Tag: Bible
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Fidget Spinner Bible Lesson
Read More: Fidget Spinner Bible LessonSo here’s a way to teach a Bible lesson using a fidget spinner…. What Really Lasts? Bring and show off as many of these fad toys as you can find (show pictures if you don’t have the actual toy): the hula hoop Lincoln Logs the pet rock the Rubix Cube Slinky the slap bracelet Beanie…
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The Idea of Invitation in Worship
Read More: The Idea of Invitation in Worship“Let the little children come to me.” – Jesus of Nazareth This past Sunday was a snow day in our part of the country. Most churches closed due to weather. When my wife, daughter, and I made our way downstairs to make some breakfast together, my wife suggested that we have a family devotional time.…
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Big God, Little Kids – free Bible lessons for children’s ministry
Read More: Big God, Little Kids – free Bible lessons for children’s ministryI have written a 13-lesson curriculum called “Big God, Little Kids.” It is a series of lessons built around stories of God doing big things through ordinary kids in the Bible. You are free to use it for any non-profit ministry setting such as Sunday School, Children’s Church, Vacation Bible School, or the like. I…
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Scripture Memory for Kids
Read More: Scripture Memory for KidsI have an acronym for scripture memory that I use at camps: MVOTW. It stands for “Memory Verse of the Week.” You pronounce it, “muh-vah-twuh.” Kids love saying it and we put motions to the words to help us remember whatever verse we are working on. Most camps and vacation Bible schools have a theme…
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Faith Development Resources: Pre-Teen
Read More: Faith Development Resources: Pre-TeenELEVEN TO TWELVE YEARS Biblezines series. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, various dates. Thomas Nelson publishers has created a series of whole-text Old and New Testaments printed in the style of a modern magazine. They call them “Biblezines.” There are different versions for different genders and age groups. There is Revolve for girls and Refuel for…
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Faith Development Resources: Late Elementary
Read More: Faith Development Resources: Late ElementaryEIGHT TO TEN YEARS Adventures in Odyssey. Produced by Focus on the Family, Adventures in Odyssey is a long-running radio program that is set in the fictional mid-American town of Odyssey. Whit is the wise elder statesman of the community who helps kids figure out solutions to life’s problems through a Christian and Biblical perspective.…
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Faith Development Resources: Early Elementary
Read More: Faith Development Resources: Early ElementaryFIVE TO SEVEN YEARS Lucado, Max, Randy Frazee, and Karen Davis Hill. Illustrated by Josee Masse. God’s messages for little ones: the story of God’s enormous love. Grand Rapids, MI: Zonderkidz, 2012. Well-known pastor and author Max Lucado leads a qualified team to present this devotional for children. With 31 devotions, the book can be…
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Faith Development Resources: Preschool
Read More: Faith Development Resources: PreschoolThis is the second list in a series of posts I am doing that list resources for ministry in both the church and home in regards to nurturing faith in children. Here we turn to the preschool age group. TWO TO FOUR YEARS Arch Books. Various authors. St. Louis, MO: Concordia Publishing House. There are…
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Faith Development Resources: Early Childhood
Read More: Faith Development Resources: Early ChildhoodINTRODUCTION Finding quality resources that help nurture the faith development of children and families can sometimes be difficult. This is the first post in a series, broken up by age-level focus, that can be of help to children, family members, and ministry leaders as they navigate the pilgrimage of the Christian faith. I will start…
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What Cain and Jesus Share
Read More: What Cain and Jesus ShareWhat?! You’re comparing Cain, the first murderer, to Jesus? How dare you! Follow me here. I was writing a paper about ministry with children and I suddenly discovered in the Cain and Abel story something I had never seen before… You probably already knew that Cain was the first child to be born (remember, Adam and Eve…
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The Family Prayer Corner
Read More: The Family Prayer CornerYesterday, I worked together with my five-year old daughter to set up a little prayer station in our house. My wife and I got the idea from her school, which uses a lot of hands-on activities that teach kids about spirituality. I’ve always been a little skeptical of creating ritualistic prayer spaces because I want…
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Four Ways to Help Kids Get Excited About the Bible
Read More: Four Ways to Help Kids Get Excited About the Bible(Picture above thanks to JaredFanning.com). Also found at http://visual.ly/top-10-most-read-books-world Here’s the file of the image: In my previous post, I shared about a large group game idea called “Super Bible Trivia.” I wanted to follow that up with a few practical tips that help us share the wonder of God’s Word with children. Here are a…
