NWPC Nursery
To accommodate your smallest family members, we have a staffed nursery with loving, nurturing caregivers who will allow you to worship without worry. You can bring your babies and toddlers to our nursery beginning 10 minutes before the service and also during the service. You do not need to call ahead.
If the caregivers need to reach you, please provide a cell phone number so that you can be reached by text.
NWPC Sunday School
We enjoy having children of all ages learn about God’s grace and love for them. During the school year we provide a Sunday School Program that includes classes for: Ages 2 – preK; Grades K – 2; Grades 3 – 5; Grades 6 – 8. Nursery care is provided for infants through age 2.
To encourage children at an early age to take part in in our worship services with their family, we begin worship with children ages 2 and older joining us in the sanctuary during the 9:00 a.m. service. We believe it is important for even our youngest children to experience Sunday worship and understand that they are part of the body of Christ, too. Don’t worry, we know young attention spans can be short, so after 10-15 minutes of singing and worship, the children are invited to come forward for the children’s message. After the Children’s message, approximately 15 minutes into the service, they meet their Sunday School teachers in the back of the Sanctuary to go to their Sunday School classes.
Sunday school teachers will bring children to coffee hour to meet their parents following worship.
In the summer children attend church with their parents. After the children’s message children from 4 years old -4th grade are dismissed to organized activities. Nursery care is provided in the summer through age 3.
However, our activities don’t end with Sunday School. We encourage them to take part in the special activities below.
Special Activities
We have special activities throughout the year for families of all ages: i.e., Fall Kick off activity, Trunk or Treat/Chili Cook off, Christmas party, Easter Egg Hunt, Beach Party, Mother or Father’s Day celebration, Summer Kick off picnic.
During the Easter season, our Easter Egg hunt is open to the whole community. Kids love to search for hidden eggs on our large grounds. Candy and lots of great prizes for all!
During the summer, we have Vacation Bible School (VBS) where all kids from ages 3 years to grade 5 learn about God. Each year our VBS has a different theme for the week. In the past we have walked through an ancient Biblical marketplace, explored the jungle, and wandered through castles, just to name a few. The theme is carried out with decorations, crafts, snacks, games, and awesome music!
Each year we celebrate the birth of Jesus with Nativity Night, an outdoor Christmas pageant, complete with live animals. We invite the community to join us and share some cookies and cocoa after the show.
Kid’s Mission Projects
We also believe in getting our children started early with serving Christ by providing opportunities for them to be part of the Mission program. These opportunities for mission help our children to understand how Jesus’ teachings are put into action. Below are some projects our children will be part of.
Each Christmas season we choose a charitable organization and the Sunday School children make “Christmas in a shoebox” for children who may not otherwise receive Christmas gifts.
Throughout the year we involve our children in several mission projects that are done in the church. They help the adults make casseroles, sort food that has been collected for various local food banks and stuff backpacks to be donated to mission organizations at the beginning of the school year.
Recent MLK Day Projects: collected personal items and put together personal care bags for prisoners; assembled bags for H.A.T.Packs, a community group that provides meals for students who face food insecurities.
NWPC Youth
At NWPC we seek to present our faith in a way that is relevant to the youth of today. Our adult leaders strive to prepare our youth to deal with the pressures and concerns of life by introducing them to Jesus and his teachings. We do this through youth group activities. Throughout the year we provide retreats, mission trips, small groups and fellowship designed specifically for them. They also learn the meaning of serving Christ by helping with planned all-church events and activities.
Confirmation
We confirm our youth in 8th, 9th or 10th grade. In preparation for this important step in their lives, we tackle some tough questions of faith and life such as what it means to be a Christian, what the Bible really says. At the end of the process, they write about their faith journey and produce a faith statement which they share with each other and the Confirmation Class leaders.
The youth are confirmed during worship service on a Sunday in front of the whole congregation. Each confirmation student has the option of sharing their faith journey and statement with the congregation at this time.
Youth Group
We also provide an opportunity where the youth can meet for fellowship and make connections with the other youth and adult leaders.
Youth Group meets from 6:00 PM to 7:30 PM on the first and third Sunday during the school year. We have fun and discuss topics about the church, God and Jesus through combinations of active games, mission work and worship. During the summer we get together for occasional swim parties or other activities.
Mission
We emphasize Serving Christ through various mission projects. Throughout the year our youth participate and help with missions at West Kensington Ministry, Crossroads Community Center in North Philadelphia and Oxford Circle Christian Community Center and prepare casseroles for the homeless in Philadelphia. Our youth also contribute to the church by serving as waiters at some of the church dinners and helping out in church activities when needed. We also collect items to prepare personal care bags for prison ministry and collect food and distribute it to those in need in the community.
Each summer our high school and middle school youth take a one-week mission trip. We have traveled to Georgia, North Carolina, West Virginia, New Jersey, Guatemala, Belize and Puerto Rico. While on these trips we experience various relational mission work, such as restoring homes destroyed by hurricanes, providing mercy ministry to those in need, preparing and serving food to the homeless, interacting with elderly people in nursing homes, interacting with children in camps, sorting clothing and books to be distributed to people who need them, helping to clean homes and yards in preparation for housing for someone in need.
