Children are important.

Why? Because the Bible says so.

Many seminary leaders today think that the Bible has very little to say about children, but the Bible actually has more than 1,600 references to children, sons, daughters and parental relationships with a consistent message calling for the nurture and protection of the younger generation. Clearly, children have a vital and valued place in God’s Kingdom, God’s Church and God’s Mission.

The Global Alliance for Advancing Holistic Child Development (HCD Global Alliance) affirms the value of children. We understand that in order to properly care for a child, we must provide for the child’s physical, cognitive, social, emotional and spiritual growth. This is a challenge and a mission. We therefore urge Christian theological institutions to “rise up” and develop high-level holistic child development training programs to equip Christian workers and professionals to care for children around the world.

By offering holistic child development programs, Christian institutions are not only producing leaders who understand the significance of the Church’s ministry with children, they are also training leaders who can influence all levels in their own countries on behalf of children. In addition, establishing holistic child development programs can help seminaries to provide courses of study for new groups of people by attracting a new category of students and ensuring that course offerings are relevant to the world today.

The Church can no longer afford to ignore children. We may have underestimated the potential of ministry with children in the past, but the future can be a different story. By providing a base for holistic child development programs, Christian educators and leaders could very well tackle what could be the single greatest obstacle the Church will face in the coming years: sharing the love of God in holistic ways with children across the globe.