Bring a Kid to Church

Bring a kid to church! There are so many unchurched kids who need a caring adult to invite them to church. Moody Church in Chicago was started because a man named Dwight started bringing lost poor kids to church. Since people rented pews back then the church leaders began to complain that the kids weren’t paying or supporting the ministry financially – so Dwight start renting pews for the kids. When it got to be too many kids, they told him he could no longer bring the children, they were too disruptive. So instead he rented a warehouse and started what he called a “Sunday School” to teach the children how to read using the Bible as a textbook as a strategy to lift them out of poverty. It grew and grew until it was hundreds of children every Sunday morning. It got so big it drew the attention of the President of the United States of America and launched a national Sunday School movement. President Abraham Lincoln visited to check it out. Today it is the Moody Church on LaSalle Boulevard. I got to be their first children’s pastor over 100 years later. You may know Dwight today as…

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Be God’s Man in God’s Place

I’m at MBI right now for a children’s ministry conference being put on by the seniors in the Children’s Ministry Major program. A major not available when I was a student. They are doing an incredible job. It is such an honor to be here. As I walked around the campus yesterday posting pictures to Facebook of the campus changes, and what’s still the same – it brought back a lot of great memories. It was actually pretty significant that I was here on May 2nd. 24 years ago, on May 2nd, 1990 – I got to go out to take the President of Moody Bible Institute one on one. I had valet parked his car a few weeks earlier and left a note inside asking if I could treat him out to a meal. When he called my dorm room a few days later, my room mate answered, and shocked said, “It’s the Presdient!” I answered, “Bill Clinton?” And he said, “No, Joe Stowell!” We scheduled our meal, and I picked him up at the “Arch” in my little Chevy Chevete and took him to the Rock n’ Roll McDonald’s, where I was the ‘house magician’ – and where…

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A Presidential Visit to your Kids Ministry?!?!

Imagine if the President of the United States heard about your kids ministry and decided he needed to see if for himself? That’s exactly what happened to a Sunday School Director named Dwight Lyman Moody… and the President was none other than Abraham Lincoln! I have the honor of being the first children’s pastor on staff at the church he founded well over 100 years ago, The Moody Church. While he is known primarily as the Billy Graham of the previous generation, his ministry began as a children’s evangelist and he had a HUGE impact on the creation and growth of Sunday School. At a time when many churches were supported by ‘rented pews’ Moody rented pews for street kids. When he was told the children weren’t welcome in church (Big Church) he started a Sunday School for street kids that grew so big and well respected that Abraham Lincoln visited one Sunday to see it for himself! Imagine having the President of the United States drop in to see your kids ministry. Moody was passionate about kids but as his ministry grew, his focus shifted to adults. He said at the end of his life, “If I had my…

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Day 3 – Thankful for My Mom

This is part of a series called 24 Days of Thankfulness. These posts are in RANDOM order, NOT priority order. Each is something I am thankful for leading up to Thanksgiving. DAY #3: My Mom It’s hard to believe this Christmas Day will be 15 years since my mom went to meet Jesus. Yes. The day we celebrate “God With Us” – is the day my mom went to be with God. Peacefully, after my little brother gave her permission to go. Though ill with cancer, she had kept her humor and loving gift of encouragement. My favorite inheritance is the boxes of cards of and letters from all over the world of lives she touched. Those who have heard me speak, have heard her words through me, even when I wasn’t crediting her. She is a part of me. They have heard the story of my call to ministry – when I said at age ten, “I want to me a children’s evangelist when I grow up,” and she said, “What’s growing up got to do with anything? You start next week,” and the kidologist was born! I am thankful for a mother who saw past the boundless energy…

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24 Days of Thankfulness

Today I launched a little Thanksgiving Project over on Kidology.org called “24 Days of Thanks-Giving” – basically I am providing a simple Word doc you can download and every day from Nov. 1 until Thanksgiving add ONE thing you are thankful for. It’s really just something I need to DO MYSELF – but I thought maybe others might want to join me, and I’d enjoy reading/seeing what others are thankful for. So you are welcome to use the Word doc, or just post in the forum what YOU are thankful for! So let me begin today, with my first post. These are NOT going to be in priority order, otherwise I’d have to go God, Family, etc. and then later on, people might judge me for putting one thing “above” or “before” another – so right out of the gate let me say, these posts will be in RANDOM ORDER of things I am THANKFUL FOR! DAY 1 – Yosemite DAY 2 – God’s Word DAY 3 – My Mom DAY 4 – Photography DAY 5 – Pandora DAY 6 – George Lucas DAY 7 – Breckenridge DAY 8 – Barq’s DAY 9 – Mercy & Grace DAY 10 –…

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