26 November 2011

BIG Ministries were very pleased to be invited back to Swan Bank in Stoke to run an advent celebration afternoon. This was to be BIG Ministries’ first event based around the theme of advent… We had waited for this day… We were prepared…

Starting at 1pm, we split everyone into two groups with half of them doing craft (making fireworks) and the other half playing ‘construction’ games. Whilst all this was going on, Damian used all of his brain power to attempt to get the laptop working again… which had somehow broken at the precise moment that we wanted to use it. Even using all of his brain power he didn’t get it to work… so we used a different laptop, which just about solved the problem. [Whilst writing this blog in the office, Steve fixed the laptop. Woo.]

After some fun with games and craft, we then went into a half an hour up-front program that included games, puppets and songs and a story about ‘The 3 not-so-wise men’ who were to late to see Jesus due to a barrage of distractions. Then it was time for a quick break before an hour long family advent party…

[Insert mental image of BIG Ministries team now eat paninis, jacket potatoes, crisps, cakes, flap jacks etc... Yum.]

It was now time for the hour long family advent party. We basically took a look at the reason behind advent – you know, about the waiting and preparing for Christmas… and then we also took a look at how we wait and prepare for Jesus’ return and that He hasn’t left us on our own until that day (Ps… because He sent us His Holy Spirit).

We had a lot of fun, made a lot of noise, and learnt that advent isn’t just about eating chocolates from an advent calendar… and also, as Howie discovered, eating all of the chocolates in your calendar as quick as possible, doesn’t make Christmas happen any quicker…

Thanks again to the people at Swan Bank for having us and feeding us and encouraging us…

(One last thing) I’m just going to finish this little blog with a note to say that BIG Ministries will be running a day event at Swan Bank on 19 May 2012. The day will include activities/workshops for children, parents and children’s workers, ending with a BIG Party including live music and games and too much fun to behold… It promises to be a great day. More details to follow soon…

Blog written by: Baz

Comedy Moment: Baz praying, ‘Dear Lord baby Jesus… in your manger…’ etc etc… It was meant as a link to the fact that Jesus didn’t remain a baby and he came to do a job… Damian did interrupt Baz and explain that. It was all planned. Actually, I think it was more of an awkward moment than a comedy moment.

Exciting Moment: Celebrating all that Jesus has done for us and continues to do…

Team: Baz, Damian, Lou, Pete, Hannah

So, here’s what happened… We drove up to Gateshead! Do you know how far away that is from Birmingham? It’s not as far as places that are further away from it than Birmingham, but it’s far. So, we arrived late, and went to our host homes where we got a good night’s sleep… Well, actually I can’t speak for everyone else and I can’t be bothered to phone them all at this precise moment in time to check if they had a good night’s sleep… Basically, I had a good night’s sleep.

The following morning we travelled to the school where ECG North East was taking place. There were various workshops and meetings happening simultaneously throughout the day. However, I can only tell you what we did as I didn’t pay much attention to everything else. [I now sit here writing the blog attempting to remember what we did] So, here’s what we did:

- A BIG party

- A rhythm workshop (led by the charismatic Stephen Alexander)

- A craft workshop (We made fireworks… but ones that didn’t work)

- A drama workshop (We managed to transform ourselves into a washing machine)

- A games workshop (Family team games aplenty)

- An all-age celebration

I know what you’re thinking… That’s a reasonable amount of stuff to do over a weekend. Well let me tell you something, that was just the Saturday! As you can imagine, we were tired. Getting back to our host homes at about 9:30pm we all relaxed and a lovely home made curry and and a nice cold beverage whilst watching various sitcoms on TV. It was lovely… Oh wait, that was just myself and Paul that did that. I can’t speak for everyone else when I say that I had the best time out of everyone at my host home!

The next morning we arrived at a local church to lead the all-age service. We looked at the story of Samson and the faithfulness of God to him, as well as to us.

Over-all it was a jam-packed but very good weekend. We then packed up and drove back to Birmingham, arriving in time to watch the X factor (only because it was on TV, not because we wanted to watch it or anything…) and we ate a curry. My second of the weekend… which confirmed to me all the more that it had, in fact, been a very good weekend indeed.

