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Category: Ministry Leadership

Covers topics such as leadership skills, sustainable leadership, women in leadership, leading teams, developing leaders, meetings

Our Everest VBS Experience

Kathie Phillips

Everest_Logo_HR

 

It’s hard to believe that our church’s VBS wrapped up a little more than 2 weeks ago.  After months and months of planning and a week of top-notch implementation, it’s a wrap.  After much-need rest and reflection, I am so thankful that we continue to run our VBS each year.  There are a few reasons why I love what we do.

  • Many of our children come to Christ during VBS.  Every year, parents share stories about conversations they’ve had with their child and how THEY led their child to Christ as a result.
  • Children invite their friends, neighbors and family members.  Our children are excited about the week and want everyone they know to be there!
  • It truly is an all-church event.  Our entire church – from staff to the congregation – rally around our VBS efforts.  There are only a handful of events that garner all-church buy-in and participation like our VBS does.

This year, our church chose Group Publishing’s Everest VBS curriculum.  In years past, we have chosen Group’s Holy Land VBS, which we have enjoyed for various reasons.  The format of the Holy Land curriculum became familiar to us, our planning team members found their niche, and not many other local churches offered this style of VBS.  It set us apart, so to speak.

This is the first time we’ve done Group’s ‘easy’ VBS since I’ve been at my church, so leading the charge of change was a challenge I was dreading.  I tried to accentuate the positive (which is my usual tendency) and highlighted elements that were not part of our typical offering.  It worked – we had a great week!

Here’s our VBS by the numbers:

253 children

175 volunteers

18 leadership (planning) teams

26 leadership (planning) team members

1 child led a family member to Christ

7 children received their very first bible

Here are just a few snippets of what I heard during the week:

{From a parent, who served as a crew leader} “…as happens almost every year, listening to the children sing gets to me.  Today I was in tears and had to step out.  The “Faith” song.  The music is always so powerful.  I shared with [name of child] why I stepped out. The next time we sang that song [child] was also touched by the Spirit.  The Spirit was strong today.  One child in our group shared that she had lost her mother to cancer.  Then another child…..shared about a grandmother who had to be in a wheelchair that they had prayed for.  We had lots of prayer requests and loved praying under our blanket.  My [child] enjoyed hearing her friends pray with and for her.  It’s exhausting thinking about trying to top today…..tomorrow.  NOT sure we can.”

{From a parent, who served as a crew leader} “I have a [younger] crew so many of the concepts are hard for them to grasp just starting to sink in. After camp today, the lady who picked up [child in group] came back in on the verge of tears to tell me that she was a friend of [child]’s mom and [child]’s family does not attend church. Today on the way out [child] was explaining to her what the cross was and what it meant. Your hard work and planning is paying off in touching the lives of even the youngest kids.”

{From a station leader} “This year, it seemed like the kids ‘got it’ more.  Awesome!”

As a VBS Director, it’s sometimes hard for me to remember the big picture when I’m in the thick of planning, but I tell ya…these kinds of stories and being part of such an impactful week for campers and volunteers alike makes it all worth it.

To all of our hardworking, creative, innovative, passionate, all-around-awesome leadership team members – THANK YOU!  I couldn’t have done it without you!

To all of our supportive church staff who used your gifts, talents and resources with us – THANK YOU!

To all of our volunteers – crew leaders, crew assistants, station leaders, security team members, prayer warriors, supporters (item donations and/or financial) – THANK YOU!

To all of our Celebration Picnic volunteers – THANK YOU!  Because of you, hundreds of people were served a delicious meal and enjoyed a wonderful evening of fellowship!

To my husband and children who supported me by listening, praying, driving me around, lifting boxes and boxes of stuff, brainstorming, eating take-out, overlooking piles of laundry and unopened mail – THANK YOU!  I love you so much!

To God be the glory!

13 Sanity Savers for VBS Directors

Kathie Phillips

We are busy preparing for our church’s VBS (we call it Summer Bible Camp) next week.  Details – big and small – must be planned out, tweaked, and re-tweaked to welcome a few hundred campers and volunteers to our program each day.  If you are overseeing VBS, you know exactly what I mean!

This summer will mark my third year leading VBS at my church.  Each year has brought different joys, challenges and lessons.  I often give myself pep-talks throughout the weeks and days leading up to kick-off to encourage me when I start feeling overwhelmed.  Can you relate?

