Time for a Party!

Who doesn't love to have a party once in a while?! We got our night started off with a praise report. Jaylah Simpson had had a very bad allergy attack on Tuesday night while at church for a meeting - her eyes swelled up so bad that she couldn't open them the whole way. Well, some who were there gathered around her and prayed for her. By the time that we were done, her left eye was almost completely returned to normal and the right eye was significantly better! Well, when she came in to KC, both of her eyes were completely normal!! We shared this with the kids and they were excited to Praise Jesus with us for His healing power! What a way to build the faith of young people - real examples in the lives of their friends teaches better than any program we can put together.

For our party, the Orange team chose to have games for the activities, so we chose 4 different games and had a snack station - enabling us to divide the kids into 5 groups.

For the first group, we had a snack station. The orange team had a tie between cupcakes and ice cream, so we compromised - we gave them both!!

Donald, a visitor, Dylan, Corbin, Caitlyn, Tony:

Gavin, Jayce, Ben, a visitor and Colin:

Aman, Alyssa, Christina, Charissa and a visitor:

They didn't seem to mind!

Our 1st game was a Bible BINGO game, led by Sister Dawn:

Amber and Devin:

Faith and Kennedy:

The 2nd game was Pass the Present, led by Sister Tammy. The children sat in a circle and were given a present wrapped up in 7 layers. When the music played they were to pass the present around the circle. When the music stopped, whoever was holding the present got to take off one layer of the paper. There was a slip of paper on top of the next layer giving them an instruction. If they followed what it said, they would receive a piece of candy. If not, that was OK, but no candy! Play continued until each layer was unwrapped. Whoever unwrapped the last layer received a prize.

Amber, Jaylah and Kennedy:

Faith, Devin, Elijah and Presley:

Tess and Erica:

Corbin:

Megan:

The third game was Scoop the Cotton, led by Sister Shanna. In this game, the children were separated into pairs. One child sat on the chair with a bowl on their lap while the other stood behind them holding a bowl full of cotton on their head. On "GO!" the child sitting had to use a spoon to try to scoop cotton out of the bowl on their head into the bowl on their lap. When time was up, they counted the balls and then switched roles and started again. At the end of the time, those with the most cotton won a prize.

Jackinson and Colin:

Donald and Devon hold bowls for Chris and Corbin:

Peyton and Cheyenne hold bowls for Zach and Tess:

Faith, Alex, Jaylah and Elijah hold bowls for Kennedy, Presley, Amber and Devin:

Kirsten and Caleb hold bowls for Angelica and Andrew:

The final game was "Fruit Basket Turnover", led by Brother Mark. This is a fun and energetic game! The children start out on a chair, in a circle, with one less chair than there are children The child without a chair is in the center of the circle. The leader then goes around the circle telling each child a type of fruit that they are for the game - apples, bananas or grapes - until all of the children have one. Then, the child in the middle has a choice - they can call out one or two of the types of fruit OR, they can call out FRUIT BASKET TURNOVER! When they call something out, the children who fit the category must then find a new chair on the other side of the room before all the chairs are gone. Whoever is left without one is the new person in the center. Such a fun game that the kids always love and uses up a lot of that stored sugar energy!

Ben and Colin race for a new seat:

RUN!!!

From here on are some random shots of your children. Here is Kirsten smiling big for the camera:

Angelica:

Donald caught by surprise playing BINGO:

Christina (with Colin in the background!):

Aman (with Alyssa in the background!):

Dylan (with Megan in the background):

Angelina:

Charissa:

Mariah:

Delaney and Andrew:

Jayce with his prize:

Alex:

Lydia:

Zach:

Chris:

We had a great party and a lot of fun with your children. They all worked so hard to earn this and it was well deserved!

Building our Life on God's Word

Delaney and Amber help lead the kids in energetic worship:

POA kids engaged in worship:

We had 4 visitors in KC this week!

Our lesson this week dealt with making good choices and the importance of building our lives on the foundational truths in God's Word. Sister Dawn's object lesson helped get things started.

Chris volunteered to help out. He was given a choice - he could have either a Reese's Peanut Butter cup or a jar of baby food prunes to try out. Well, he chose the prunes (yes, we put him up to it!), took a bite and immediately regretted his decision!

I guess they didn't taste that great!

From this lesson, she reminded the kids that we all have choices like this every day. And to some of us, it seems like such an easy choice to follow Jesus - like picking the Reese's. But, many people choose the hard way and then have to live with the consequences from those decisions.

