Our 2008 Hillsong Kids album is called Follow You.

It takes Jesus out of an abstract belief and makes it concrete, a cultural shift from faith being a set of propositions you put your trust in.

A generation ago that album could have been called ‘Believe This’.

Witness the rise of social justice in the Church which (hopefully) gives equal footing to worship and justice in our faith.

Justice takes our abstract doctrine and makes it concrete… we are called to be Jesus’ hands and feet.

Amen.

We should be focussed on creating a Church that our Children will want to be a part of and lead.

We need to be creating a ministry where our ceiling will be their floor.

We want them to stand on our shoulders

The next senior/lead pastors of our Churches are most likely in your parenting rooms, or our early childhood ministries.

Which in my mind is the only reason to include chocolate in your weekend services.

My blog went a little haywire earlier this week. Had a spot of emailage to the support people at my host and it seems to be fixed.

Here is a cool idea… the copenhagen bike.

Here’s what I think.

There are ideas out there that you can’t see from your current perspective. It’s an idea/solution to your problem so wildly different from your experience and expertise it’s not immediately obvious.

That’s why we need each other.

I am excited!

And not just because it’s Fri and a full weekend in Church is ahead of me with loads of opportunities to be a blessing.

Not just because I’m sitting here at home on my computer looking out at a beautiful afternoon listening to my son play Wii Fit.

But because there are new things on the horizon.

I’m excited to see new projects coming, to see new initiatives and new seasons.

It gives me a hope for the future.

I’ll bet that it’s the same for you.

And if you and I feel the same then why should it be any different for those we lead.

So next year for your teams and leaders, even if they are staying in the same role and serving with the same kids give them fresh vision that gives the expectation of a new season ahead. Because it IS a new season. In my experience God elevates and promotes in a moment and you can’t plan for it, but you can prepare!

Prepare your people.

It’s what leaders do.

And when opportunity arises, in the fullness of time… there will be people around you ready to rebuild the wall. (So we built the wall…for the people had a mind to work. Neh 4:6)

Hey you need to do this!

I pasted some text from the Kiva website below, I love this concept!

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I just made a loan to someone in Benin using a revolutionary new website called Kiva (www.kiva.org).

You can go to Kiva’s website and lend to someone across the globe who needs a loan for their business – like raising goats, selling vegetables at market or making bricks.  Each loan has a picture of the entrepreneur, a description of their business and how they plan to use the loan so you know exactly how your money is being spent – and you get updates letting you know how the entrepreneur is going.

The best part is, when the entrepreneur pays back their loan you get your money back – and Kiva’s loans are managed by microfinance institutions on the ground who have a lot of experience doing this, so you can trust that your money is being handled responsibly.

I just made a loan to an entrepreneur named Cyriane in Benin.  They still need another $250.00 to complete their loan request of $475.00 (you can loan as little as $25.00!).  Help me get this entrepreneur off the ground by clicking on the link below to make a loan to Cyriane too:

http://www.kiva.org/app.php?page=businesses&action=about&id=148474

It’s finally easy to actually do something about poverty – using Kiva I know exactly who my money is loaned to and what they’re using it for.  And most of all, I know that I’m helping them build a
sustainable business that will provide income to feed, clothe, house and educate their family long after my loan is paid back.

Join me in changing the world – one loan at a time.

Thanks!

———————————————————
What others are saying about www.Kiva.org:

‘Revolutionising how donors and lenders in the US are connecting with small entrepreneurs in developing countries.’
– BBC

‘If you’ve got 25 bucks, a PC and a PayPal account, you’ve now got the wherewithal to be an international financier.’
– CNN Money

‘Smaller investors can make loans of as little as $25 to specific individual entrepreneurs through a service launched last fall by Kiva.org.’
– The Wall Street Journal

‘An inexpensive feel-good investment opportunity…All loaned funds go directly to the applicants, and most loans are repaid in full.’
– Entrepreneur Magazine

WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?

No seriously, you’re reading the blog of a Children’s Pastor… and seemingly remaining interested… unless you just searched for the term ‘Don’t Do Normal’ and this page came up, which raises two very important points… 1 Thanks Google, and 2 Why can’t people who are searching for ‘How to give away one million dollars’ come here?

