Long gone are the days of cookie-cutter children’s ministry! We need to adapt, to change, to grow up... Come and be a part of the conversation. As we grate against each others’ thoughts and convictions, maybe we can figure out what this children’s ministry thing is all about.
A few days ago, I wrote a review of Formational Children’s Ministry as part of the book blog tour for it. I already had obtained a copy of the book for myself before being asked to be a part of the blog tour. Today, I received the complimentary copy from Baker Books. I don’t need it since I have a marked up copy already. If you would like a chance to win this copy, you need to do one of two things: Follow me (twitter.com/henryjz) on Twitter and tweet “@henryjz is giving away a... (more...)
If you are a part of a church, you need to get this book! Collaborate is a unique collection of 35 leaders sharing their wisdom on how churches can more effectively work with parents to pass on faith to children and students. I’ve been privileged to be able to work with the Minister’s Labelto get the word out about the book. I even got to write one of the reviews for the book’s page on Amazon! Here’s what I wrote: From the wisdom of Michael Chanley and the Group of 34, you... (more...)
(Image taken fromXKCD.com) How many times have we heard this version? :) AKPC_IDS += "4000,";Popularity: 6% [?]SHARETHIS.addEntry({ title: "What Luke Skywalker Learned in Sunday School", url: "http://www.elementalcm.com/2010/03/08/what-luke-skywalker-learned-in-sunday-school/" }); Read More →
(photo originally uploaded to Flickr by sean drellinger) As I mentioned in my previous post, my senior pastor sent me a couple of articles that sparked the series on Passing on Faith. The first article is from The National Post, written by Brendan T.N. Caldwell who is a CEO of an investment management company. Click here to read the article. I thought the parallel of passing on a financial inheritance with the passing on of faith to be a really good picture. Caldwell talks about going from “shirtsleeves... (more...)
Today, my senior pastor passed on a couple of articles he came across about passing on faith. In light of reviewing Ivy Beckwith’s book, Formational Children’s Ministry, and the dramatic increase in family ministry discussions (e.g. Orange, D6, Collaborate, etc.), I thought it might be cool to explore a few approaches and views to passing on faith to children. If you are interested in contributing to this series, I’d love for you to. Simply email me your submission to (henryjz at... (more...)
I am so excited for this movie! If you haven’t read the books, you are missing out on a pretty accurate portrait of the mind of your “normal” junior high boy. Check out the books! And check out the movie trailer below: AKPC_IDS += "3994,";Popularity: 5% [?]SHARETHIS.addEntry({ title: "Diary of a Wimpy Kid Movie!!!", url: "http://www.elementalcm.com/2010/03/05/diary-of-a-wimpy-kid-movie/" }); Read More →
A few years ago, I was at a national gathering of children’s ministry leaders within the denomination I was serving at the time. While I was perusing the resources table I ran across this book called Postmodern Children’s Ministry. The term “postmodern” was just starting to gain momentum in church-world, and I was very interested to see what the author had to say. I read the back of the book and was hooked! I devoured the book and found resonance in what the author said about... (more...)
(picture originally uploaded to Flickr by Kenny Møller) A while back, I hear Erwin McManus talk about a time he was speaking at a leadership conference. The speaker before him mentioned that a good leadership strategy was to be one step behind early adopters. The speaker compared it to discovering edible mushrooms. The mushroom tester dies when eating a poisonous mushroom, while the person who comes behind learns from the mushroom tester’s mistakes and improves on them. McManus tells the... (more...)