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Large Group Game: Super Bible Trivia
Read More: Large Group Game: Super Bible TriviaI’ve played a fun game with large groups of kids over the years that I call “Super Bible Trivia!” This contestant-driven stage quiz game is more of a staged drama than an actual serious quiz game. But it is set up so that the kids think it is a normal quiz game at first. Don’t worry, they’ll…
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Cardboard Craft: Noah’s Ark
Read More: Cardboard Craft: Noah’s ArkMy daughter was making a zoo with blocks and her little plastic animals. I figured, “Why don’t we just make a Noah’s Ark since we have all these animals?” I’m not the most crafty person in the world, but I know how to cut cardboard boxes. So I started cutting up an Amazon shipping box.…
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Super Easy Scripture Slides and Images
Read More: Super Easy Scripture Slides and ImagesI recently stumbled upon a fast and free way to make Scripture slides for Children’s Ministry (or any other ministry, for that matter) with an array of free and attractive backgrounds. And it may already be in your phone/device. It’s built into one of the popular apps out there – the free YouVersion app of the…
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Children’s Ministry Lesson: The Ten Plagues
Read More: Children’s Ministry Lesson: The Ten PlaguesI have taught Children’s Church lessons for over a decade and I think yesterday’s lesson on the ten plagues was one of my favorite lessons to ever teach. Please don’t think that I love dark and dismal things like plagues. They really are pretty negative. Biblically speaking, they were real judgements carried out on lots…
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Is the Holy Land Really Holy?
Read More: Is the Holy Land Really Holy?This is a question I have pondered for some time now, especially since recently visiting Israel. You would think that all the fighting over the Levant throughout history would make this land pretty unholy. Another way of looking at it is to say the land is fought over so often because too many mutually exclusive…
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Israel: The Land of the Bible
Read More: Israel: The Land of the BibleJust last week, we returned from our 10-year wedding anniversary trip to Israel and the West Bank. Most of our time was spent in Israel proper, but we did get a chance to see Bethlehem and Herodian, which are in the Palestinian Territory of the West Bank. I was here 13 years ago for school…
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Could You Turn Down 15 Million Bucks?
Read More: Could You Turn Down 15 Million Bucks?Delilah was a sell-out to the Philistines. Like Judas, she accepted money in exchange for betraying someone very close to her. But I recently discovered a detail that blows my mind about the story of Samson. The Philistines offered Delilah the equivalent of 15 MILLION dollars in today’s money (see the IVP OT Bible Background…
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“Holy Fools”: Exploring the Journey of Calling for Christian Variety Performers
I am happy to announce that my PhD dissertation has been published to ProQuest, an academic database for published research. I have made the dissertation open source, which means anyone anywhere can access the full content free of charge. Here is the full dissertation: https://www.proquest.com/dissertations-theses/holy-fools-exploring-journey-calling-christian/docview/2622316783/se-2 Please share far and wide. I am very much excited…
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The Easiest Large Group Game Ever
This is probably the easiest large group game ever invented. If you can think of an easier one, please let me know in the comments. Heads or Tails! This game of heads or tails involves EVERYONE in your large group. It is actually better the larger the group gets. There is an elimination factor to…
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Merry Christmas from the Joyners!
Greetings from our family in Richmond, Virginia! We are thankful for you, our friends and family. We are also thankful to the Lord for His gift of the love to us all this season. This past year has been a roller coaster of experiences and emotions, specifically regarding our spunky little Annie, who is now…
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Book Release! Incredibly Bad Dad Jokes
I have been writing down my original Dad jokes for several years now, but recently they dramatically increased. While the past five months of my life have been the toughest for me as a Dad (with Annie’s medical crisis), the Dad jokes actually came out in full force during this season. You see, in my…
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A Children’s Ministry Poem
From the mouths of children come questions galore about heaven and angels and Satan and more. They speak what their hearts say without holding back, so the wonder of God is something they never lack. Oh God, who are you? Who inspires the minds of little ones many, so that they may find this Jesus…