When it’s all said and done, I rely on tried and true strategies that keep me sane before, during, and after the madness – I mean planning. 🙂

BEFORE VBS

  • Work ahead.  VBS season falls during my busiest time of year (ministry-wise and personally) so working ahead on projects helps me not to cram at the last-minute.
  • Limit unnecessary meetings and appointments.  Doing this allows me to be available to meet with VBS leaders and help them brainstorm ideas, gather supplies, answer questions, etc.  If I’m diligent about working ahead, I can be available to them and give them my undivided attention.
  • Clearly label borrowed items.  That way, you can return things with ease once camp concludes.

DURING VBS

  • Eat breakfast every day.  Trust me, you’ll need the fuel to start each day off right.
  • Speaking of food, plan simple, easy-to-prepare meals.  I use my slow cooker almost every day during VBS because I’m too exhausted to cook.  I’ve also been known to keep the pizza delivery guy’s number on speed dial during VBS week!
  • Go to bed at a decent hour.  I don’t know about you, but I’m no good if I’m sleep deprived.  Close your computer, put the electronic devices away, turn off the TV and lights, and go to bed!

AFTER VBS

  • Accept offers of help in putting things away.  Many hands make light the load!
  • Take inventory of supplies for future reference.  Not only will this save you time down the road but it can also save you money.
  • Organize as you pack things away.  Clearly label supplies so they can be easily located for future use.
  • Celebrate the wins.  You and your team have worked incredibly hard to plan a wonderful week for the children and volunteers.  Take time to celebrate the stories you hear and the children who received Christ or took next steps in their faith journey.  Celebrate your volunteers, your planning team and all that God did during the week!
  • Debrief and evaluate with your team.  Talk about what worked well and what needs to be changed to make next year’s VBS even better.
  • Rest!  You deserve it for a job well done.

THROUGHOUT VBS

  • Power up with prayer.  As the days become busier and the details are far too many to count, spending time with the Lord in prayer helps you stay focused on what’s most important.  Encourage your team and volunteers to pray throughout also by providing a prayer list for them to pray through together.

Keep the conversation going!  What would you add to this list?  Share your ideas below!

{Throwback Thursday}: Encourage & Equip Families to Worship Together

Kathie Phillips 2 Comments
Photo Credit: Central Presbyterian Church
Photo Credit: Central Presbyterian Church

This month, our church has encouraged families with elementary, middle, and high school students to worship together in lieu of their regular Sunday morning programming.  It was an idea that surfaced at the end of last summer and again this past April at a staff meeting.  It wasn’t really a hard decision for us to make because of two observations: (1) last summer it was almost impossible to recruit volunteers to serve because of August travel schedules and (2) summer is a good time to try something different.  We had also been asked by several families to promote this type of initiative.

After a number of collaborative brainstorming sessions between Children’s Ministry, Student Ministry, Worship Arts, invested parents and Senior Leadership, we decided to go for it.  But we wanted to be strategic about our approach.

We wanted to give advance notice to our congregation, so we began announcing this change a few weeks out.  Our first announcement fell on our VBS Celebration Sunday (when there were many families – regular attenders and visitors – were in attendance.) Our Family Pastor even gave the children a bit of a teaser by announcing that a special ticket book might show up at their house. *See below for more info about this.

In addition, a number of promotional material was prepared.  We contracted a designer to create a Worship Together logo that was used on promotional material through the Sunday bulletin, our weekly e-newsletter, a letter that was mailed home to parents, our website and video.  Our promo videos included a rising 6th grader being ‘interviewed’ by one of our preachers; a skit by members of our Family Ministry team and one by me (gasp)!

We acknowledged that some parents & families might be a little apprehensive about worshiping with their younger elementary-aged children.  We wanted to ease their fears a bit and supplied a “Worship Together Resource” handout for parents to download from our website.  You can take a peek at that here. (I will also place a pdf copy under the “Parent Resources/Downloads” tab on this blog.)

Being very intentional about including children and students in the service is something we also desired.  This included a special blessing that parents could over children and students on Communion Sunday; creatively telling the Bible story through skits (involving children & students); and using examples that kids could relate to.  Our contracted designer also designed a pew card that explained the elements of the service and why we do them.

Supplying children’s worship bags was also a way for us to be intentional about including younger children in the service.  Each bag (a small, bright yellow plastic bag that I had on hand from a previous event) was filled with crayons, a pencil and that week’s specially designed children’s bulletin.  Our children’s bulletin was a one-page bi-fold which included a cover page; a place for older children to take notes (write down the scripture, who was preaching & what they learned); a place for children to circle corresponding pictures every time they sang a song, prayed, gave an offering, took Communion and read their Bible; and 2 activity pages (we varied the activities each week and chose crosswords, coloring pages, decoder puzzles, mazes, etc.)  Remembering that we were catering to children in grades 2-5, we wanted to offer a balance of activities to suit the wide age span.

