If you haven’t already discovered TED talks, you need to check them out.  I try to watch one or two of them a week, and have been particularly intrigued by the way they often correlate to the world of Children’s and Family ministry.

This past week I watched Brene Brown’s talk on ‘The Power of Vulnerability’.  And it challenged me to think about the type of environments we strive to create for kids.  I encourage you to watch Brown’s talk and let me know your thoughts.  (just a warning she does use some ‘adult’ language)

It has challenged me to dream of creating an environment of mystery, awe, wonder, conversation, discourse, joy, acceptance, and love.  Providing our children a space where they can wrestle with hard issues of life, in the safety of unconditional acceptance and love.  Environments where the truth is not just taught…but lived.  A greenhouse for spiritual growth.

I pray that we can create environments where kids feel safe enough to share their struggles, are shown and allowed to practice love, gratitude and joy, all while resting in the reality that God loves them for who they are not what the do.

What’s your story?

KB

Over the summer Matt Guevara, who has been handling the webmaster duties of the Cory Center, stepped into a new and unexpected role when his church leadership asked him to become the campus pastor of a future campus. Within weeks, the potential of a campus became reality and planning, hiring, and numerous other jobs were in full swing culminating in the launch of the new campus at the beginning of October.

Bethel Graduation

As Matt’s role changed in his ministry, he realized that his role at Cory Center would need to change as well. That’s how my journey with Cory Center begins…

I graduated from Bethel Seminary’s Children and Family Ministry program along with my good friend and Cory Center podcaster, Kyle. I’ve been in ministry for just over 10 years and have a passion to see fathers encouraging one another and engaging in the life of their children – you can see my thoughts on this at Orange Dads and likely will see that bleed through to my work here as well.

In 2008, with a desire to see the Church partner with parents to raise a generation that is excited about their father and their Creator, our family moved to the suburbs of Chicago from the Maryland/DC area. I accepted the call as Children and Family Pastor at the Evangelical Free Church of Wauconda, in (where else?) Wauconda, Il.

As part of the Cory Center, I’ll be taking on the role of Webmaster while Matt moves into a different role on the team. I’ll also author posts, lending my thoughts in the area of parenting helps, strengthening marriages, and leadership.

If you’ve been around the KidMin or StuMin worlds for very long, you know there are thousands of resources out there to help us improve ministry to kids, youth, families and so on. In fact, at any given moment, there are likely discussions happening on the numerous online ministry communities asking about which resources you like the best.

How do you make your ministry decisions?

So, my question for you to consider is this: when was the last time you thought about, talked about,heard about, or read about those great resources – and someone responded with “The Bible”?  I am as much into reviewing the great resources out there as the next guy – and I’m all for a great education (especially from Bethel Seminary) – but shouldn’t the God’s Word be the FIRST place we head when planning, strategizing and setting goals?  Does the Bible even have anything to say on the issue of methodology of children’s or student ministry?

The Bible wasn’t just given to us so we can read it, apply it to our individual lives, maybe tell 1 or 2 persons a year about Jesus, and then live our life!  It is meant to get us to radically reorient our lives around the gospel. It calls us to give everything and – not just to DO ministry – but to BE the gospel in our families and communities.

The Bible does speak to methodology of the church and its various ministries, but are we even reading, listening and applying it? On that, I think we have fallen short…

Every Monday morning, as I sit down at my desk with a hot cup of coffee and open up my laptop to begin another week of ministry, I am greeted by a reminder which reads, ‘Two Notes of Encouragement”

A wise man once told me that church culture is like a rudder of a huge ship.  Culture determines your direction.  If you turn it to quickly everyone falls off the ship.  But if you make small, incremental, intentional changes in the same direction over an extended period of time eventually the ship will be headed in the right direction.

As leaders it is our responsibility to manage the cultural rudder in a way that keeps people from falling off the boat, but also produces a culture where volunteers thrive and children and their families grow spiritually.

Several months ago, through God’s prompting, it became clear to me that the culture of our ministry was missing a spirit of encouragement.  This was not a shock to me.  Encouragement isn’t one of my gifts.  I’m a doer, so it is hard for me to pick my head up long enough to actually notice the amazing volunteers and ministry that goes on around me every Sunday.

So every week I force myself to slow down, look around, and notice.  All morning, in the back of my mind, I am thinking about those ‘two notes of encouragement’ that will face me Monday morning.  They force me to notice.  They force me to pay attention. They force me to live out a different type of culture.  And every week the rudder turns another two degrees.

Whatever the issue may be, as leaders, it is our responsibility to live the culture we want to create.  It is through this ‘living out’ week after week that we begin to change the culture around us ‘two notes of encouragement’ at a time.

What’s your story?

KB

I personally was unable to be at last week’s D6 Conference, but heard it was fantastic. The line up of speakers was incredible with the likes of Voddie Baucham, Rob Rienow, Mark Holmen and many more…

I saw this video last night posted about a stark difference between a couple of the speakers and wanted to get your thoughts.

In essence, if we say we want to inspire parents to disciple their children, yet continue to create programs to separate them; how is anything changing? What are your thoughts?

Pew Internet released an exhaustive study profiling the presence of social media in everyday life.  The report is part of a comprehensive series called the Social Impact of Technology.  Download the entire report here.

