new prayer request

A co-worker of mines friend was in a very serious car accident, she was t-boned while making a left turn. she is in very critical condition. she is in a drug induced coma so that she can't move and cause further injury. she has survived surgery so far but only yime will tell. her husband is currently with her at the hospital.

Prayer Request

I have a prayer request that isn't bus or church children's ministry related but it is a very serious situation. there is a little boy in my day (he is 2 years old) he is currently in KGH in isolation with his mom and the only others allowed to enter are the doctors, he is not allowed to come in contact with germs at all. his dad has said that he may need to be there for up to 6 monthes. the only details that i know are that he has kidney problems which means he needs to be on a low sodium diet and his kidneys are not doing very well right now but on top of that his other organs are producing liquid that is leeching into his body causing him to be extremly sick. currently his eyes are so swollen that he cannot see out the right eye and the left eye is almost swollen closed. he started to get sick again last week. as a result of the current medical problems they are facing they are having to pull him out of daycare.


sorry for going on for so long about this but i thought that i should try to give whatever details i knew and i really would appreciate the prayers and thank you all.

I've had the chance to network and chat with other people from churches across Canada and the United States and discuss thier church's outreach, and our program is very unique. Not alot of churches have this privilage to bus kids (or youth) in to sunday school and spend a few minutes directly with kids. My stories have been met with looks and words of almost envy from other workers. Many churches are just beginning to realize that outreach doesnt mean a couple arms from the church pulling people in, it means reaching out from the inside. One church changed thier vision to include the phrase "to work from the inside out".
I'm so excited to have been able to work with you guys in the bus ministry! Its given me the chance to plant the ideas in other youth and children's workers' minds.
I'm sure that Marvin's said this multiple times, but, its important to look at the children, NOT the numbers. You could have 1 kid on your bus, but even the fact that she will get to hear about Jesus, even for one day, could mean a huge difference later in their life.
A speaker told of a story of a muslim man. He was the poster boy for muslims, did everything according to the book. But earlier in his life, he was befriended by a christian woman, who never pushed christianity on him, but told him about it. Being brought up muslim, he never converted, and never really believed what she said. Later on in his life, as he was making his pilgrimage to the "Holy City," these thoughts came back. It was not untill he reached the peak of the pilgrimage when he performed in a ritual which involved a live sacrifice and catching its blood in a ceremonial bowl, did he realise the truth. Literally, at the peak of his muslim religion, the teachings by a woman in his childhood came back and he realised who his saviour really was. He's now a christian who is carrying on this woman's ministry.
This is just a small reason why you guys are here for the "one" not the many.

Bless you all.

New Member to the Bus Ministry Family!

A big welcome to the newest member of the bus ministry team: Elysia Bewernick! Elysia has joined the Downtown/Capri route as one of the leaders under Heather. She'll be riding the bus on Sundays as much as she can, and will be joining Heather's other leaders on a rotational schedule for visitions as well. Make sure to go out of your way to make Elysia feel welcome...

Omega MetroKids

Summit Pacific College is starting a new Omega program next fall: Omega MetroKids. It's something like the internship at Metro Ministries in NYC, but it goes for 8 months rather than 4, and the courses are actually transferrable if the student pursues further studies at Summit. Omega MetroKids is located at Surrey CLA church and uses their well-established bus ministry for the practical application side of the program.

If you are interested in learning more about this program, I do have some handouts and a CD-ROM that the director gave me. Also the website is posted in the links section of this blog.

Let's Not Forget This Little Answer to Prayer

Sometimes we can pray so many prayers and wonder if God ever answers or even hears any of them. I have a story that proves that he does both. I've been wanting to record this little story ever since it happened but busyness kept getting in the way. Most of you know the story because you're in it, but it's worth being reminded of it.

Way back when, in the afternoon after our last potluck, we had a planning meeting. We didn't get it started off right; there was no prayer before the planning got going. The agenda eventually took us to the complicated issue of how to handle gifts for youth, and that's what it stayed: complicated. We (at least I) couldn't get my head around all the options: siblings that came to church, siblings that didn't come to church, youth that only came on Wednesdays, youth that came on Sundays, etc. The discussion was going around in circles and the whole thing was getting frustrating.

Somewhere in the midst of that, Chalyse said we could pray about it. Then some time after that I made the executive decision to move on in the agenda and leave the problem unresolved. When we got through the rest of the stuff, we finally did pray, including a prayer against the cloud of confusion surrounding the youth gift issue.

At that point I thought it was worth a shot to broach the topic one more time. And all of a sudden, it wasn't confusing anymore. We quickly narrowed everything down to two similar options and left it at that.

This sudden clarity was no coincidence, so don't let yourself think that it was. God answered our prayers!

(By the way, in case you were wondering, every youth that comes to church, whether on Sunday or Wednesday, will get a gift this year. Youth that don't, won't.)

Prayer

There a girl in the grade 2/ 3 room who needs prayer for her mom as she is pregnant and she smokes. She comes on the buses and is worried for her mom. Thanks.

...and after you have done everything, to stand.

"Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. Stand firm then..." (Ephesians 6:10-14a)

It's time for us to stand our ground and stop giving way in our personal lives.

Like it's been said before, whether we like it or not, as children's outreach workers we are caught up in a cosmic war, and the territory being fought over is the hearts of kids in the community. When we pray, go to the kids, bring them to church, speak words of life to them, etc, we are on the offensive.

When an army goes on the offensive, they have to expect a counterattack. The devil's counterattack against us is almost always covert. If we're not watching for it, we don't even know what hit us. We might not even realize that we've been attacked at all. But he doesn't care about that. What he cares about is making us harmless to him. So he comes at us with all kinds of personal temptations designed to take us out of commission--or at least to make us ineffective.

Taking a stand is everything. It's true that we need to use the armour of God and the sword of his Spirit in order to stand, but unless we actually decide that we are going to stand our ground, all that great armour and the mighty sword will just be laying off to the side as we get pummelled to the ground. I don't know about you, but I'm tired of that happening to me.

Will you choose to stand your ground and determine not to give way anymore?

Fall 2006 Potluck Pics

Thanks to all who brought yummy food for our first potluck of this ministry year. We couldn't have done it without you. Well, I suppose we could have, but then it wouldn't have been a potluck...