Archive for 'Inspiration'
Leadership Weekend Review
Posted on31. Aug, 2010 by Kenny.
This weekend was Gateway’s annual Leadership Weekend. Every year it’s a Friday night and most of the day Saturday event where the core of the church comes to worship together, pray, be challenged and hear the vision for the upcoming year and engage in how God is leading us. This was my third such event at Gateway, and it was absolutely phenomenal. This year we laid out some pretty major challenges for the leaders of Gateway. The staff has been in an organizational restructuring for the last 6 months and the full plan of why we restructured and what the new structure is setting us up to do was revealed. It was met with excitement and zeal. The energy surrounding this weekend was absolutely contagious.
What’s really exciting is to see all the progress. I remember sitting in an off site meeting with our directional team a little over a year ago as we got stuck while talking through some issues. It was during this frustrating meeting where some ideas were brought up for the first time that led to where we’re headed right now. I also remember sitting in another overnight off site last Fall when early ideas were presented to the group, ideas that might address problems we were facing as an organization. Many people have prayed, fasted, discussed and strategized for thousands of hours to come up with what was presented this weekend. I’m totally excited about where we are heading as a body and it was thrilling to see the buy in.
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Baptism Video
Posted on20. Aug, 2010 by Kenny.
We like to celebrate baptisms big here at Gateway. We usually hold them three times a year (summer months) so that many can participate. We held a baptism a few weeks ago and nearly half of those baptized were kids. Several parents baptized their kids that night. Actually, two sets of parents were baptized and then baptized their kids. It was becasue of their kids that the parents finally decided to take this step. Powerful!
Enjoy the video!
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Summer baptisms
Posted on03. Aug, 2010 by Kenny.
Last week we baptized close to 30 kids after one of our services. It was a beautiful time.
One of my favorite parts about this baptism were the number of parents being baptized because their kids were taking this step. Several parents decided to be baptized as a family because their child had been “bugging” them about it.
I always encourage parents to baptize their children. After saying that at the last baptism class, one of the parents asked if it was okay if they baptized their child even if they haven’t been baptized. I asked them why, they hadn’t been baptized. No good reason. So, on baptism day, I had the honor of baptizing both mom and dad before they turned around and baptized their daughter. Simply beautiful!
Enjoy the video montage of the baptism day.
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VBS/Kids Camp on steroids
Posted on20. Jul, 2010 by Kenny.
A co-worker recently sent me information about a little event that happens at a church in St. Louis every year. When I came across JUMP, I had two simultaneous reactions.
- I was in absolute wonder and awe of the sheer size of this event.
- I threw up in my mouth just a little bit thinking about putting on and event of this size
JUMP is a week-long VBS/Day Camp hybrid held at St. Louis Family Church. Over the years it has grown from a small outreach to an event of epic proportions. This year 3,243 participated. Here’s some of what it took to pull JUMP off:
- 987 volunteers (Thank you all!)
- 158 watermelons
- 485 gallons of Gatorade
- 5,700 bags of cotton candy
- 260 pounds and 8,350 bags of popcorn
- 6,928 pounds of ice
- 167 gallons of syrup
- 18,200 sno-cones
Amazing, huh? What spoke to me the most about this is that at Children’s Pastors, we have to constantly be creative and just because we don’t have a resource or staff or facility doesn’t mean God can’t do something utterly amazing through your ministry and church. JUMP is pretty impressive, but it’s a day camp held in the church parking lot. Chances are you have one of those, so what’s stopping you from thinking outside of the box and doing something amazing?
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Book Review: Lead the Way God Made You
Posted on05. Jul, 2010 by Kenny.
I never had any intention of reading this book. Never is such a strong word. Actually, the cover and title of this book is very intriguing. It draws you in. You want to know more. That was the case when I first saw this book in the bookstore almost five years ago. I opened it up and started skimming the chapters. Drama Coach? Director? Production Assistant? Ummmm, that’s okay, I don’t do productions as a part of my weekend experience. I have a lot of books on my list to read and this one wouldn’t be the best use of my time.
That was my first experience with this book.
One time I even discouraged someone from reading this book. I told him that it wasn’t really a book about leadership, but about leading children’s ministry productions. Sorry Larry.
I’ll say it.
I was wrong.
A few months ago Larry Shallenberger asked for people to review this book for his blog tour. I’m not even sure why I agreed because I had already made up my mind that this book wasn’t for me. I think it was the promise of a free book. 
Well, I’m glad I got to review it because it may end up being one of the most important books I read this year.
This IS a leadership book that happens to tell a story as a narrative that illustrates the lessons being taught. The story happens to be about a Children’s Musical Production. While skimming, I missed the point and made incorrect assumptions.
