Transform 4/14
Equipping Leaders with Strategies
To Disciple in the 4/14 Window
What Is The 4/14 Window?
"This Changes Everything!"
An entertaining explanation of the 4/14 window by Compassion International and the Global Alliance
for Holistic Child Development
"It's Time To Wake Up!"
We Are Losing A Generation.
by Youth with a Mission
3 Reaching the Family
In the 168 hours of a week, the local church has a maximum average of 3 hours (weekend service and midweek service) to influence this generation. The influence that they receive during the other 165 hours of the week is out of our hands. However, family is, by far, the most influencial sphere in a child's life, and if we want our efforts to be fruitful and long-lasting, then we must make it our priority to reach out to the families of the children. We must bring them to Christ, provide them with resources to build their own faith, and educate them with effective strategies to establish and maintain a Christ-centered home.

4 Developing Leaders
​The children of today are not the church of tomorrow - they are the church of today. We must prepare and mobilize them to minister and serve within the local church, in their communities, and to the world. We must learn to recognize their individual strengths, create opportunities for service and growth that develop their unique God-given abilities and talents, and nurture the use of their own spiritual gifts as active members of the body of Christ.
Did You Know...?
Transformation:
The Process
​The personality of a child is completely formed by the time he is 3-years-old. By the time he is 4-years-old, a child is aware of himself as an individual and is capable of understanding his need for a personal savior.
​A 9-year-old child already has a foundation of morals and values that will serve as the basis of personal beliefs for the rest of his life.

​A 13-year-old child has already formed his own world-view, one that will affect every decision he makes for the rest of his life. This means that, apart from the saving intervention of Christ that creates a renewed mindset, a person who is 90-year-old will think about the world in the same way as he did when he was 13-year-old.

​Even though the world-view of a person is completely formed before he is 13-year-old, less than 1% of Christian students attending universities around the the United States maintain a biblical world-view. Whatever world-view they adopted before the age of 13 was not based on the basic truths of God's Word. This makes us ask: Why do children (who will grow up to be adults) see the Bible as a book of fairy tales and child stories, but not as infallible truths laid out by God himself?

​50% of Christians accepted Christ before they were 12-years-old, but after 12-years there is only a 6% chance that someone will accept Christ as their personal Savior.

​Between the ages of 4-14 is when a person is most receptive to the call of the Hold Spirit to accept God's gift of Salvation through belief in Jesus Christ. This is called "The 4/14 Window."

After the age of 14, the focus of a ministry should not be on formation but rather discipleship. We must make a long-term commitment to help teens grow on what they have already learned as children and to invest in the Kingdom of God with every ounce of their being.

The work of Transform Ministries began in Sonora, Mexico, in 2007 in response to the need for children's ministries in the small towns and villages surrounding the principal cities of the northwestern state. In 2010 the ministry extended into the United States and has collaborated on various projects with other ministries like Evangelism Explosion International, Church of God of Prophecy international children's ministries, and the east-central Hispanic region of Church of God. Transform Ministries works with churches in the U.S.A., Mexico, and Central America, and the ministry continues to expand as the God allows.

The vision of Transform Ministries is to equip churches to work more effectively with those who make up the 4/14 window, and educate church leaders on the necessity for strategic and intentional ministry to children and youth.
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Through conferences that include open-floor seminars and interactive workshops, teachers and leaders are encouraged to move beyond teaching into discipleship. They learn how to create lesson plans that are strategically developed to encourage memorization and life application, as well as how to make long-term commitments to the spiritual growth of their children. They learn intentional and practical ideas to transform their children's programs from telling bible stories into a ministry that encourages and fosters spiritual maturity in the lives of their students. In the conferences, we cover the four essentials of ministry to children: Effective Evangelism (collaborating with Evangelism Explosion International), Intentional Discipleship, Reaching Out to Families, y the Development of New Leaders. The conferences are designed to equip leaders and teachers with a renewed focus on the spiritual needs of the child, instill passion in him to pursue the presence of God and His kingdom, and to equip him to be an active participant in the Body of Christ by serving his local church, the local community, and the world.
Transform Ministries also collaborates with the local church to organize and carry out evangelistic events, like Vacation Bible Schools, Kid's Days, and street evangelism.
The Need For Transformation
The majority of children's ministries focus on the entertainment of the child with games, songs, and fun activities, with the intention of teaching him how to be an effective dedicated Christian when he becomes a teenager. The church as a whole has done an excellent job at teaching Bible stories like Jonah and the big fish, Daniel and the Lions, and Jesus using the lunch of a little boy to feed 5,000 people. However, children see these as fiction stories, about as believable as Cinderella, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, and Pinnochio.

