Time for some Ministry News

This has been the scene at after-school all week, and I am loving it! On Monday we started a new challenge called the After-School "20" Challenge. The goal is for the kids to earn 600 points individually and 6000 points as a group. How do they earn points? Well, just like last year, the only way to earn points is my reading, writing, or math. They have to do some activity involving one of those subjects for 20 minutes, and they will earn 20 points. (Hence the "20" challenge). We did a challenge similar to this last year and a lot of the kids got into it. The kids that reach the individual goal will get a very nice prize (I'm not telling them what it is, but it will be worth it for them). If they reach the group goal, then every kid that at least participated will get invited to a party that we will have. Last year Miguel won the points challenge by a landslide, but he has a lot of competition this year. Most of the kids are really motivated, which is really fun to watch.

Another thing I am really enjoying at after-school is "Abdul", one of my tutors. He was my only tutor a lot last year, and has continued to be not only consistent, but an amazing help. His 2 sisters are now in the program, and though he has 2 other brothers that could bring the girls, he is always the one walking them from his house to the Hope House. His youngest sister is 7 and he is so amazing with her, helping her with her homework every day, and reading with her so she can earn points for the challenge. I am more and more impressed with him every day, and I can't wait to see all the plans that God has for him! He is struggling a bit in school, which is actually understandable. He made such a drastic change in his grades and behavior last year that they put him in honors classes this year, for the first time in his life. However, its his junior year in high school, and he wasn't really ready for the change in how difficult honors classes would be. Add to that the fact that his Father suddenly passes away not too long ago, leaving him with a lot of responsibility, and a broken heart...and you can see how things might be hard for him. Nonetheless, he has continued to step up to every challenge he faces, and to blow me away with his kind and serving heart.

Kids Club was also really great last night!! Despite horrible snow, ice and freezing temperatures, we still had a good number of kids come out. We have made some changes over the last few weeks and we started implementing them last night. Basically, we want to make Kids Club more exciting and fun for the kids. I was given the task of trying to make the Reading Room exciting. (The Reading Room was once the most dreaded station for the kids. They all loved the playground, game room and computer room fine, but hated the reading room). The idea that God gave me was to have a Kids Club Mystery. Each week something important is *missing* and attached to the missing thing is a ransom note from the mystery suspect. The *suspect* is one of our KC leaders. This week the song DVD was missing and we made a HUGE dramatic deal about it and had the kids up looking around, it was so funny. They found it in the back of one of the chairs and of course Carisa and I acted shocked. I read the note and the kids learned that each week in the Reading Room (the once dreaded station) they will hear a story from me that will reveal a special clue about the suspect. This clue will allow them to eliminate one leader as a suspect. At the end of 8 weeks and a lot of silly fun, they will figure out which leader was the *thief.* The coolest thing about all of this is how much the kids LOVED it! 2 weeks ago when we announced which age group would be in the Reading Room, we got a bunch of sighs, this week, they were sitting in anticipation, hoping it would be them. When the 8 yr old girls were called they jumped to their feet cheering!

The other new changes went over well too. We have a craft station that the kids enjoyed, and a game/prizes station that they loved too. After kids club, all the kids could talk about was who they thought the Mystery Suspect was. I hope this excitement lasts the next 8 weeks! As we were leaving I was asking Bonita and Miguel which stations they went to (Pedro and Linda have moved to pre-teens so they aren't in our Kids Club). Miguel excitedly told me all about the game/prize station and how much fun he had. Then I asked Bonita where she went and she said, "The game room...the boring one now". HAHA!! She said she really wanted to go to the new stations because they all sounded so much fun. In fact, hearing Bonita and Miguel talk made Linda and Pedro want to come back to our Kids Club, and made Bonita not want to turn 11 in May (she move to pre-teens then). What a great night!

God Squad went well on Monday night too, although some of the girls that I had wanted to come didn't come. I will keep praying though! I am actually having somewhat of a day off today. Philadelphia schools were cancelled today, which means that after-school is also cancelled. I did go to staff prayer this morning and I will go to Prayer Pals tonight, but I'm just kinda working at my own pace today. I have already worked over 30 hours from Sunday through last night (about 10 hours a day), so I'm going to try and take the rest of the week at a bit of a slower pace Now that the Kids Club Mystery is in full swing, and the After-school challenge has started, I don't have as much that has to be done right away. I do still have a pretty full to do list, but I don't feel as much pressure now. I have some new ideas with God Squad and God's Girls that I am working on this week, and I will tell you about them soon. This post is long enough!