Overview:

Questions have been raised about the social impact of widespread use of social networking sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace, and Twitter. Do these technologies isolate people and truncate their relationships? Or are there benefits associated with being connected to others in this way? The Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project decided to examine social networking sites in a survey that explored people’s overall social networks and how use of these technologies is related to trust, tolerance, social support, and community and political engagement.

The findings presented here paint a rich and complex picture of the role that digital technology plays in people’s social worlds. Wherever possible, we seek to disentangle whether people’s varying social behaviors and attitudes are related to the different ways they use social networking sites, or to other relevant demographic characteristics, such as age, gender and social class.

Highlights:

• Americans spend more time on social networking sites that any other single online activity.
• 79% of American adults said they use the Internet and 59% of Internet users use at least one social networking site.
• Facebook users are more likely to comment on another user’s status than update their own status.
• Half of Facebook users comment on photos at least 1-2 times each week.
• Private Facebook messages are infrequently used.
• Only a fraction of users’ Facebook friends are people users have never met in person or met only once.

I think the cultural impact of these findings and this type of research is astounding.  Think about it – children in our churches and programs are being raised in an environment where friendship means commentary, where close social ties equals taking and rating pictures of your close friends, where conversations are rarely private – in fact, conversations are taggable, searchable, and archived for all to see.  Social media is the greatest single influence on relationships today and leaders in children’s and family ministry need to take note and provide leadership for families and kids to navigate these waters wisely.  How do you see social media influencing relationships within your ministry context?

Recently the New York Times spoke with education experts about what the classroom will look like 10 years from now.  The written excerpts from the predictions are fascinating, but even more compelling are the audio interviews.Check them out here.

This brings up a great project put together by Greg Baird from Kidmin360 and Kidmin Jobs, The Future of Children’s Ministry.  Twenty different leaders in children’s ministry contributed to this resource which focused on predictions for the future of our field.  The resource is available for free download here.

What do you think kidmin will look in 10 years?

Several months ago there was an incident in our home that has caused me to ponder my over-connectedness.  It was a cool spring evening.  My wife and I were settling in for the night and I began, what was then, my nightly routine.  Checking last minute e-mails on the laptop, checking Facebook on the iPad, sending a Twitter update on my iPhone, and pulling up the newest book on my Kindle.  It was this sight that prompted a slightly sarcastic remark from my wife, “are you serious…I think screens are little to important to you these days.”

At the time I didn’t want to admit it…but my wife was right…I was in love with my screens.  But it was more than just my screens, it was the connection that they represent.

When Katie and I got married 10 years ago I didn’t have a cell phone.  I didn’t have a laptop.  Smart phones and tablets were just a twinkle in Steve Jobs eye.  And I didn’t even have a Myspace account, let alone Facebook and Twitter.  It was a different world.  A world where the only screens I owned were far from mobile.

This has all changed.  And for the most part I am thankful. The connections and networking that is possible because of technology and social media is incredible.

As ministry leaders, connection is at the center of our ministry.  Relationships are everything.  They are the foundation for growth.  But if we are not careful, our connectedness can actually lead to neglecting the relationships that are the foundation of our world.  We are so connected everywhere else that we forget to be present…here.  at home.  at work.  at play.  with Jesus.  And when it comes to building healthy relationships, presence is key.

We have amazing technology that holds incredible potential for the movement of the gospel.  We just have to use it wisely.

Is your connectedness keeping you from being present?

What’s your story?  How do you fight against the ever-increasing difficulty of presence?

KB

We’ve been taking on a discussion risen from the recent release of the movie Divided and the issues of youth & children’s ministry it calls into question.  In short, the movie basically calls the church’s use of modern, systematic, age-segregated discipleship of children & youth both ineffective and unBiblical.  (How’s that for a mouthful???)

We’ve talked about if the approach presented within the documentary is right or wrong, as well as what exactly is the Biblical model.  Setting those issues aside, I think it’s crucial to consider the question of effectiveness in making disciples of children & youth in today’s church.  Here’s what we know:

• Young people are leaving the church in droves from 16-23 years of age.  Some return, most do not.
• The church adopted the systematic, age-separated paradigm of education from non-Biblical theories (i.e., Recapitulation Theory).
• The Theorists who created those ideas where often atheists or at least non-believing humanists.
• The Bible seems to institute the family for the discipleship of children – regardless of age.  It never calls the pastor/elder or deacons to be the ones who disciple children, but does call parents (especially fathers) to instruct them.
• The church is designed to live in unity with one another; does this include an “allowable” option of having others disciple our children?

I gotta admit, I’m not coming up with a whole lot of answers for ya; but simply more questions for us to consider together.  I am hoping to have a guest article on this movie in the next week or so; but we want to hear from you.  Are the folks of Divided and NCFIC just way off base, or do they have a point worth considering?  Tell us what you think.

Play really does help you have the right to pray with and disciple kids.  There are age, gender and social barriers to name a few that are leveled through play.  During play kids see what you have in common with them.  Barriers come down when the kids see you care enough about them to take the time to play.

While playing and talking with kids they can see you as a real person.  These conversations can be intentional so as to provide bridled disclosure of leader’s hard times.  When that child has a tough time, they will come to you.

Keep in mind that play looks different for girls and boys.  Boys want to be rough and active for the most part while girls like to talk and complete small tasks (like painting nails or crafts) while talking.

When was the last time you played games or went to a kids neighborhood to build a relationship with a student?   How can you introduce playing in your ministry setting (either before, during or after class)?