Also, make sure you check out ECG 2012 in Scarborough. We’ve been the last few years (Although not in Scarborough) and have had a great time.

Blog written by: Baz

Exciting Moment: Aside from the curry situation, I would have to say that doing the workshops was the exciting moment as this is what we’re looking at doing more of in the future. It was good to see that they worked.

Comedy Moment: A small child was handed a water pistol in order to squirt everybody in one of the stories. That was fairly funny.

Team: Jo, Steve, Baz, Ellen, Stephen, Rach, Paul

BIG Ministries were privileged to go back to Bethel Church in Coventry, where myself and Jo grew up, to deliver some training. The day was a ‘taster session’ of what Bethel Church hopes to provide more of in the future. Their aim is to provide training in all areas of Church leadership. BIG Ministries been asked to come in to provide some training on working with children. It was a really good day, with a good number of people, many of whom were very passionate about working with children. We were encouraged.

We also enjoyed cake.

Blog written by: Baz

Exciting Moment: Delivering training is always exciting.

Comedy moment: Damian advertising the God’s Love Is Unstoppable album a little bit too much…

Team: Jo, Steve, Baz, Damian, Lou

16 October 2011

Here we were again, in Warfield… But this time we didn’t get caught up in a triathlon on the journey there. I for one preferred not travelling at the speed of a cyclist going up hill. It was an early start though. We left Birmingham at 6am, drove through torrents of fog (can one have torrents of fog?) and saw the sun come up. That was nice.

The BIG Party saw us look at the story of Jonah and how he chose to do the opposite of what God asked him to, but God still remained faithful to him. We also played a load of games, and did some songs and ate biscuits… the usual stuff really.

Then… we went home.

Blog written by: Baz

Exciting Moment: Jo had some good conversations in the ‘think zone’ that went off on tangents… but good tangents.

Comedy Moment: We had new member, Abi, on team from Coventry. Unfortunately we didn’t have an ‘Abi’ name badge and so she wore a badge that said, ‘Trevor’. Some kids actually thought her name was Trevor.

Team: Jo, Steve, Lou, Ellen, Abi, Baz, Becky.

This was a fairly pleasant event… aside from the atrocious drive to Huddersfield on the Friday night, which put everyone off Burger King and included chaotic traffic on (what seemed like) every road in England. But we made it and had a bit of time to relax before bed time.

The training day then began on the Saturday at about 10am, with Jo leading the first hour or so on faith development and what not. The training day was full of loads of different people from all different churches in the Methodist Circuit in Huddersfield. It was great to see so many people there.

Other items featured in the training were as follows:

- Using the Bible with all ages

- Puppetry

- Using multi media

- working with 7-11’s and boys and girls and so on and so forth…

We all had a really good day spent with the guys up in Huddersfield and hopefully everyone took away something useful from the day. Thanks for having us.

Blog written by: Baz

Comedy moment: Well, guys, what can I say… can’t really think of one. Oh wait, a toddler continually went up to the electric organ at the front of the church and began to play it whilst Jo was delivering her training.

Exciting moment: There was a very positive response afterwards with many people talking about the various ideas they could incorporate into their churches from the training.

Team: Jo, Steve, Tabi, Lou, Baz

It was two years ago when when we last joined St John’s Church for their weekend away at the Hayes Conference Centre in Swanwick and I remember it being fairly fun back then… So I guess it was nice that things hadn’t changed too much.

Myself, Jo, Lou and Dave arrived on the Friday night (Tabi turned up Saturday morning) and, having set up the stage and the sound equipment and all other things fun and exciting, we were ready for the bombardment of screaming over-enthusiastic children to keep us on our toes… in walked one, and then a second, then a third, then a forth, then a fifth… and then we waited… and waited… But there never was a sixth child on that first Friday night. To be honest it was too late for most of the kids and they were in bed. So, with the five kids that we did have, we just chilled out and played Jenga and made balloon animals and did a bit of craft and some games. It was really cool. A relaxed but fun start to the weekend.

After a good sleep and a few hash browns and sausages… mmmm… we were ready once again for a bombardment of children. This time all 34 of them turned up – which was good news because the team games that I had prepared would have been a little awkward with 5 children.

