Children's Ministry has been blessed that we have designated classroom spaces for our Friday Awana program and Sunday programs, and we are grateful.  As more families return to in-person services after the pandemic, we now have over 100 children attending our various programs, and some of our classrooms are now reaching maximum capacity and still growing.  

We also need a bigger and safer activity center for our children like a gym.  During our Awana game time, we have been squeezing 20 or 30 kids in a regular classroom with concrete floor, and often the kids are bumping into each other or slipping and falling on the hard concrete floor.  We always have ice packs and bandages ready to deal with those bumps and bruises.  An indoor gym would be much better and safer for our children, and it will also help during the long winter when the kids cannot play outside.

Secondly, Children's Ministry and Youth Ministry both need the same kind of open activity space.  Right now the only available open space is the basement.  Children's activities interfere with youth worship when our kids play in the basement on Friday night.  Another example is a couple of weeks ago when we had our annual car racing event, we invited the parents to join. We needed to use the whole basement and we had to ask youth ministry for it.  Taylor graciously agreed to let us use the basement, but I feel bad that we are asking youth to make room for children.  Sharing space also causes a lot of transition issues and requires extra effort from our coworkers when setting up and cleaning up.

Our children are flexible and adaptive, and I'm sure so are our youth.  However, if we can take care of these needs through CBE, it would help us to spend more time and energy on their spiritual formation, and on our programs and teachers.

儿童事工很感恩，我们周五Awana和周日活动有固定的教室空间，感谢神。在疫情结束后,我们有越来越多的家庭参与我们的活动，我们现在有 100 多名孩子参加我们的各种项目，我们的一些教室现已达到最大容量，并且还在不断增加。 我们还需要为孩子们提供一个更大、更安全的活动中心，比如体育馆。 在我们的Awana游戏期间，我们在普通的水泥地板教室里挤了20或30个孩子，孩子们经常会互相碰撞或在坚硬的水泥地板上滑倒。 我们总是准备好冰袋和绷带来处理这些碰撞和瘀伤。 室内体育馆对孩子们会更好、更安全。漫长冬季孩子们不能在外面玩，体育馆也是一个很好的帮助。

其次，儿童事工和青少年事工都需要同样的开放活动空间。 目前唯一可用的开放空间是地下室。 当我们的孩子周五晚上在地下室玩时，孩子们的声音会干扰青少年崇拜。 另一个例子是几周前，当我们举办年度赛车活动时，我们邀请了家长们参加。 我们需要使用整个地下室，我们不得不向青少年部询问。Taylor传道慷慨地同意让我们使用地下室，但我感到很难过，因为我们要求青少年为孩子们腾出空间。 共享空间还会导致很多过渡问题，并且在布置和清理时需要我们的同工们付出额外的努力。

我们的孩子们非常灵活、适应性强，我相信我们的青少年也是如此。 然而，如果我们能够通过扩堂来满足这些需求，这将有助于我们花更多的时间和精力在他们的灵性培育上，也更好的支持我们儿童和青少年牧师和同工们。

-Sophie Yang (Children's Deacon), on behalf of Pastor Bowman (Children's Pastor) and Tony Ng (Children's Director)

Good evening, my name is Lilian Wang and I am the current Youth Deacon. My family started attending CBCGB in 2003 when I was just 7 years old. I went through AWANA, ALIVE, college fellowship, and am now a young adult at Cross Bridge. I love this church dearly and want to see us grow together and forward, and I am passionate about raising up the younger generation to love God, fear God, and serve God.

Here is an update about the current needs in youth ministry. Youth Ministry has a current and pressing need when it comes to facility space particularly on Friday nights but also for Sunday school. Our current middle school Sunday school classroom reaches capacity and does not have enough classrooms for breakout sessions. For Friday nights, our youth are spread out to every corner of the church campus including 151, the church office, the main building basement, first floor, second floor, and third floor. This creates a safety issue if there is ever a threat because we cannot safely secure all the youth when they are spread over the entire church campus. The youth being spread out is also unwelcoming and confusing to newcomers because they do not know where to go. There have been times that newcomers have stood off to the corner and cried because they did not know where to go and were left alone. Our current meeting locations on Friday night are also not very great. For example, the basement classrooms do not have windows which means the counselor must leave the door open to abide by the Safe Church Policy. This creates distractions and makes it difficult to hear one another. Some classrooms are not soundproof and one classroom has walls of glass so people stare at the youth and make them uncomfortable. We even have one small group who meets in a stairwell! In summary, the youth ministry has many needs related to space and safety. While we are able to “make it work”, it is not ideal and creates many obstacles for executing the vision of youth ministry.

大家好，我叫王丽莲，现任教会青少年执事。我的家人于 2003 年开始参加 CBCGB，当时我才 7 岁。我参加了 AWANA、ALIVE、大学生团契，现在是 Cross Bridge 的一名年轻成员。我深爱这个教会，希望看到我们一起成长、进步，我希望能培养年轻一代爱神、敬畏神、事奉神。以下是有关青少年事工当前需求的最新信息。

青少年事工目前在教會場地方面最迫切的需要莫過於滿足週五晚上的團契聚會跟周日早上主日學所需要的空間。中學生的主日學教室已經達到各個教室能容納的上限，更別說有額外的教室來讓讓學生進行分組的討論。週五晚上，青少年已經把能使用的空間都用盡了，其中包含151樓、教會辦公室、還有主堂的地下室、一二三樓。正因為所有的能用的空間都用了，如果遇到外人入侵，青少年分散在教會的各個場地，較安全上的考量，我們沒辦法輕易地定點保護所有的青少年。如此的分散也不利於新來的青少年慕道友，初來乍到，他們容易迷路、不知道該往哪裏去。過去曾經有新朋友因為找不到他們的小組，被留著孤零零的一個人站在教會的角落哭泣。我們現在周五晚上聚會的地點其實也不理想。例如，地下室的幾個教室因為都沒有窗戶，以至於輔導們必須把門打開好遵守教會的安全政策。這樣一來，很容易受到教室外面的干擾而往往聽不清小組員之間分享的聲音。有些教室隔音不夠，又有一間教室四周都是玻璃，經過的人常常往裡面看，讓在裡面聚會的青少年很不自在。我們甚至有一個小組在樓梯間聚會。總而言之，青少年事工在場地與安全上仍有許多的需要。雖然我們現階段 將就將就 還過得去，但是這不是長久之計，這更阻撓了我們實踐青少年事工的異象。

-Lilian Wang (Youth Deacon)