More importantly, this book spoke to some of they areas where I’ve felt “stuck” as a leader. It spoke to my frustrations as well as some of the frustrations my team has been feeling. There are many different styles to leadership and no one possesses them all. Perhaps part of the reason I feel stuck is becasue I’m not allowing my team to lead the way God made them which in turn isn’t allowing me to lead the way God made me.
I’m not going to get into the details of the book here. All I can say is that as I read this book I often found myself nodding in agreement, “Yes! This makes perfect sense!” I also found myself getting really hopeful about the way things could be if people on a team actually led this way. Plenty of light bulb moments. I’ve already been talking to my staff about the concepts and we’ll be reading the book as a team this month. We’ll experiment with some of these concepts this summer and fall and if we see certain results, me may look into some organizational restructuring. It’s very exciting!
So, order this book right now! You may have a packed out reading list, but do yourself a favor, pop this book at the top of your list.
Oh, I also have an extra copy of this book to give away. I’ll make this really simple. This post went live on Monday morning, July 5th. The last comment on this post today (Monday) gets a copy of the book. So, leave a comment!
Also, spread the word, I’ve got another copy to give away. The last person to tweet a link to this post with the #kidmin tag today (Monday) will get a book. This should be fun, so tweet away.
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What should I read next?
Posted on01. Jul, 2010 by Kenny.
So, back in January I posted my reading list for 2010. I had 18 books on the list. For some of you, that’s a leisurely weekend of reading. For me, that’s an undertaking! So, we’re a little halfway through the year and here is where I stand.
So far I’ve read 5 books total, essentially 1/3 toward my goal of 18. I’m really not sure I’ll hit 18, but I still think I can kick it in high gear and get pretty close. Unfortunately, of the books on my 2010 list, I’ve only read 2, Orange and Mad Church Disease. I’m starting Parenting Beyond Your Capacity this weekend (another book not on my list), but I hope to hit my list again next.
I know a lot of you have read the books on my list. Based on what you’ve read, what book should I read next? Below is a little poll. Whatever book gets the most votes, I’ll read it next. I was going to suggest comments on what book needs to be on my list, but I think I just need to focus on the 16 I haven’t read next. Maybe next year I’ll crowdsource my reading list.
Okay, vote below (you can vote for more than one book… just to make it interesting). I’m anxious to know what I’m going to read next.
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A “not-so-new” (but great) leadership resource
Posted on30. Jun, 2010 by Kenny.
Leadership is an interesting thing, isn’t it. Some of us are born with a natural “know-how.” Others of us have to work really hard at it. All of us get stuck at certain places. As people who oversee ministries, we need it, need to know how to grow it and how to cultivate it. All of us know what our limitations are as a leader. I know mine. At times I’m embarrassed by mine. It’s good to know that this isn’t the end of the story, there’s plenty of time to develop and plenty of time to grow.
So, there’s a book out there that I want to point you towards. It’s called “Lead the Way God Made You.” I’ll be honest, it really spoke to where I am right now as a leader in many different ways. I’m doing an official review for this book on Monday, July 5th which I’m writing right now. It’s a holiday weekend and I’ve got a feeling that a lot of my regular readers will be soaking in some rays as opposed to reading my blog. On Tuesday, be sure to log in and read the review. I’m kinda excited about what this book might mean for me as a leader. Maybe if it helps me, it will help you.
Larry Shallenberger published this book five years ago and to celebrate the anniversary, he’s organized a blog tour. So far you can read Larry’s summaries here as well as the first few stops of the blog tour here, here and here.
If you haven’t read the book yet, go ahead and pick up a copy or two right here, I highly recommend it!
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Summer camp video
Posted on30. Jun, 2010 by Kenny.
After this week I don’t plan to publish any more camp posts. My production director was on a post-camp vacation last week, so I just got the final day of camp video. It’s a great video that shows a snapshot of all the best parts of camp. It’s about 10 minutes long, so feel free to skim.
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Dealing with Crisis
Posted on28. Jun, 2010 by Kenny.
Today was the last day of the series, Never Waste a Good Crisis. It was an incredible service, a great conclusion to a great series. The service led up to a key point… when the video below came on. Powerful! There were very few dry eyes around the auditorium. Nothing like the power of a story to drive a point home.
The link to the service wasn’t online when I wrote this post, so I’ll add the link when it’s up.
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Father’s Day @ Gateway
Posted on22. Jun, 2010 by Kenny.
Sunday was Father’s Day and we were right in the middle of a series called, “Never Waste a Good Crisis.” It’s been a phenomenal series. This week one of the leaders from High School and College shared his story. It’s a powerful story for men to hear and it tied into our series so perfectly. If you want to see more, I attached the video of the entire service below. Enjoy!
Full service:
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