Over the weekend we looked at who Jesus is and how He is with us in all aspects of our lives – the tough bits, the good bids, the normal bits, etc. We played a large variety of games, including the return of the giant inflatable wheels; we sang and danced to a few songs; we did some craft; we did some drama; we did some thinking in the think zone; we did LOTS of stuff…

It was a great weekend and the BIG Ministries team had a pretty nice time hanging out with the kids from St John’s. They made us laugh… they bought us cards… they fed us chocolate.

Blog written by: Baz

Exciting moment: Apart from receiving a bar of chocolate on the last day… Jo had some exciting moments in the think zone where children explained really complex things in really easy to understand ways. In particular – explanations and analogies of ‘the trinity’.

Comedy moment: In the drama workshop, one very serious looking 5 year old child sang, Happy Birthday, only using the word, ‘bananas’. Why not give it a go yourself…

Team: Jo, Baz, Lou, Dave, Tabi

We were once again back at Barnt Green Baptist Church to lead their all-age service. We had set everything up the previous evening, which meant we could have an extra hour in bed. Bonus! And so, arriving at 9am on Sunday morning (still fairly early for a Sunday morning, I know) we did a soundcheck and quick rehearsal of, well, everything. We were looking at the story of Jonah and that God loves everyone but doesn’t always agree with everything that everyone does. The story was most exciting as it involved the stage being set up as the inside of the fish that Jonah was swallowed by. Darren and Herman (Herman’s a new guy on the puppet team all the way from some ranch in the USA) showed up, as did Howie. They all contributed to making a very good point in their own  special way. Basically they got everything wrong and Jo, being the clever one, corrected them. It was nice to be on familiar territory at Barnt Green Baptist Church and is always a pleasure to go there. No doubt we’ll be back there again soon… Unless the fish spewing Jonah onto the shore was too much for people to bear.

Blog written by: Baz

Exciting Moment: People doing loads of different things during one of the songs. They were either singing, or doing actions, or colouring, or writing prayers, all in worship of God.

Also, Lou made her debut on the sound desk and was great.

Comedy Moment: After everyone had made rowing boat ores out of pipe cleaners for the craft, Steve made many a joke with words that began with the sound ‘ore’. Eg, it would be OREsome if we did the story now… ORE something else. Hmmm… on reflection maybe it wasn’t that funny.

Team: Jo, Steve, Lou, Rach, Martin, Baz

Photo by John Pang

Waking up on a rainy miserable Saturday, we knew it was time for Bethel Church’s Annual Party in the Park… and we knew that as always, the weather would change!

We arrived in Coventry in glorious sunshine and heat… and wind… we started to set up, and had to change our plans a little due to the wind, the stage set for Jonah was just not going to work, so we went to plan B, and prepared for the calling of the disciples story instead.

After setting up and a splendid lunch from Grundy Catering (that’s my mum!), we headed back to the park to be greeted by loads of people arriving to join in the fun. There were bouncy castles (which Matilda enjoyed very much), face painting, stalls, craft tables, cakes, bbq and games all happening.. very cool!

Then we had our first slot…

Steve & Baz started the proceedings with our new favourite: ‘The Music Quiz’, which really got people interested, then we did the story of Jesus calming the storm – we did this with options, and some lovely acting from Baz & Steve… taught people that ‘Jesus is Powerful’, and this then was followed with the High 5 song (one of Doug Horley’s finest), and our 15minutes was complete.

Time for cake, chatting, and more bouncy castle with Matilda….

Then slot number 2…

Steve & Baz started proceedings with another Music Quiz, then we told the story of when Jesus called the first disciples. Taught people that ‘Jesus loves everyone’, cause he does… then finished off with some wonderful air-instrumenting in Words are not enough (perhaps one of Damian Herbert’s finest!?).

And it was over for another year. Good work Bethel Church, Coventry on doing something that shows people God’s love by just being friendly…

Blog written by: Jo

Comedy Moment: Steve lying on the floor to illustrate ‘how do you get up from an all-time-low’ (The Wanted).

Exciting moment: Seeing so many people milling around in the park having a lovely time.

Team: Jo, Steve, Baz, Lou & Matilda (and John & Brenda & Ellen who played with Matilda!)

