Hope Lives

February 22, 2009 in Blog, Everything, Uncategorized with 0 Comments

Hope Lives This weekend, some of us on the KidzMatter team went to the Spark Children’s Ministry Conference in Milwaukee.  We had a really  great time, and the Spark team were super people.  In my downtime in the resource center, I got to browsing around at what the other  providers had to offer.  Group Publishing was right next to us, so they were a logical place to start.  They had one product that really  caught my eye that I wanted to share.

 It’s called Hope Lives.  Hope Lives is a book by Amber Van Schooneveld about compassion and poverty.  I’ve just flipped through it,  but it looks great.  In conjunction with the book, Group has released  curriculum to go along with the book.  They have a  children’s ministry kit, youth kit, pastors kit, and small group kit.   They’re cheap too: your whole church could get involved with Hope Lives for less than $150 for a 5 week series.  

The whole purpose is to help you encourage your children to develop a compassionate response to poverty.  It reminds them that hope lives.  It helps them put it into action.  If you’ve been looking for a way to get your kids involved in poverty outreach, Hope Lives is a great way to start.  You can check it out at group.com/hopelives.

Plowing

January 21, 2009 in Blog, Everything, Uncategorized with 0 Comments

It’s winter right now in Indiana.  That means that spring is just a few months away.  (I went to school for 12 years to learn that!)  Here in Indiana, spring means time to plow and plant for most farmers.  They tear up the old stalks and roots, and bring fresh soil to the surface.  That allows them to plant new seed on top that will flourish and grow.  But what happens if that farmer doesn’t plow his field and just throws seed on top of it all?  (Some of you from in the city may have to think harder about this one.)  Very little grows.  Shocking, I know.  Scripture points this out to us too:

Proverbs 20:4 (NCV) “Lazy farmers don’t plow when they should; they expect a harvest, but there is none.”

I find myself like that lazy farmer a lot.  It’s hard to part with old things.  They’re just comfortable.  I’m pretty sure you know what I’m talking about too.  What are those policies, programs, ideas, or people that are comfortable and are so hard to get rid of?  They’re like the old crops for the farmer.  We try and tell ourselves that we can add this new thing to the old thing, and it’ll be better.  Take this hypothetical classroom for example: you have an old, grumpy, generally angry guy teaching a class.  So you think, “Well, if I just put someone less grumpy in there with him, it’ll all be OK.”  The thing is, the problem is still there.  You’re just masking it.  You can throw fertile new young hearts out onto that soil, but few of them will take.  You haven’t plowed the problem.

Sometimes, plowing things up and getting rid of the old is painful.  It takes a sharp blade to plow.  You’ll make people mad.  It’s guaranteed.  I realize you can’t just go around offending everybody.  That’s poor leadership.  There’s also a point at which you let yourself be walked on too much.  That’s poor leadership too.  It all comes down to what’s more important.  Offending a few adults who have had years to grow in their faith, or turning an entire generation of kids with fertile new hearts (seeds) off to the Gospel because you weren’t willing to plow up the old stuff?  Take a look at your ministry today: what can you start plowing up?

Lessons from the Christmas Cantata

December 22, 2008 in Blog, Everything, Uncategorized with 0 Comments

Tonight was the Christmas cantata at my home church, Liberty Baptist.  Our music pastor, Chas Singer, and our choir did amazingly as always.  As I sat there this evening, listening to the words they sang so beautifully, some things hit me.  I wanted to share some of those with you.

1.  Imagine being Mary and Joseph, lying in the stable looking the living, breathing Son of God right in the face.  Imagine the task of parenting a perfect child for the next 30 years!  (Most parents probably wouldn’t complain.)  He’d be courageous, relentless, and brave.  He’d love a world of sin.  Nothing we could do would keep us from the intimate love he would give.  He overcomes it all.  This is our God.  These are some of the ideas from the song, “This is Our God” that our choir shared tonight.  Remember that you serve a living Savior.  He came as a baby for you.  Even when you’re burned out, you have the knowledge of His unspeakable gift to you to drive you on.  That’s a crazy thought.  Here’s some of the highlights of the lyrics from this song:

Who is this child asleep in the manger?
Tender and mild, this intimate Stranger?
Recklessly, wildly loving a dangerous world
Who is this light invading our darkness…

This is our God, living and breathing
Call Him courageous, relentless, and brave
This is our God, loving and reaching… Continue Reading…

Orange-alicious!

December 21, 2008 in Blog, Everything, Uncategorized with 1 Comment

So, out of the three of us, I have the unique position of never having been to an Orange conference, and not yet planning to go to one.  (Unless, of course, someone volunteered to take me!)  So rather than talking about what I like about Orange, and what I look forward to, I’m going to talk more about some of the pluses and minuses of Orange, as I see it.

1.  Great speakers and music.  Orange has always done a great job of getting and keeping the best minds in children’s ministry, and the greatest musical talent.  If you want to be encouraged, uplifted, and worship, you can’t beat the group the team at reThink has brought together.  It’s an amazing conference in this area- one of the best in the industry.

2.  Spread out.  One of the most common complaints I hear about Orange is just how many people are in one place.  Orange may need to consider doing two sites in the future- help reduce overcrowding a little.  They’ve started on this already by moving to a larger venue, but it’s still something to look out for.

3.  Keep the loose schedule.  One of Orange’s strengths is how loose their schedule is.  You’ve got plenty of time to take some time to refresh and recharge, check out Atlanta, and whatever you want.  You won’t feel rushed through the day, without feeling like you’ve got too much free time.

4.  Diversify their interests.  Orange was started primarily to be a family ministry conference, and they’ve done really well as such.  But in order to be even more successful than they are now, they’re going to have to start diversifying a little of what they talk about.  The conference needs to be more open to other forms of ministry, rather than just one.  They must still keep what makes them them, without excluding everyone else.

So those are my thoughts about Orange.  What do you think?

Sinners in Desperate Need

December 12, 2008 in Blog, Uncategorized with 3 Comments

“Then those ‘sheep’ are going to say, ‘Master, what are you talking about? When did we ever see you hungry and feed you, thirsty and give you a drink? And when did we ever see you sick or in prison and come to you?’ Then the King will say, ‘I’m telling the solemn truth: Whenever you did one of these things to someone overlooked or ignored, that was me—you did it to me.’” (Matthew 25:37-40, MSG)

On November 30, a limousine was parked in front of Princeton Pike Church of God in Hamilton, Ohio.  No one knew why.  A week later, the members of the church learned something about that limousine: 9 celebrities had been inside that limousine.  Not the celebrities we would think of.  Not at all.  But they were celebrities in the eyes of the King.  That limousine had carried 9 homeless men to church that Sunday morning.  It just so happens that the owner of a limo service attends that church.  On November 30, he went out into the streets and found 9 homeless men and brought them to church.  7 of the 9 came to know Christ personally that Sunday morning.  That’s what I call a bus ministry!

To most limo owners, that would seem like craziness.  You don’t normally let dirty, smelly homeless men ride in your limo for free.  But that man saw something more important than their physical state: their spiritual state.  In his mind, they weren’t homeless.  They were sinners in desperate need of a Savior.

Continue Reading…

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