Effective Children's Ministry

Archive for the ‘Bits and Pieces’ Category

From time to time we hear of people using the material on EffectiveChildrensMinistry.org in ways you might think are unusual.

The brightly coloured visuals and review games have been very useful for those working with elderly people.

Youth groups have used some of the teaching and review games.

Home study groups for adults have also found the PowerPoint presentations valuable. 

Individuals have used the PowerPoints in their laptops to share Bible truth in one-to-one situations.

So feel free to use and adapt whatever you find here, in order to communicate the gospel effectively to whatever age range you are working with.

Respected marketer and communicator Seth Godin said in a recent blog of his:

Apologize

Defer to others

Avoid shortcuts

Tell the truth

Offer kindness

Seek alliances

Volunteer to take the short straw

Choose the long-term, sacrificing the short

Demonstrate respect to all, not just the obviously strong

Share credit and be public in your gratitude

Risking the appearance of weakness takes strength. And the market knows it.

Doesn’t this ring true with us as communicators of the gospel?

Substitute the words “And the market knows it” with “And those we are reaching with the gospel know it” and we have a very powerful incentive to be sincere and self-sacrificing – in short, to be Christ-like.

Brandon Maddux, over at ChildrensMinistryLive.com , recently blogged about an experience he had. He saw a young lad get on a bus and engage in meaningful conversation about the Lord with a girl of similar age.

I thought to myself:

Whoever taught that boy in Sunday School did a good job. 

Whichever children’s ministry leaders or volunteers touched his life - they influenced him for good and for God.
They taught him the need of the lost and how to engage them in conversation about God and his love for them.

They taught him to be bold, and no doubt to trust in the Holy Spirit to help him and guide him in his outreach.

What have we taught our kids this week?

>>Read this touching story, and Brandon’s challenging comments, here.

Thanks to Tony Kummer and the geek-hours he spent poring over children’s ministry blogs, we now have a definitive Top 100 in the kidmin-o-sphere!

Catherine and I could hardly believe that our wee blog was even in the list, let alone sitting where it was. If you want to find out where we got to, check out Tony’s list over at Ministry-to-Children.com. It will be worth a visit, because there are links there to some cracking good blogs with heaps of interesting posts and resources.

While you are there, look over some of the other resources – lesson plans, colouring pages, articles, etc.  And there is also  a smashing forum which covers all sorts of important matters (and has a bit if fun!) by pooling the experiences of many members. The forum is free to join, and all the materials on Ministry-to-Children.com are, like ours here, completely free to download and use.

This is such a treat! the following link will take you to a Facebook page belonging to the Jesus Story Bible. One wee boy has written his own story book for Jesus. I know you are going to love this.

>>The Jesus Story Book Bible – Sam’s story book.