Family Friday Links 6.8.18
Foster The Family Blog, had an encouraging piece, called A Love Letter to Single Foster + Adoptive Moms, written by Jamie C. Jamie writes, "Maybe you are surrounded by people who carry and support you. You are blessed to have them. But, also, they are blessed to have you--a shining example of what it means to lay down your life for someone else, a bright example of sacrificial love. Your family and friends are better because you are in their lives, living and loving this journey in front of them." Who is someone you can encourage today?
A friend of mine shared a blog that challenges our concept of success in ministry. The blog is from Feeding on Christ by Nick Batzig Many times we compare our ministries to that of others. One of the difficulties with comparing is that we don't always see what God is doing. We especially don't get to see what God is doing in ministry to the next generation. There are often years before we see fruit. Nick writes in his blog entitled, God’s Metrics, "The fruitfulness of a Gospel ministry is never observed in total in the here and now. The one who waters the seed of God’s word in men and women’s lives may see the increase, while the one who sowed the seed may not. The one who planted and the one who watered may never see the increase, but a future generation may see it." Don't give up hope!
Sarah Eekhoff Zylstra for the Gospel Coalition wrote a post entitled, Study: America’s Greatest Gospel Opportunity Lives in Your House. Sarah writes," So how can we pull families into engaging more in transmitting their faith? There’s nothing wrong with dropping the kids off at youth group for an hour on Friday night, but that’s insufficient. We must call parents and children to be on mission together. We want to encourage the church to lead families into a corporate mission with Jesus." It is vital we are helping families to engage their faith!
The Babylon Bee this week had a helpful article on how a church took a new approach to training their VBS workers. The article entitled, Church Uses ‘Hunger Games’ Footage As VBS Volunteer Training Video. One of the trainers says, “See how Katniss finds a safe place in a tree and hides from the roaming bands of bloodthirsty kids? That’ll be you a few weeks from now,” a children’s ministry worker said as she pointed out the various elements of the protagonist’s survival skills that helped her to win the fictional battle royale. “You can’t get too attached to your fellow workers or kids, or you won’t be ready to do what is necessary to make it out alive.”
What are you reading these days? Please share in the comments.