My buddy Jared Kennedy (welcome back to Twitter, by the way) posted a great article Making God Famous for Kids! Great read and reminder.

The second one is by Sam Luce and his post “Christians Today Are Theological Idiots“.

The gospel announces that everything “in Christ” is already accepted by God because of Jesus’ work for them. Therefore, no improvement, good behavior, or performance is necessary in order to experience the deep acceptance we long for and in fact strive for on a daily basis. (pg. 62)

After church, while at lunch, I asked the kids what they had learned that morning. Their class is using the Children’s Desiring God curriculum titled “The ABC’s of God“. It choices a letter of the alphabet to describe and explain an attribute of God. Yesterday’s letter was “Z” for Zealous. At lunch, my kids explained that being zealous means you do something with all your strength and energy. Not a bad definition for a 7-year-old.

Later that night, before bed, I asked them again. When I got the same answer, I decided to challenge them by asking what verse they learned about. While they had to “tag-team” it they came up with Isaiah 42:16. Being very skeptical I had my daughter grab her Bible off the shelf in the living room (an ESV Grow Bible for those keeping score at home) and read that verse. They were right on!

This is why children’s ministry is important! It does has lasting impact on future generations! It may be a “sowing” instead of “reaping” type of ministry; but so what, no one will reap what is never sowed! Thanks children’s ministry workers. You play a critically important role in partnering with parents in the spiritual formation of the next generation!

Joe Thorn
@joethorn
May we not be merely reformed in theology, but reformed in heart!

Tullian Tchividjian
@PastorTullian
The Bible is not a record of good people earning God’s blessing, but bad people receiving God’s blessing because Jesus earned it for them.

Dustin Nickerson
@DustinNickerson
Bible study is a verb, not a noun. Something we do, not something we go to.

Jesus promises both joy and hardship. We’re doing something wrong if we don’t have both.

D6 Conference
@theD6conference
“Parents are the primary teachers in their children’s lives, even if they don’t know it.” @timothywashere

“Faith development is a lifelong process for all of us, it is never too late to be more intentional in your parenting.”@kpowellfyi

Russell Moore
@drmoore
Pastors and fathers: if you will not fight back a wolf, do not call yourself a “shepherd.” You are a mutton provider.

Darth Vader
@DepressedDarth
Blessed are the geeks, for they shall inherit the Earth.

Elliot Grudem
@elliotgrudem
If you are a 20 or 30 something, you are not an “emerging adult” you are an adult. You don’t need to explore, you need a job (@johnwbryson)

theResurgence
@theResurgence
The weaker we feel, the harder we lean. The harder we lean, the stronger we grow spiritually, even while our bodies waste away – J.I. Packer

David Platt
@plattdavid
Gospel of the kingdom: not that Jesus will heal all your sicknesses today, but that He will forgive all your sins forever.

Chris Kainu
@ChrisKainu
“Healing is the result of love. It is a function of love.” – M. Scott Peck

Sam Luce has started a series on Guerilla Parenting. Here are the different parts so far 1, 2, 3.

The Resurgence had a post entitled 10 Ways to Love Your Kids.

Chris Spradlin over at EpicParent.tv posted 5 Things Parents do to Destroy Their Kids Faith.

Let me say up front that I’m not a fan of having community groups where kids aren’t engaged in the study aspect of the group. It seems to me that it’s communicating the wrong message to them, the message of, “This isn’t for you.”

Don’t get me wrong, I understand that kids can be a distraction and that adults need time together with other adults talking about adult issues. I get why groups segregate, I’m just not convinced it’s helping either party.

Here’s What We Do

Our community group meets on Saturday nights at our house. We spend the first half hour eating a meal together and getting caught up with each other. After dinner is (mostly) cleaned up, we move from the kitchen into the living room to do our study. Since we started we have been using Marty Machowski’s family devotional book titled Long Story Short.

Each week the lesson has 5 parts to it. We do the first part together as a group. The rest are completed throughout the week at home as a family. Each lesson takes about 10 minutes to complete. We begin and end the lesson time with prayer, usually led out by one of the children in the room. From there the kids are dismissed to go play upstairs and the adults talk through the lesson, taking it deeper. We ask questions like why our kids need this story (and why we do as well) and how we can apply it ourselves. We end our time together taking prayer requests and praying with and for each other.

The rest of the evening is spent listening to kids make a mess upstairs, before helping them clean up before everyone has to leave so we can all be to church the next day.

This has worked great for us … most of the time. We have our nights where either kids or adults are in a funk and we struggle to get through, but we have more nights where kids are asking great questions that lead to gospel conversations and adults (re)learning how to study the Bible and have fun at the same time.

This is true community … multigenerational community … gospel community.

Topic: The nature of sin:

We need to meditate on the true nature of sin until we load our consciences with its guilt and inflame our hearts with a longing to be liberated from its hold on our lives. As long as we can either justify our failures with rationalizations and excuses, or rest content with unrepentant sin and low levels of holiness, we will not be deeply determined to give sin the death blow. (pg. 54)

Don't know why, but he claims it was comfortable.

Recently during movie night at the Aldridge house …

Sam Luce
@samluce
Leaders are readers but readers aren’t necessarily leaders.

Greg Baird
@gregbaird
If parents are not living the Gospel chances are their efforts at sharing the Gospel with their kids will be relatively fruitless. #KidMin

J.C. Ryle
@JCRyleQuotes
“People fall in private, long before they fall in public.”

@D6family
@markins, @ronhunter
“In order for a man to be courageous, he must know the truth about who God is.” @DennisRainey

Brad House
@PBHouse
Ownership inspires passion, which leads to action. #community

Stephen Miller
@StephenMiller
God rescued us from Himself, by Himself, for Himself.

Matt Chandler
@MattChandler74
May the Spirit grant us changed hearts rather than restrained hearts

Matt Chandler
@MattChandler74
Those who find themselves utterly captivated by the gospel can hardly be entertained by anything else.

Elyse Fitzpatrick
@ElyseFitz
As you face trial, remember that He’s been tried in the same way. He knows suffering and he’s praying for you that your faith will not fail.

Noel Piper
@Noel Piper
If you carry all the burdens by yourself, you’re burning out & disobedient. You are not the Savior. @DarrinPatrick #dgpascon

Pop’s lessons in manhood– 1. Out of struggle comes strength. @CrawfordLoritts #dgpascon
Pop’s lessons in manhood– 2. Out of strength comes discipline. @CrawfordLoritts #dgpascon
Pop’s lessons in manhood– 3. Out of discipline comes integrity. @CrawfordLoritts #dgpascon
Pop’s lessons in manhood– 4. Out of integrity comes your inheritance. @CrawfordLoritts #dgpascon

Josh Howerton
@howertonjosh
Christian: you will never face a problem in your life that you care about more than your heavenly Father. Rest.

Greg Barid posted “7 things parents need you to know“.

Kenny Conley wrote a post about the power of community within children’s ministry.

And finally, Ryan Huguley had a great post on building teams.