Praise the Lord

Lord, our Lord,

    how majestic is your name in all the earth!

You have set your glory

    in the heavens.

Through the praise of children and infants

    you have established a stronghold 

against your enemies,

    to silence the foe and the avenger.

Psalm 8:1-2

In worship this month, New Hope is talking about 

LIVING FOR A LEGACY

which is very different than just living. 

It means having a purpose. 

Living out God's plan. 

Making a difference with every day. 

Not settling for second best - but giving your all to God's glory. 

It means praising the Lord with every breath. 

And that is what we are talking about in Student Worship this month. 

Giving God the Glory!

We started our time in worship with an upbeat version of the hymn,

 To God be the Glory. 

And then our message, given by Cale, used the following materials:

a hairdryer (on cool)

a blown up balloon

paperclips

string (to tie the paperclips to the balloon)

a permanent marker

Cale started by telling the kids that the balloon represented God. 

(So he wrote God on the balloon with the marker.)

Then he said the paperclips were us - 

choosing to be connected to God through faith (the string). 

And then when he turned on the hair dryer, 

the balloon started floating in the air. 

As it floated around, Cale reminded the kids that when we celebrate how awesome God is - lifting his name up, we glorify God. 

It is through our praises that God's name is lifted. 

And we can praise God with our words, 

with our songs, with our prayers, with our service -

 with our WHOLE LIVES!

Here are our small group questions:

How do you lift up God’s name? 

How do you celebrate how wonderful God is?

What do you think would happen if everyone praise God’s name?

How do you honor God?

How do you remember God’ loves you?

Lift up the name of the Lord, Friends! 

Rise and Shine!

Mercy

He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. 

And what does the Lord require of you? 

To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God. 

Micah 6:8 

This past week we talked about mercy.

Mercy is a hard one for kids to define. 

We defined it as abundant kindness!

We continued with the same songs we have been singing, 

but will change them next week. 

We used these in worship - which we also use in the sanctuary. 

Which is pictured here. 

(Isn't she beautiful dancing with them?)

God's abundant kindness was illustrated by Cale. 

He used a cup with a mixture of vinegar and salt 

and a handful of dirty pennies. 

First he showed the kids the dirty pennies. 

He talked about how they might have gotten dirty. 

He asked the kids what they thought. 

Then he talked about how we sin. 

He put the pennies in the cup, and stirred them up. 

As we did, the kids counted to 30. 

And when they came out - they were clean!

God's mercy does the same thing for us!

The kids each got a clean penny to take home!

After more worship songs, we broke into our small groups!

And here are our small group questions:

What is mercy?

 When has someone shown you amazing kindness?

  When is it hard to show kindness to someone?  

   Jesus calls us not just to be merciful, but to “love mercy.”

 How is that different? How is that harder?

May God's mercy flow on you today!

Peace, Pastor Katie

Love that Fills Us

And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. 

But the greatest of these is love.

1 Corinthians 13:13

This week for Student Worship, we talked about love. 

God's great and abundant love. 

A love that centers us. 

A love that fills us. 

A love that transforms us. 

Powerful love!

We sang the same songs as last week, 

to build up familiarity:

Every Move I Make

Hold Me

Blessed Be Your Name

How Great is Our God

One of the amazing parts of the time Sunday 

was the prayer requests.

The children opened their hearts, 

praying for their friends and family, 

but also thanking God for our church.

One child prayed for people who don't know God's love. 

Their prayers were so heart-filled, I was moved to tears!

Our message centered on the understanding that God's love fills us.

Led by one of our amazing youth, Benton, 

he did this experiment again and again -

much to the children's delight -

and so they could understand that God's love fill us, 

again and again!

We took a small baking pan and filled it with colored water. 

(the color doesn't matter). 

In the center of the pan sat a candle. 

Attach it to the pan either by hot glue (like we did)

or with a ball of clay. 

Just make sure it stays still. 

Then, light the candle. 

Put a glass jar or cup over the candle and watch what happens. 

Benton told the children that when we put God 

at the center of our lives, 

like the candle was in the center of the jar, 

we are filled. 

And the jar was filled. 

The jar gets filled. 

The bigger the candle, the more it gets filled. 

After the message, 

we broke into our small groups and shared these questions:

Here are our small group questions:

What does love feel like? What does love look like?

Who do you love? Who loves you?

How is God’s love different (greater) than our love?

How does God’s love fill you?

How do you share God’s love with others?

It was a wonderful day! 

Rise and Shine friends! 

Peace, Pastor Katie

Windows

Our worship space has huge windows.

Huge old windows. 

Which are a bit grimy. 

And no so uplifting. 

So we made faux stained glass windows

using window markers. 

And they look awesome!

And each week we are going to add symbols of what we have learned to them. 

How cool is that?