October is known for lots of things:  holidays like Halloween and Columbus Day, the beginning of sweater weather, and beautiful leaves in shades of orange, yellow, and red. Many folks even roll out the red carpet for Pumpkin Spice everything if they can hold off until October.

If you’re a churchgoer, October is likely your Pastor or Clergy Appreciation month as well. Celebrating Pastor Appreciation Month is a wonderful way to show your ministers how much you appreciate them and their work.  Ideally, your ministers are aware of how much they mean to you personally, your church, and your community.  Sometimes, however, life gets busy and we don’t always remember to show appreciation the way we’d like.  I’ve been there.  I get it!  

In fact, I’m a minister’s wife and I don’t usually remember Pastor Appreciation Month until it’s nearly over! Has Pastor Appreciation Month taken you by surprise again, too?  If so, you’ve got time to show your love.  Here’s a quick and easy gift idea for you:

You Rock! Pastor Appreciation Gift

You’ll need the following items.  Most can be found at your local Dollar Tree, but Walmart and Target would also have what you need.

• pillar candle
• candle plate
• decorative stones
• Sharpies or other permanent markers
• raffia or ribbon
• scrapbook paper

We did two variations of this gift with my KidMin group.  For our pastor, we made a list of roles that are filled by a senior pastor.  Our list had things like counselor, leader, teacher, public relations director, etc.  The kids wrote a pastoral role on each rock and decorated it.

For our other ministers in our church, our girls played word association.  We named the ministers and they came up with fun lists of things or ideas they associated with each minister.  My personal favorites were “#awesome” and “good with old people.”  They wrote the results of our word association game on the rocks.

To finish up, they plated each candle, added a tag made from scrapbook paper, and positioned the rocks around each candle.  Then we prayed for each minister and delivered the gifts while classes were happening.

What are your favorite ideas for showing appreciation to your ministers?