(Hmm… just writing that down has increased my chances)

So what are you doing here?

You are set apart not just as a believer in Jesus Christ, but a person who may be called to minister to children! You are like a statistic within a statistic, a piece of a piece of a pie.

• You are unusual
• You are counter-cultural
• You are different
• You are standing out
• You are separate, distinct and set apart
• You are peculiar, unconventional and too some, strange
• You are contrary not to the Word of God, but to the world
• You are an visiting alien here for a specific purpose and goal
• You are opposed, not to the world but to anything that exalts itself against the Kingdom of God
• You are anything but average

YOU’RE A DEVIATION FROM THE NORM

Once you become a follower of Jesus normal just isn’t good enough anymore. You are part of the world that is to come… The Kingdom of God is here… and yet to come. The Jews were not expecting Jesus. They expected a conquering king, a strong soldier. He would free them from all their enemies. He would change the way that they lived. There would be freedom from the rule of their enemies.

This is what the religious leaders got in Matt 5… the beatitudes

• The way up is down
• The way in is out
• The way first is last
• The way of success is service
• The way of strength is weakness
• The way of security is vulnerability
• The way of protection is forgiveness
• God’s power is made perfect… in our weakness
• Want to become great? Become least.
• Want to discover yourself? Forget your self.
• Want to ‘get even’? Bless and love them.
• Jesus didn’t just tell us to turn the other cheek we have to turn our hands and heart toward the other and do good.

You’re not normal, so don’t pretend to be.

Anyway, different is far more interesting.

Ministry can be often intense.

You very infrequently look back at an experience and wish you were angrier… now maybe you think of a great comeback line, but that’s just being too clever too late. Unfortunately for my temper I admire the leaders who respond with grace in a situation. When some old pastor guy (using the term loosely) tells a story about the time when a group of angry congregation members/protesters/motorcycle gang, wrote a strongly worded letter/protested/punched while quoting scripture/burning an effigy of the pastor/killing bunny rabbits and they responded by taking them all our to lunch/praying and they took him out to lunch/getting all of them saved and one member turned out to own Harley Davidson and giving hundreds of bikes to the Church Men’s Ministry… well I always repent of my angry ways and promise to do better in the future.

• Irregardless of circumstance does the Church have your heart?
• Irregardless of leadership do the children have your heart?
• Does time make the heart grow fonder?
• Does time make your heart grow colder?

Guard your heart.

So I spoke at the Kidshaper conference last week about keeping perspective in our lives… here are some great quotes about perspective and a summary:

• In order to keep a true perspective of one’s importance, everyone should have a dog that will worship him and a cat that will ignore him.
• Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts. Albert Einstein
• Every generalization is dangerous, especially this one. Mark Twain
• I’ve missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life and that is why I succeed. Michael Jordan
• Won’t you come into the garden? I would like my roses to see you. Richard Brinsley Sheridan
• A penny will hide the biggest star in the Universe if you hold it close enough to your eye. Samuel Grafton
• When a man sits with a pretty girl for an hour, it seems like a minute. But let him sit on a hot stove for a minute – and it’s longer than any hour. That’s relativity. Albert Einstein
• There is no burnt rice to a hungry person. Philippine Proverb

GIDEON: Judges 7:1-8

• God bought about a victory from an army too small (Midianites 135,000 = 450 to 1)
• With weapons that were completely inadequate (empty clay jar, a torch, a trumpet)
• And a leader who was determined but felt completely insignificant (Judges 6:11)

Twittered this thought a few days ago, just thought I would put it here in case you missed it:

I am not here to grow my Children’s ministry, I am here to grow my Church BY building my Children’s ministry.

It’s a shift in thinking. I really want to see our whole Church family move forward!

Love this post from Wayne Stocks brilliant random thoughts blog, which is what you call your blog before you realise there are approx. 18.7 million with the same title.
(Man, I really know how to build up and tear down in one sentence)

Anyway read it today!

8 Reasons to Get Involved in Children’s Ministry from Psalm 78