Ministry with Balloons is a blast!

Ever since I was the house magician at the Rock ‘n Roll McDonald’s in downtown Chicago (in college) I’ve been twisting balloons for kids at church, birthday parties, magic shows, etc. But my use of them in my ministry for teaching was pretty minimal and limited to one balloon creatures. That was until very recently.

“Master Ron” as he is known, is a Christian children’s entertainer and awesome juggler and balloon artist. I have used him for years to sub for me in Kids Church when I’m out of town, and he is the only sub I’ve had that the kids just don’t seem to miss me at all when I get back. (is that good, or not?) :-) A computer systems analyst by day, and a balloon twistin’ juggler by evenings and weekends, Master Ron is a great teacher and communicator with kids…. and an inspiration to me.

This summer I had him teach all our grade school kids at our church for Sunday School in June. We found ourselves with three weeks to ‘fill’ between our regular Sunday School and when our summer Family Sunday School class could start, and I needed something easy for me and fun for the kids to fill those three weeks. Master Ron was the solution!

We (mostly he) did a journey through the Bible with the theme of “When we got a problem, God’s got a solution” and showed through many Bible stories that God can help his people in any situation, and ultimately about the problem of sin and God’s solution in Jesus!

I love Ron’s enthusisam and energy when he is teaching. If you tied him down, I’m sure the ropes would break as he is all over the stage and grabs and keeps the kids attention, often using them on the stage as part of his program:

Headed for the firey furnace?

OH NO! What will happen? As usual, God comes through!A pregnant Sarah with Abraham!

David facing Goliath!

The Devil’s Arrows of Temptation?
No match for the Sheild of Faith!Master Ron is more than just a Master of Balloons, he is a master teacher of children! If you are in the Chicagoland area, I highly recommend him for your church. His contact information is available at his website: www.masterron.com

Ron is my Balloonspiration!

In fact, here is the NEW ME:

Well, for camp this year, anyway. The last week of June was my 10th year speaking at Camp Timber-lee and I’ve lost track of how many total weeks since I used to do two weeks very often. I’ve done just about everything at camp from Gus, to magic, to (inventing) Toybox Tales, built a huge paper airplane, drank gross food, and a ton of other stuff, but I’ve never really done balloons, so I decided it was time for something new.

Here I am in my first balloon hat (Ron, I need help!) and Kim the first girl at camp to win one of my creations at the end of chapel. (Road Runner for the theme of the year: RUN!)

Here are my lions for Daniel and the Lion’s Den!

Instead of full bodied balloon people every story, for the (almost) sacrifice of Isaac I made masks for the kids, it was pretty funny to see them acting with these huge balloon faces.

Here is the cast of for the story of Esther – a hat with a head and arms and the characters name down the front. In addition to the regulars, I added some obscure characters in the story I was sure they hadn’t heard of (like Hatrach, which I called “hat rack”) and Moe and Curly for the King’s guards and even a ‘Stand In’ who played any character I needed on the spot, such as Haman’s wife, or King’s scribe.

Here is Haman (pronounced, of course, ‘Hey Man’) hanging from his own gallows. I wish I had more pictures but most of the time I forgot to get a picture before the balloons were popped or given away, but it was a great way to bring the stories to life. At the Friday night bonfire one kid said, “I used to think the Bible was boring, but now I want to go home and read it more.” Thanks Ron for helping me develop another way to reach and teach kids for Jesus!

Even Baby Luke got into the balloon fun!