[Kid Inspiration]

Each year about this time (actually around the time of Super Bowl), we at Hillsong Church have our Superbowl event – Vision Sunday.

Pastor Brian presents to our whole church where he feels the Church is heading. Realigns us around purpose and points us toward Jesus our hope and future.

This year was the first time that the vision has been presented globally to all our family of Hillsong Churches, so it being Monday morning here in Australia that vision will have been presented and generated a lot of passion and excitement all over the world.

I am pretty sure the video will be put up online soon and will update this post when it is. UPDATE: http://www.myhillsong.com/visionsunday

The great thing about this year is that we focussed on people and their stories in a big way. It’s not so much about the big announcements (although a campus in New York is exciting), but more about becoming the kind of Church we need to be to impact this world.

Our Church has always been about connecting, equipping and serving people and in 2010 the opportunity to do just that will be greater than ever before.

So I am excited because every person that calls Hillsong Church home is called to greater participation in seeing the Kingdom of God advanced.

(It is cool seeing the New York link at the top of our website).

(It doesn’t link yet, but when it does)!!

So there is a twitter competition going on right now! In fact it just started.

Check out the official BIG website here: http://hillsongkidsbig.com/news/10/01/big-release-competition

All the rules and everything you need to know!

Oh and here is the latest on the release of Follow You!

A few #kidmin people have done Top Ten lists in the past few weeks.

I wanna do one too.

Not sure what kind of list to do though…

Thinks to himself… ‘if I want reader participation I should offer them an incentive’…

Okay, if you write a comment/suggestion of the top ten list I should do and I do it. Then you will win a copy of our new, yet to be released kids album. Hillsong Kids Ultimate Collection.

Of course it hasn’t been released yet so I of course be sending it to you after that takes place.

I would love to highlight one of the main reasons we use media with our kids during weekend services.

When I grew up in New Zealand there were only two TV channels, the appropriately named One and Two, so my friends and I watched the same TV programs:

Macgyver and Knight Rider

(I cried when Kitt ended up in the acid pool and they had to remake him. Episode 314 Junk Yard Dog).

It united us as kids and has given us a common language and reference.

This has all changed with the stunning width and breadth of media available today. Our media choices are used to differentiate and separate us into tribes/groups. Are you an emo kid, do you like Hip/Hop, or are you a fan of ?

One of the many reasons we use media in our services is to create a shared experience.

No matter which campus I go to, which of our extension services I attend there will be children who I share a common language with… not about just Disney or Nickelodeon but with our curriculum and the Big Message videos. We could talk about Funny Man Dan and his latest exploits or some song they saw last week and as the media is created to point towards our theme and (hopefully) toward Jesus the relevance to their lives should immediately obvious.

And just like today as the mist of time clouds my eyes as I think about Macgyver diffusing a bomb with a toothpick, or Michael Knight foiling an international plot I hope that our kids today will remember with fondness and hopefully understanding what they experienced as a child.

(This may turn into a series methinks)

We just started a bit of a leadership promo here at church for the kids department.

We are calling it ‘So You Think You Can… Lead Kids’. Encouraging all of our leaders to invite one other person to lead our awesome kids – Kind of a ‘Double Your Impact’ month.

Check out the page here: hillsongkids.com/leadkids

Now I did this site pretty much myself using free tools online and put them on our site. And the video was edited with iMovie, but comment below if you would like to know the process of the deal and with enough interest I can lay it all down for ya!

Enjoy this from our latest kids album:

Follow You.

Album release is coming soon… due before Christmas in Australia, and in April 2009 in the US/UK…

But of course you could order direct from hillsongmusic.com even if you do live somewhere else in the world!

I really am excited about this album, some very different tracks and also my first vocal ever… with Dan Lee-Archer (aka Funny Man Dan), a hip-hop groove called ‘Love Never Fails’.

Album cover for Follow You

So in every service in Hillsong Kids we have various upfront positions rostered for our primary school programs.

And I always forget who ends up doing what.

So if I write them down here:

1. It might just help me remember them
2. If I forget, they are online for posterity

THE THREE M’S

MC – Responsible for the running of the service, welcomes kids etc. They also do the offering.

Ministry – Does our ask God, thank God prayer requests. And any time of ministry/prayer with the children.

Message – Does the message. Every service someone will bring a message to the children. Some services it may be longer than others.

There are a lot of other roles in a service, but these are three of the main one’s in terms of upfront/platform leaders.

Didn’t have a camera!

So had to steal a couple of shots from some friends on facebook.

Kidsfest 2008… album recording… the whole day…

God is good. The event REALLY was a huge blessing to our kids and our church!

Hillsong Kids Album 2008 pit choir

Hillsong Kids Album 2008 rehearsal

So once I get a hold of our ‘offical’ photos from the album I will link ‘em here.

7am this morning, awoke and made my way to someone else’s house to start filming a music video for ‘Love Never Fails’, which just may turn out to be one of the most embarrassing things I have ever done.

Love Never Fails is a song written by myself and Gio Galanti, one of our kids album producers from Hillsong London. With help from Funny Man Dan in lyrics we have created this kind of Hip Hop track that talks about the fact that love never fails.

It’s not exactly praise and worship, so we are making a music video for it and including as maybe a little bonus on the album this year. But it was a whole lot of fun check out a couple of shots from the shoot with the ever imporessive Ben Field directing!

Ben peering into the little monitor to see what’s happening.

Dan filming last scene of day with a little help from our pro shaders