How I Write Entire Teaching Series at Once

I wanted to take you behind the curtain a bit, and share a little about how I create complete curriculum units in a short amount of time—as I’m often asked for “my secret” or for help when friends find they need to crank out an entire series in a short amount of time! I’m heading to another week of camp speaking, and I’m excited about the theme: What a FUN theme for a week of helping kids to “BUILD” their lives on the Word of God! So many applicable verses come to mind, like: You also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. I Peter 2:5 I’ve done a Kid’s Church unit in the past where we looked at our “Connections” to God, Family, Church, Friends, Neighbors and the World. But I had 8 chapels to write and that series was only 6 lessons—and while I could do an intro and a review—the creative in me said, “Time to do something new and fresh!” rather than rehash something old. I did look through them for “lego ideas” that would be transferable. Then the…

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Principles for Powerful Programming

I recently had a vision casting meeting with our elementary volunteers. Currently, my church runs a good program. The kids are dropped off in various rooms. Then they travel to a large room for some corporate worship before traveling back to their separate rooms for a lesson. There is a lot of loose time and transition time. My goal was to pitch that we have very little time with these kids to make an eternal impact—so we need to make every minute count. So I presented some goals we will aim for this fall: Goals for this Fall: We want every child who comes to Kids Rock to feel noticed, loved and welcome! We want to make Sunday the highlight of their week! We want guests to come back because they had a great time and made a connection. We want kids to leave having learned something NEW and life-changing. These are goals everyone could agree with, easily. But how do you make them a reality? You have to create a program that has some pop and power and that pulls the kids along. It can’t drag and it needs to have clear direction, purpose and it be intentional. There…

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Back in the Saddle

Yeeeeee-HAW! Well, it’s been about a month that I’ve been “back in the saddle” as a full time children’s pastor and what a ride it’s been! I suppose I should get back to blogging and letting y’all know how it’s been going! I’m having a blast and it’s going great so far. I’m not changing too much too fast – mostly getting to know people – learning how things are done here, and evaluating. I’m impressed with the number of volunteers, the commitment of the staff and with so much of what is already in place. We have some excitement in the air because of a new building that will be breaking ground soon and so the opportunity is ahead of us for growth as we will be moving in to a new building (Lord willing) in the fall of 2016. That’s going to mean preparing to raise the bar in how we do thing to prepare for anticipated growth over the next year. I’m also busy looking at how we are organized, how we process things, and how we recruit, schedule, do check in, retain volunteers and visitors and theming both here and when we move into the new…

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Forms, Meetings and Hanging Pictures! Week 1 at The Rock

If you haven’t heard, I am the new children’s pastor at the Rock of Southwest in Littleton, Colorado. The kids ministry is called Kids Rock! (Pretty awesome, as kids DO rock!) This Sunday I’ll be introduced as we say farewell to the current children’s pastor who is moving out of state. Kim is well loved and has been a wonderful leader of the children’s ministry – so nice to pick up where a great leader left off, while at the same time being excited about what’s next! So how did my first week go? Since I had a week before I’m officially introduced on Sunday, I was able to focus mostly on meeting the staff and setting up my office. (And filling out lots of forms.) It’s kinda fun starting out with an empty office and figuring out how to arrange the furniture and what to bring from home to make it HQ for the Kids Ministry. I didn’t want my back to the door – with two youth pastors here, as well as a youth intern… your back to the door isn’t wise! But seriously, it’s so that I can communicate that I’m available and eager to engage with…

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Download My New Book FREE!

  Download My New Book for FREE! I’m so excited to let you in on a NEW BOOK that David C. Cook just published for me – and the best part is, it’s 100% FREE! Jesus’ ministry was all about relationships, and kids loved him! How can we do ministry with kids and families in the same way? How can we close the gap between Sundays by creating real, meaningful, life-changing relationships with parents, kids, and volunteers? In It’s about Relationships, you’ll learn: How to connect with kids by thinking like kids The HUGE difference between why you do kid’s ministry and why people volunteer Practical ways to make kids feel welcomed and special How to make time in your week to build relationships Get your free ebook now!  

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