Be a Kid - Even if it Kills You
My house is a kid magnet.
It's true. Drive by my house any given Sunday night in the summer, and you will find the lights on, cars all over, a good portion of our youth in the living room, people in the kitchen playing cards, and a bunch of kids watching TV in one of the bedrooms. You can drive by at midnight and they're all there. School started this past week, so that will probably move to Friday nights...
So this past Sunday, there were a buch of kids of all ages at the house, and they decided to play game that's popular with our youth. It's called citychase, or at least that's what they call it. It's a combination of hide-and-seek and tag. Basically, there is a defined area which includes several streets, and part of a park. Everyone disperses except the "it" and the chase is on. The rules include no backyards, no roofs, and staying within the area.
This game involves a lot of running; running to get out of line-of-sight of the house while "it" is counting, and running to not get caught if you get sighted. I generally don't play, but the kids asked me to, and I did this time. It was a ton of fun, but my legs were burning.
Monday, we had a church picnic at the beach to close out the summer. One favorite beach game for our youth is to try to dunk the big guys. I'm one of the big guys. I pretty well undefeated by the youth, but that comes at a cost. To me, anyway.
But it does give the kids some stories, and it gives me some "cred." I am proud of the fact that most of these kids trust me implicity, and that they consider an old dude like me one of their own. And that's important, not only for ministry, but for life. Because there are times when we need to be able to look at the world through the eyes of a kid. Too often, we assign our own adult values to the choices that youth and kids make. We make bad choices because we don't understand their choices. The Words says that we should approach the Kingdom of Heaven as a little child. If our youth and children are part of that Kingdom... well, you do the math.
It's true. Drive by my house any given Sunday night in the summer, and you will find the lights on, cars all over, a good portion of our youth in the living room, people in the kitchen playing cards, and a bunch of kids watching TV in one of the bedrooms. You can drive by at midnight and they're all there. School started this past week, so that will probably move to Friday nights...
So this past Sunday, there were a buch of kids of all ages at the house, and they decided to play game that's popular with our youth. It's called citychase, or at least that's what they call it. It's a combination of hide-and-seek and tag. Basically, there is a defined area which includes several streets, and part of a park. Everyone disperses except the "it" and the chase is on. The rules include no backyards, no roofs, and staying within the area.
This game involves a lot of running; running to get out of line-of-sight of the house while "it" is counting, and running to not get caught if you get sighted. I generally don't play, but the kids asked me to, and I did this time. It was a ton of fun, but my legs were burning.
Monday, we had a church picnic at the beach to close out the summer. One favorite beach game for our youth is to try to dunk the big guys. I'm one of the big guys. I pretty well undefeated by the youth, but that comes at a cost. To me, anyway.
But it does give the kids some stories, and it gives me some "cred." I am proud of the fact that most of these kids trust me implicity, and that they consider an old dude like me one of their own. And that's important, not only for ministry, but for life. Because there are times when we need to be able to look at the world through the eyes of a kid. Too often, we assign our own adult values to the choices that youth and kids make. We make bad choices because we don't understand their choices. The Words says that we should approach the Kingdom of Heaven as a little child. If our youth and children are part of that Kingdom... well, you do the math.
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