What is the connection?

Last week Cami and I coordinated a camp for our church with 65 children and 15 leaders with the theme of “Rome”. Sixteen of the children (25%) came from Orthodox families, and for many of them, this was their first contact with an Evangelical Church. Cami and I were responsible for regiment I (6 to 8 years old). On Wednesday, the lesson came from Romans 5:1-11 “only Jesus and His Love can give meaning to my life”. The children each received coins they could use to bid on auction items. There were really popular items children could recognize the logo and there were “cheaper” candies wrapped in white paper. In the end the winning bidders received their prizes. Big disappointment – the popular items, were just empty containers and what was supposed to be in them, was actually wrapped in the white paper. We talked about our feelings and went to visit Paul. We found Paul in prison talking to Brutus about the love of Jesus and about salvation. In our small groups, Mihnea (8 years old) had a question that he could not wait to ask even before we started reading from the Bible. He asked me: “Alex, I really do not see the connection between the game we played today and what Paul told us. I know there is always a strong connection – please let me know what the connection is.” I realized then, how important it is for children to be taught consistently. Before you know it they demand to be taught the right way – the Biblical way. I asked Mihnea to have a bit more patience and to wait until we read from the Bible. We started reading Romans 5:1-11. “This hope does not disappoint us, for God has poured out his love into our hearts by means of the Holy Spirit, who is God's gift to us”. All of the children realized that only Jesus and His love is our hope that never disappoints anyone.  The children then wrote a request for God to book a place for them in heaven. I was surprised how many children understood that only Jesus and his loving sacrifice is our reason to be with GOD eternally.

The undersigned Mihnea, “please book a place in heaven for me because I believe in Lord Jesus”
The undersigned Bianca from Bucharest, “please approve a place in heaven for me because I don’t want to be disappointed”
Request: “Lord please accept me in Heaven because you are full of Love and the best, plus I do good things.” Signed Loana

Children can understand the Bible, all of it, including Bible passages like Romans that are considered, by some, to be for adults only. We just have to find the way to connect the Truth with their life experience. Continue to pray for all children and their families and that the seed planted in their hearts will grow and bear fruits.

Alex Bruda

Romanian website launches this month

 

Every week there are children’s workers in local churches trying to come up with some way to impact the lives of boys and girls for Christ in their communities and their church. During the week they are carpenters, bank tellers and taxi drivers. On the weekend they are challenged with connecting the Word of God with the real lives of children that God has entrusted into their care. Every Generation Ministries is working to provide those children’s workers with great training and quality Bible teaching tools that they can use to to touch the lives of children.

If you are reading this blog you know the power of the internet as a content delivery tool. This phenomenon is not limited to the United States but a fact of life in many of the countries where EGM is serving. EGM is harnessing the power of the internet to expand the reach of our ministry. We are working with our national ministry teams to launch websites to provide streaming training videos and Bible teaching materials for children’s workers. Just a few weeks ago, our Romania ministry launched a new website where children’s workers can subscribe and receive Bible teaching materials and also streaming training videos. The teaching materials were developed by our Romanian staff and are biblically sound, developmentally appropriate, super creative and most importantly help children’s workers in local churches connect the Bible to the real life of children in their Romanian context. We already have over 300 subscribing churches and are excited to see what happens in the fall.  We have been very fascinated by Romanian churches in Austria, Italy, Spain, Greece, Moldova and …….the US who have subscribed to the website! Check out the website at http://resurseegm.ro/ . The website is in Romanian but you will find a translator button in the upper right for you to explore a bit in English. Every Generation Ministries has plans for launching Spanish and Arabic websites in the next few weeks. Find out more about our internet initiative and other EGM news at www.egmworld.org or like us on Facebook.