After completing one holiday club in Hoylake, we thought to ourselves, ‘What better way of spending the end of summer, than doing another holiday club?’ So we did one. This time at Holcombe Brooke Methodist Church, somewhere near Upper-Ramsbottom and Bury and Manchester… and lots of other places that might all be the same place.

We did pretty much exactly the same as we did in Hoylake the previous week, with a few tweaks, and so we were very well rehearsed. We did the usual songs, puppets, stories, games (including the one with the giant inflatable wheel and balloons – but I’m not going to explain that again.), a variety of workshops, craft… and other stuff. I must say that the Holcombe Brook team sorted out all of the craft for the week and it was some of the best craft that you can do in 12 minutes that I have EVER seen! There were flying saucers and wind mills and glow in the dark things. It was well cool. I especially wanted my own flying saucer. Mainly because they also flew like frisbees and one kid had thrown one at my eye ball and I wanted to get my own back. He was hiding behind his Dad though, which is cheating.

About 70 kids turned up each day and they were full of energy. And when I say, full of energy, I mean it! It was great to have all of the kids getting really stuck in to everything and getting as much as they could out of the week.

Again, we stayed in a huge house, although this one wasn’t a minutes walk from the sea. Although it did overlook the country side and had a horse grazing in the meadow out the back. We were spoiled once again. Curry on the first night was also a winner; as was curry on the last night when we got home. Maybe we should make that a BIG Ministries rule from now on. Begin and end events with curry. I’ll run it past Jo and Steve… and maybe set up a petition. I’ll be in touch.

In closing, it was a super holiday club.

Blog written by: Baz

Exciting moment: One child who usually struggles to join in with a lot of things, joined in with the whole week and had an absolutely great time.

Comedy moment: I thought that the pirate joke was the funniest thing of the week. Many would say otherwise, but I’m writing the blog so there. It goes like this: Why are pirates called pirates?… Because they ARRR! (the word ARRR! is to be said in the voice of a pirate if you didn’t get that.)

Team: Jo, Steve, Ellen, Baz, Pete

BIG Ministries once again had the pleasure of being part of the BIG Bash holiday club at St Luke’s Methodist Church in Hoylake. It was the fourth year that we had been involved and so, knowing what to expect, we were excited. Around 150 kids turned up each day to participate in the fun that ensued from St Luke’s Church. There were stories, games (including one game that you may have read about in a previous blog post. It’s the one with the giant inflatable wheels that you put balloons inside of and then role them the length of the church and then dispense of the balloons in the points baskets. It’s called Balloons For Wheel! Which I think is a good name. You see, it sounds a little bit like, balloons for ‘real!’ But if you can’t pronounce your R’s you would say, balloons for ‘wheel!’ Plus, the balloons are actually for the wheel. Close brackets) songs, puppets, craft, balloon modelling, rhythm, drama and dance workshops. And that’s not even the end of it! There was more… but I can’t recall everything. We also looked at who Jesus is and that He is with us in all areas of our lives.

Over the week we stayed just down the road from Hoylake in a place called, West Kirby… I don’t even think we drove through East Kirby to get there. East Kirby must be miles away. Anyway, a family were kind enough to go to America so that we could stay in their house. The house only had three floors and about 10 bedrooms and was approximately a 1 minute walk from the sea/lake/area of water and beach. (Please read the following sentence in a sarcastic tone) We were REALLY disappointed.

So, we had a great week; as did all of the kids I believe. We were all well fed, we were all well slept, and we were all well. Apart from Louise who was ill one day. There always has to be one who just wants to ruin it for everyone else doesn’t there!

Then we went home for a couple of days rest before we headed to somewhere in Manchester for our next holiday club…

To be continued…

Blog written by: Baz

Exciting Moment: The discussions about God that many of the kids had in their small groups. It was good to hear them exploring really complex things that Stephen Hawking wouldn’t even understand.

Comedy Moment: We played a game that involved standing inside an inflatable wheel and catching balloons in a giant fishing net. However, one tiny lad who had been chosen for the game could barely see over the top of the wheel. He had a great time though.

Team: Jo, Steve, Baz, Lou, Ellen