional reorganization to better address the spiritual developmental needs of children and students and a focus on the end-result of growing fully devoted followers of Christ,” he said. “We also will be working with parents to build their awareness of how children should be growing and developing spiritually at these different stages.”

A recent nationwide spiritual development study was done on teenagers, including those not involved in a church or spiritual organization. The data is being used as a resource in the work of the Generations Group.

“We see that Southern Baptists are leading in overall spiritual development, but we also know that parents have the greatest influential role in a child’s life,” Rohrlack said. “We are planning an intentional emphasis on reaching parents with greater tools to grow children through this process.”

Rohrlack said the process will also address the roles of church staff members and will seek to help churches of all sizes “work together as a team.”

“We plan to make this a reproducible and customizable team concept so that churches of any size can create a similar team to meet their own ministry needs,” he said.

In addition to Rohrlack, the Generations Group will include associate director Cory Singleton. Ken Owens, director of the Collegiate Ministry Group, will also play a key role in the development of the new ministry process, Rohrlack said.

For more information on the Generations Group, contact Rohrlack by email at steverohrlack@scbaptist.org or by phone at 803-227-6153.