Activities and teachings directed at younger people are necessary if they are a part of the congregation. Find the brethren that are most gifted at teaching young people. This author has seen much debate about whether young people should be separated from their parents during a service. Obviously, if young people are separate, teaching can be tailored directly to their level of understanding. On the other hand, it is vital for children to see their parents participate in the main service and for them to understand as much as possible of what actually takes place there. Lessons directed toward children can be presented with adults present—the children can learn and the adults can frequently learn something from the children. The overall schedule of your services should be based upon the congregations and its needs. Breaking the service up into sections with a short break in between allows people to come and go for the parts of the service most applicable to them. Some groups have youth lessons before the main service. Others have a praise service of all singing for 30 to 60 minutes. Still others have a prayer service. People can then attend those sections that are important to them. When this kind of format exists, it is important for brethren to encourage each other not to "hide" from things that they might actually need. If God wants someone to learn to sing or pray for others, that person may need to be encouraged to attend the praise or prayer service, even though they may feel like they do not want to.

When people begin a new service, especially if they are participating as they never have before, they often want to stay much longer than when they just "went to hear a message". This is a very good thing, but it also makes serving food important—either a snack or a full meal. People simply stay at any event longer when there is food—especially if it is good food. Groups that have several different segments to their services, or a service followed by a Bible study may want to serve the food between events. If all of the events run one after another, it is best to serve the food at the end—more people will stay and talk. Serving at the beginning is better than not at all—this may be required if the meeting facilities do not have refrigeration. As with everything else, there will probably be people in your congregation who are gifted with preparing, organizing and serving food. Let them serve in this way, and thank God for them.