This page was last updated on: August 29, 2010
Monthly Prayer Letter
2010 September
As is to be expected the summer and the month of August have ended with a whirlwind of activities. In a week we taught three Basic Trainings and put on two JumpStart sessions. In Sept we do it once more for the Imperial Valley. Thank you for your faithful prayers and donations which keep us “on the road,” we couldn’t do it without your partnership.
Awana is off to a great start. Commanders and Directors are encouraged and encouraging one another as they network and pray with and for each other at the JumpStart sessions. Leaders are refreshed and trained and ready to reach out to the many clubbers who will be walking through those church doors. There will be clubbers who come there every week, and those who have never darkened a church door before. Just as Jesus taught that a shepherd would go out into the night to hunt for a lost sheep we are praying that there will be many shepherds who will go into their neighborhoods to reach the children and parents who do not know that Jesus died on the cross to save them. Gene often quotes this old saying, “Lord help me to be a Nobody, who is willing to tell Everybody, there is Somebody, who is willing to save Anybody!”
The ultimate goal of Awana is Salvation and Training. Churches are encouraged to reach out not only to the kids from their neighborhoods, but the families as well, showing them the way of Salvation. Once they have accepted Christ the Church is to train them to serve Christ.
Valley Bible, San Marcos, definitely puts this into practice: "We had a great Kids Evangelism Explosion, on the job training. I arranged kids to come for games and craft and let the adults talk to them. One mom, and 4- 5th grade boys and one 2nd grader prayed to receive Jesus as Lord and Savior. What an event. Excited about all 14 kids will be first time Awana members, all from Soccer Camp. So pleased with what God is doing."
Three families first brought their children to Cubbies and Sparks in Awana at Community Bible Church, Vista. These families then began attending church every Sunday. Two of the fathers have now signed up to serve as leaders in Awana this year.
We really love it when we see leaders putting special effort into the Bible Teaching time. Horizon NC has captured the clubbers attention as their Skit Team brought the Bible Lessons to life each week. Complete with costumes, lighting and props, the leaders took to memorizing lines and Scripture. Many clubbers were saved as a result of the salvation messages.
Personally, right now many hours get spent staring at the computer and exercising my fingers as we contact the many workshop instructors to get titles and descriptions for classes for the upcoming Awana Ministry Conferences. Sometimes it takes several emails to the same person to get a response back. Once the instructors are confirmed and descriptions all are in, the shops can all be arranged into the four sessions and 22 rooms. (It is quite a work in progress, sort of like a combination of scrabble and rummy cube games. There are times when the whole board gets rearranged.) Finally I can begin setting up the draft of the program. Then the draft gets emailed off to a typesetter to be put in program format. Once that is done we email it to each instructor for their approval. And a proofreader looks over it as well. Then it can be posted as well as emailed to all the commanders so the leaders can even choose the shops they will attend ahead of time. The San Diego conference is coming together now but Hawaii Conf still has a lot of work to be done.
Pray for: conferences to come together; Safety in travel and effective salvation presentation as we visit clubs
Gene and Nancy Goertzen
Awana Missionaries
In our 40th year