Earlier I mentioned a special ticket book for families.  We mailed a ticket book to families with elementary-aged children so that the children could redeem tickets each week for a special small treat.  We chose some items that corresponded with the scripture text as well as general items like pencils and bookmarks.

I am hearing pretty good feedback from parents and other adults about how much they’ve enjoyed worshiping together and seeing the children in worship.  Our prayer is that Worship Together would become a regular practice among families at our church.

You may also be interested in reading:

Dear Parents of Young Children in Church by Sharon Harding

What about you?  Does your church encourage families to worship together?

Rest, Growth, Health: Essentials for Ministry Leaders

Kathie Phillips 1 Comment

 

Rest, Growth, Health

I love being by the water.  Being in such a tranquil place restores my soul like nothing else.  A few weeks ago, our entire church staff retreated to Pennsylvania together to worship, eat, play and reflect upon three specific themes: Rest, Growth, and Health.

In November, each staff member was provided a workbook that would help us reflect on these areas in our personal lives as well as our roles here at church.  Because our church leadership believes that a healthy staff is imperative to a healthy church culture and a healthy church is vital to our effectiveness in our Kingdom work, they provided questions for personal reflection in these five areas of health: Spiritual, Physical, Emotional, Financial, Vocational.

The exercises and questions were good for me to think through.  As I did my work, I realized two prevalent themes in three of the five areas of health.  The themes were distractions and excuses.  Although I knew I struggle with these areas, it wasn’t until I saw them written on paper several times that I realized they were a common thread running through many of my shortcomings, both personally and professionally.

Another ‘aha’ moment for me was when I asked the question: When do I feel most alive?  My answers:

  • Getting to dream
  • Working on bigger projects (as part of a team and individually)
  • Working on my own projects where I have creative control
  • Creating things

So, in thinking of terms of Rest, Growth, and Health, what does this look like in my life?

REST

I think I do a pretty good job of resting, especially after a busy season.  Sometimes what I struggle with is just resting…not entertaining myself or letting someone or something entertain me.  Sometimes I struggle with simply resting and resisting the urge to be doing something.

Rest for me looks different at different times.  Sometimes I rest alone, catching up on TV shows, reading a good book or magazine, praying and journaling, enjoying a latte from Starbucks, pinning to Pinterest, listening to music or a podcast.  Sometimes I rest with others, spending time with my family, having coffee or lunch with a friend, or shopping.  Sometimes I simply rest by sleeping.

Here are a few resources that speak to the need for rest:

Hidden in Plain Sight by Steve Adams

The Gift of Sabbath by Danielle Bell

GROWTH

In my opinion, we should never stop wanting to grow and expand our knowledge.  It doesn’t matter how old you are – keep growing and learning!

I consider myself a student of kidmin, leadership, and ministry.  I want to stay up-to-date on what’s happening in my field.  I want to lead well.  How do I do that?

  • I read books, magazines, blogs, articles…anything having to do with kidmin and leadership.
  • I connect with other leaders.  I love spending time with people who do what I do.  We have so much to learn from each other.
  • I attend workshops and conferences.  Again, I love connecting with like-minded people but I also need to learn new skills and techniques.
  • I take risks.  Yes, this is scary, but very necessary for growth.  God wants to enlarge your borders!

Here are a few resources that speak to the need for growth:

Great Leaders Grow by Ken Blanchard and Mark Miller

Evaluating Yourself for Growth as a Leader by Orange Leaders

10 Steps to Becoming a Better Children’s Ministry Leader in 2015 by Dale Hudson

HEALTH

An article in the Jan/Feb 2015 issue of Kidzmatter Magazine says, “‘Busy’ is the new ‘Fine’.”  I’m sure you’ve experience that when you ask someone how they’re doing.  The truth is that many of us are not fine.  Life is hard.  Many of us are depleted spiritually.  Many of us are not taking care of our bodies by getting enough rest, eating healthy, exercising and having regular doctor’s appointments.  Many of us deal with anxiety and depression.  Many of us are desperately trying to make ends meet each month.  Many of us are at the end of our ministry rope and are ready to throw in the towel.

Here are a few resources that speak to the need for health:

How Bill Hybels Stays Replenished by Carolyn Burge

Leading On Empty by Wayne Cordeiro

I’d encourage you to download this modified self-evaluation and spend some time honestly evaluating your life.

Join the conversation: What God is teaching you in the areas of Rest, Growth and Health?  Let me know by leaving a comment below.

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