Fairy tales do not change lives;
nor do Bible stories
that are not clearly founded
on the infallible truths of the word of God
​
Sadly, it is for this reason that millions of youth in our world have walked through our Vacation Bible Schools and Sunday Schools without ever hearing the truth of God's word. They hear nice stories that make no lasting impact on their lives, and therefore, a hunger for God is not instilled in their hearts. Rather, they turn to the world to seek purpose, love, a reason for living, and acceptance in this life through drugs, alcohol, gangs, prostitution, sex outside of marriage, homosexuality, pornography, cutting, and suicide.
​
Enough with the entertainment.
It's time for a revolution in the way we do ministry. It's time to aggressively influence the future of today's young generation and prepare them for tomorrow. Proverbs 22:6 states, "Direct your children on the right path, and when they are older, they will not depart from it." When you make a long-term commitment to influence the life of a child, you will leave a lasting mark that will transform generations to come.

When God wanted to change the story of a nation, he used a child. Samuel was chosen to establish a new age of leadership in his nation. Josiah changed the course of political history when he was crowned as king at only 8-years-old. David taught future generations how to be a true worshipper. Jeremiah was called as an adolescent to proclaim hope to the captives. God chose to enter this world in the form of a baby, and it was a child that Jesus used to show us to demonstrate the faith that one needs to enter the Kingdom of Heaven.

The entire world is obsessed with one question: "How to we reach the young generation of today?" They know that today's innocent children are the adult consumers and world-changers of tomorrow. As the church, it is our social responsibility and divine commission to ask ourselves, "What are we doing NOW to win and disciple the next generation for Christ?"

It is time for a revolution.
We must be agents of transformation
in today's young generation.
Proverbs 22:6 (NLT)
​
Direct your children onto the right path,
and when they are older, they will not leave it.
1 Evangelism
The 4/14 window represents the ages of people when they are most receptive to the Gospel message of Christ's saving grace. 50% of Christian worldwide received Christ before they were 12 years old. After the age of 12, there is only a 6% chance that a person will accept Christ as their Savior. By the time a child is 9 years old, they already have a basic concept of fundamental beliefs and moral values, and by the time a child is 13 years old, their general world-view has been established. The evangelism of children does not only entail sharing the good news with them, but also equipping them with the training and resources to share the gospel with their families, their friends, their communities, their school acquaintances, and through the social media.

2 Discipleship
It's not enough to give a child the hope of eternal life and the promise of a home in heaven, It is necessary that the local church form long-term strategies to commit to disciple the child to live out his faith on a daily basis in his church, his home, his family, his community, and his world. It is also imperitive that the local church create a network within their ministries to reach the child on every level of influence and facilitate his spiritual growth. This long-term commitment to discipleship means ministering to the child's emotional, physical, and social needs from the moment he walks into the church until he is an adult.
The Four Essencials
Foundations for Ministry to the 4/14 Window
"When we disciple a child,
we are transforming a nation!"
See what Youth with a Mission in Columbia (South America)
is doing to impact the 4/14 window in their nation!
¿Donde Trabajamos?
USA
México
Centroamerica