“There is no junior Holy Spirit.”
Origin
Michele spent roughly ten years working directly with children and youth, first inside the church she and her husband Rob planted and then across the churches and schools that invited her in. Rob was the senior pastor and he gave her room to test what young people could actually carry. She used it.
Every lesson in this book was taught in a real room with real kids before it was written down. Some worked the first time. Some were rebuilt three or four times before they landed. What survived that decade is what made it into the book, which is why the subtitle calls them proven and true rather than new.
The traditional posture treats children’s ministry as preparation, as though the real thing starts later. Michele came to believe something else: children can be equipped at their age-appropriate level, minister alongside adults using their gifts, and know from a young age that they are genuinely part of the body of Christ.
Drawn from Michele’s own account.
The golden thread
“There is a golden thread of bringing restoration, healing, and encouragement to the heart. If you don’t believe that you are valuable, you will not believe that the dreams in your heart are valuable. I make a case for knowing your value, and throughout pretty much everything that I do, there is that golden thread of bringing restoration, healing, and encouragement to people’s hearts.”
The book runs on the same conviction that runs through everything Michele builds: every person, starting with the youngest child in the room, is valuable, and worth activating.
What the lessons cover
Five threads run through the collection. A leader can teach straight through the book or pull a single lesson for the week in front of them, and the lessons hold either way.
The five threads
- Identity in Christ. Who a child is before God, taught at a level a child can actually hold.
- Hearing God’s voice. How to recognize it, how to test it, how to respond to it.
- Raising children leaders. Handing real responsibility to young people and standing with them while they carry it.
- Giving children a voice. Making room for what children have to say to the whole body, not only to each other.
- Healing hearts. Prayer, honesty, and the slow work of restoration, held gently at every age.
How far it reaches
The book was built for the children’s wing, and churches kept reporting back that they were using it well outside it. Much of the material adapts to youth, to parents, and to whole-congregation teaching with very little rework, because the questions underneath it do not change with age. Who am I. Can I hear God. Does my voice matter here. Can this be healed.
Where it has gone
- More than 100 lessons, drawn from ten years of firsthand children’s ministry and youth ministry work.
- Written for children’s ministry leaders and parents, and adaptable well past that range. Many lessons carry across every age group, adults included.
- Used churchwide by adopting churches, not only in the children’s wing.
- The companion resource to the Kingdom Kids Workshop, taught today as Building a Kingdom Culture at Home and in Ministry.
What churches say
“We purchased your curriculum because it was so amazing! We absolutely love your curriculum! We actually use it churchwide at times. So much of the curriculum is easily taught to all ages.”
Where to get it micheleokimura.com/store
The lesson book is the companion resource to the Kingdom Kids Workshop, where Michele trains the adults who will teach it.
Where the thread leads
“The golden thread is like the spine. It runs through everything I do and teach and coach and speak on. And it culminates in embracing your brave purpose. And living it out.”
If you are ready to walk this out yourself, Michele coaches authors through the Brave Purpose Author Method.
Bring Raising Kingdom Kids to your church.
Tell Michele about your church, school, or family team and what you are hoping to build. She teaches the companion workshop as a conference session, a full eight-hour training, and an e-course.
- Based in
- Honolulu, HI