The last several weeks we have been playing “Minute to Win It” games at msy YOUTH (middle school youth group @ Hayward Wesleyan), which is where the contestant has to accomplish a task in 60 seconds or less. I happen to be standing in the A/V booth last Wednesday and thought it would be fun to record the action…
Task: stack 28 styrofoam cups in a pyramid and de-stack them in 60 seconds or less.
source YouTube
I’ve been working on uploading some videos of the kids @ Hayward Wesleyan singing the various worship/music videos we use to sing during VBS and Kids Camp this past summer. While you can visit the Vimeo video channel for LIVE Worship Videos for Children anytime now and in the future for more and more updated content, here are a couple I’ve got so far:
source Vimeo (1), Vimeo (2), Vimeo (3), Vimeo (4), Vimeo (5)
Last night, Amanda had a bold plan: she wanted to go through ALL the girls toys. The plan was to organize the ones we wanted to keep and throw out or donate the ones the girls had outgrown or didn’t play with anymore.
3 1/2 hours later… DONE.
The girls had the most fun! They got to play with toys that they hadn’t seen in months! It was like Christmas and birthday presents times 100. They loved it! It was the best of both worlds: the parents got to clean and organize and feel refreshed at excess thrown out, and the girls got to play with an abundance of toys and seen it all strewn about!
![Judge Deborah [y2_w06]](https://i0.wp.com/jeremymavis.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/Judge-Deborah-y2_w06.jpg?resize=696%2C435&ssl=1)
The Israelites now have their own land. It is divided up among the tribes/states. Each tribe is tasked with driving out the remaining inhabitants of the land. But they fail. Over and over again in the last 10 chapters of Joshua, each tribe fails to dislodge the inhabitants of the land of Canaan. We asked the Main Street students what happens when bad people are around good people… and they answered:
“Bad stuff.”
Yep.
The opening 2 chapters of the book of Judges detail each tribes failure to dislodge as well as the “Cycle of Sin” which is where Israel does good for a while, then does bad (they do evil in the LORD’s eyes), God allows a foreign power to conquer/occupy them, the Israelites cry out for help, God raises up a deliverer/rescuer/judge to save them, they are saved, and they enjoy peace and goodness for a while… until they choose to do evil in the LORD’s sight again, and the “Cycle of Sin” starts all over again.
Deborah is the fourth Judge in the book of Judges. She follows Othniel, Ehud and Shamgar.
Deborah is tasked by the LORD to rescue Israel from King Jabin and his commander Sisera. Deborah has her own commander, Barak, who when asked to go into battle and defeat Sisera, pleads with Deborah to accompany him. They rout Sisera’s troops, but Sisera escapes and finds his way to the tent of a woman named Jael. Jael lures Sisera into her tent and he goes to sleep, which is when Jael drives a tent spike through his temple and kills him. Then the land had peace for 40 years… until the Israelites sinned again.
After the messup with Achan, the Israelites learned their lesson, right? Well, almost.
The peoples of the land of Canaan were afraid…and rightfully so. The Israelites were a conquering force with the God of heaven and earth on their side. The people of Gibeon decided to trick the Israelites, and they did because Joshua and the leaders did not consult the LORD. They made a treaty with Gibeon without knowing that they were neighbors. But a promise/treaty is a promise.
Later, the Gibeonites were attacked by the five kings of the Amorites because they had made a treaty with Joshua and the Israelites. And because of the treaty, the Israelites had to come to their rescue. But God was with them and helped them.
source Vimeo
Last Friday evening (10.1.10) we had a Lock-In with our middle school students (grades 6-8) from 9:00p-7:00a.
Doors opened at 8:30p and after we checked everyone in, we went over the rules of the Lock-In. Here is a run-down of what the evening’s activities were:
There ended up being over 100 middle school students at the Lock-In that night! It was awesome! We had the best time just playing and goofing off and eating all the snacks that everyone brought. Below is a video from the evening:
source YouTube
@ msy YOUTH (that’s middle school YOUTH group @ hayward wesleyan) a couple of weeks ago, we talked about Abraham and God starting “to fix this world” back to “his kind of world” – the Garden (before humanity messed it up). God picked a man–Abraham–and promised to make a special people out of him (whose vocation as a people would be to show the world what God is like), give his people a special place to live (land of Canaan, crossroads of the known world at the time), and give his presence to them. I illustrated this story and the Abrahamic Covenant using one of Sari’s beautiful creations.
Sari loves to color. And she’s really good. It’s a beautiful creation. Unique to Sari and perfect. Sari’s picture is like God’s creation–unique to him and perfect. But humanity (Adam and Eve) tore creation apart when they chose to follow themselves rather than God.
Maybe God had some options with this “wrecking” of his creation. He could destroy it, scrap it, and start over with something else. He could erase humanity and rework things. Who knows… but what we do know is that instead of wiping us out, he chose to “fix” us. He chose to “redeem” humanity. And his plan sought to create a special people, put them in a special/intentional place, and bind his presence with them–all through Abraham. This plan had its intent to bring the broken created world (humans included) back into right relationship with its creator–God. Back to God’s kind of world.
The picture doesn’t really look like the original creation does it? It’s got a rip and some band-aids holding it together. The Abrahamic Covenant was just the beginning of God’s redemptive/fixing plan–albeit a very important beginning. God has narrowed his focus from a worldwide engagement with humanity (Genesis 4-11) to one man–Abraham–and is going to begin his work on broken humanity.
Here is msy YOUTH’s working statement about the Bible: “The Bible is about God continually working to fix this world through his kind of special people in order to make his kind of world.”
Whew! Finally, after purchasing this new play structure from Rainbow Play Systems back in the middle of June, and the slow-going construction that followed… I am proud to say that the structure is now complete. I had to fix one of the tarps that decided to almost blow off yesterday, but it is in working/playing condition!
All we have left to do now is lay and spike some landscaping timbers around the play structure and fill with mulch. We’re also looking into a couple of picnic tables for parents to sit on while kids are playing. So stop by and enjoy the new playground!
Your kid’s an All Star? Wow! Someday he’ll be average like the rest of us.
The link above does a fantastic job of talking about apathetic faith and passing that apathy down to our kids by the things we do (and don’t do).