For our next object lesson, Brother Mark and Sister T showed us an example of the 2 men from the Bible - one built his house on sand and the other on a rock. He took some army guys and glued them to a concrete block and then put some in a container full of sand. The interesting thing is that most of the kids truly thought that it would be silly to build a house on sand. At first, they just didn't understand. But, when we discussed the storms of life that come and then demonstrated by pouring water on our 2 examples, they quickly understood. The men on the block did not fall...

but those on the sand drowned!

We then discussed how our lives are the same way. We can choose to build our lives on the solid rock of God's Word or on the sinking sands of this world, but only one is going to stand when the storms come.

Further examples! Caleb and Brother Mark were each given 15 cups. Sister Tammy gave them instructions to follow using the cups. If they followed the directions, they would make something in the end. Well, Caleb did exactly what he was told to do while Brother Mark ignored the directions:

In the end, Caleb made a pyramid out of his cups, but Brother Mark had nothing to show for his time.

We each have the opportunity to hear God's Word to us, but we each have to decide for ourselves whether or not we will follow the instructions that He has given us. He wrote His Word as a life manual for us to guide through every path our life takes us down - it is up to us to chose to obey!

We pray that each child who comes each week has a desire to follow Jesus no matter what direction their life takes them down.

God's House

This week in kC, we took some time to review some important things with your children. After worship, offering and prayer, we reminded them about our prayer cloths. Each week, we have a prayer request box with forms for prayer requests and praise reports for the children to fill out. Beside these things, there is a small box of prayer cloths. They are available every week for the children to take as needed. They are in the same fun material that our banners are in - bright, colorful and kid friendly. We took the time to remind them that they are there and what they are for. We also assured them that it is Jesus who does the healing, not the cloth! There is no power in the cloth. But, we explained that since we can not see the prayers that are prayed for us and others can't see the prayers that we pray for them, we can give these to friends and family as a symbolic reminder that they are being prayed for. Many children have given wonderful testimonies of people that they have asked us to pray for who have been healed or recovered miraculously. God works through the prayers of children, just like He does for adults!

Sister Dawn and Sister Tammy prepared and performed a short skit for the kids called "What NOT to do in church" - as a review and reminder of the things that Pastor reminded us a few weeks ago about taking care of God's House and keeping it a holy place. The skit showed 2 girls as church is about to start. They showed everything they could think of that we should NOT do in church. Before the "service" they were gossiping (about their real selves!), talking on the phone in the sanctuary, chewing gum, then, when the music began, they RAN to get a seat. Dawn sat during worship and played on an electronic game. Tammy stood for worship, but with her arms crossed and not participating in the worship. Evyn filled in as a "preacher" for us and while he did, the girls were passing notes, eating lollipops, drinking soda, throwing paper airplanes, whispering, etc. Finally, as soon as "altar call" was made, instead of praying or being quiet, they threw their trash down and ran to the back to chat and play with their friends.

To pull it together, we asked the kids if they noticed anything we did wrong. They were able to tell us EVERYTHING! We had some great discussion with them about those things and why they are not good in God's house. Then we reminded them that it is not enough to know that these things are wrong, but that we have to remember to do or not do them, as appropriate.

Tying this to our lesson this week, we introduced John Mark and told how he didn't do what he said he would do, causing others to not trust him anymore. He learned quickly that he must do the right thing, not just say he would do it, and had to work hard to earn the trust back. To demonstrate these truths further, we split into 3 groups for small group lessons.

Sister Dawn had an activity in her session to demonstrate what happened if she had a game for them and didn't supply all the necessary materials, but didn't tell them until it was too late. How disappointing to not be able to trust someone to do what they are supposed to do.

Brother Mark asked the kids various questions and gave them each a paper with Yes on one side and No on the other. They then held up the side that answered as they wished for each question. He reminded them that is important to let our yes be yes and our no be no and to be true to our word.

Sister Tammy had a demonstration where she was going to play catch with someone, but kept tricking them and not throwing the ball, until finally, they stopped trusting her to do what she said. We then talked about things we do or don't do when we say that we will or won't - they offered some great discussion.

Through these small group lessons and our skit, we pray that the children left with a valuable truth to treat God's house with respect and also, to do what we say we will do and be trustworthy. How important of a lesson that is and the earlier they can learn it, the better off they will be!

Alexandria and Erica before service:

Filling out the review sheets to earn points for their teams:

Pre-service activities: