KidsCamp

We are just a few days away from KidsCamp at KBA. We are really excitied and looking forward to what is going to happen at camp this year. We will have a required parent/camper meeting this Sunday after the 2nd service in the Worship Center at 12:15pm. We will go over what to bring, rules, contact info, and answer any questions.

I will tell you that the bus trip is about 4.25 hours long and students will be allowed to bring an MP3 player and gaming system for the bus ride, but they will need to turn them into Jeremy upon arrival at camp and he will disperse them back for the ride home. Please send your child to camp with sunscreen and tell them to keep putting it on.

Reproduction and Development

Pastor Jimmy and I recently went to a church leadership conference that focused on creating reproducing movements. A want to share a few of our notes from the conference. Pastor Jimmy shared these with our small group leaders this past Wednesday night and challenged each leader to develop new leaders by Labor Day.

As a continuance of this effort I want to challenge each of our children’s small group leaders and Sunday School teachers to do the same. I know that many of our leaders are operating in classes that are beyond a capacity where we like to be. Ideally we like to operate in a 1:8 ratio, that is one leader for every 8 children.

Please read these notes below and begin praying about who you can bring under your wing and begin apprenticing. I would to see each of our Children’s Sunday School classes reproduce by Labor Day. I would love for our children to be able to receive more individual attention within their classes and have a deeper more meaningful relationship with their teachers.

Our mission: developing children in Christ

4 Reproducing principles

1. Reproducing requires everyone to have an apprentice

2. Reproducing is proactive not reactive

3. Reproducing is not about size it’s about leader readiness.

4. Reproducing is not about our kingdom it’s about God’s kingdom

You can do this!

The Five Steps of Leadership Development

Come follow me:

1. I do.  You watch.  We talk.

• Three simple ?’s:
  • What worked?
  • What didn’t work?
  • How can we improve?  (continue this throughout the process)

2.  I do.  You help.  We talk.

3.  You do. I help.  We talk.

• Release responsibilities to the new leader

4.  You do.  I watch.  We talk.

5.  You do.  Someone else watches.

Eggstravaganza

Easter Egg Hunt for 30,000 eggs, inflatables, free food and drinks, cotton candy, sno cones, games and much more. Free to the public.

This is going to be one party that your children won’t want to miss. We are expecting more than 3,000 people this year and we plan on blowing this thing up HarrahChurch style.

Easter Egg Hunt Times:

11:00 am – Ages 0-2 and 3-4
11:30 am – Ages 5-6
12:00 pm – Ages 7-8
12:30pm – Ages 9-11
1:00pm – Ages 12-17
1:30pm – Ages 18+

Preschool Parenting Class

We had our first Preschool Parenting Class about 4 weeks ago and it was a great time. The class was called Preschool Parenting: Creating a Rhythm. We had an intimate group of 8 parents attend. Some have one preschooler and some had 3 preschoolers at the house right now. The material for the class came from the ReThink group DVD resource of the same name that was given to the church by Gina McClain.

During the class we went through how to use the Small Talk resource that we provide to parents each week and explored what it would look like to use the stories during the month. We use props from bath time to tell the story of Jonah and the Whale, David and Goliath, and a few others. The parents really got a kick out of playing with the toys and learning how to take their parenting skills to the next level. It was great to get feedback from those in attendance about how the class helped them break through their fears of spiritual leadership as they realized how fun and easy it was to educate their children about the Bible and how much God loves them.

We are hoping to offer this class twice a year to our Preschool Parents. The resource provides two ways to offer the class. One is for a large group and the other is for an intimate setting. The intimate setting really worked out well for us, but we hope to one day approach the large group presentation because it seems like a lot of for to put on.

If you are reading this and hope to participate in our next event please feel free to contact Jeremy Davidson at HARRAHkids at Jeremy@HarrahChurch.com.

Orange Week: Reactivate the Family

A huge part of the HARRAHkids and Orange Strategy is to reactivate the role of the parents in the spiritual development of children. Pastor Jimmy Holbrook’s book Shelter is a part of that effort. In the book Jimmy discusses how to build a shelter where you can raise little warriors and princesses who will one day leave the home and enter the world on their own. We believe that it is the parents primary job to educate children in following Christ and that we as the church are here first to support parents with resources, guidance and programming.

We provide parents with take home materials that they can use at home to reinforce the lessons that their children are learning in our children’s programming. FamilyTimes.org is a resource that we direct parents to which provides grade school parents with some incredible tools to use in the home. Small Talk is a resource we provide for parents of Preschoolers each month with activities that they can do during the month to reinforce our lessons and to keep them up with the Bible stories we are studying.

The church has about 50 hours each year to work with a child. A parent has more than 3,000 hours to work with their children. When the church and the family begin to work together we multiply our impact in the life of the child.

Another way we are working to reactivate the family is by providing Family oriented ministry events and activities so that parents can serve beside their children. I think that one of the best things we can do for children is allow them see their parents experience and worship God. We are working on breaking down the programming walls that prohibit children from seeing other generations worship and serve God. By doing this we are seeing the family develop together in Christ.