Today on the podcast, Sean and Makenna speak about how you can begin to discuss lofty theological ideas with preteens. 

They specifically are discussing this illustration that Elevate used to talk about justification, sanctification and glorification. The illustration uses a mirror and dirt and spray bottles to discuss the idea of these two theological concepts. Makenna shares what she used recently during the message to explain justification, sanctification and glorification to the preteens. During the message she used a wardrobe style mirror that was covered in coffee and dirt and it was pretty nasty. To explain justification, she noted that God doesn’t look at our reflection he looks at Jesus’ reflection. For this mirror the process of sanctification is squirting it with a spray bottle of cleaner which doesn’t take away everything, but bit by bit like God cleans away the dirt (sin) away so that we can reflect God better back to the world.

As Makenna squirted the mirror the coffee stain slowly trickled down and then used a paper towel to clean off one spot where God had removed the sin to show how much better we are able to reflect the light. For glorification Makenna used the same mirror but dumped a whole bucket of water onto it. To do this portion of the illustration she had the mirror inside of a large bucket to catch the water.

Illustrations can be a great step for preteens to be able to understand these lofty theological ideas. Here is a link to a previous podcast where we discussed this same idea. 

Have a question about preteen ministry or a unique preteen ministry idea that we can feature on our podcast?  Send it to podcast@fourfivesix.org. Looking for a great community of preteen leaders that you can plug into? Join us at http://fourfivesix.org/.

Today on the podcast, Sean speaks about the idea of having preteens serving the younger students as a means of serving and ministering to preteens.

Sean believes that this idea of having the preteens serving the younger students is a great FIRST STEP of beginning a ministry to preteens, especially when you don’t have the resources to have a separate ministry for the preteens. FourFiveSix has lots of great information about how to start a preteen leadership program.

Sean emphasizes that this is a great first step, but it is definitely not the last step. Sean explains there is more to the ministry like spiritual development for the preteens. He poses the question, what are you doing to engage preteens beyond allowing them to serve? Check out fourfivesix.org/bike and THIS PAGE which discusses six ministry techniques to help preteens step into faith-ownership.

Have a question about preteen ministry or a unique preteen ministry idea that we can feature on our podcast?  Send it to podcast@fourfivesix.org. Looking for a great community of preteen leaders that you can plug into? Join us at http://fourfivesix.org/.

Today on the podcast, Sean shares a portion of Paula Mazza’s breakout session at the 2018 Preteen Leaders’ Conference entitled Power of Play.

Paula discusses the emotional issues that preteens suffer from that swing all over the place. Preteens emotions can become very evident during game time. Preteens have so many changes going on in their bodies that cause these can cause huge emotional swings. They begin to think like adults but lack the experiences to help guide them. They are striving for independence from their childhood. What we see on the outside isn’t always what is going on inside, especially emotionally.

These understandings of the emotional stage that preteens are in can help us when we plan games for our preteens. When we plan games for preteens, we need to realize that games can be a great way to provide a language for them and a time when they can try out new things to figure themselves out.

During the podcast, your hear participants from the conference share both positive and negative effects of games in preteen ministry.

This recording is only part of Paula’s session. Get the entire session, and all of the other recordings from the 2018 Online Conference here.

Have a question about preteen ministry or a unique preteen ministry idea that we can feature on our podcast?  Send it to podcast@fourfivesix.org. Looking for a great community of preteen leaders that you can plug into? Join us at http://fourfivesix.org/.

Today on the podcast, Sean and Makenna discuss the new Diamond Collector Card Game developed by FourFiveSix.

The card game was developed to help preteens talk about the pressures in their lives. There are three different colors that focus on specific pressures:

• red cards focus on pressures from God,
• green cards focus on pressures from peers
• blue cards focus on the pressures from authorities.

These cards can be used a couple different ways.

1. The Diamond Collector Game, where you are trying to create diamonds by using the pressure cards and the rock truth cards in your caves. In addition to the rock and pressure cards there are effect cards that can change things that occur during the game when they are activated. The goal of the game is to earn more diamonds than everyone else.
2. A game similar to Apples to Apples. The first person puts out a pressure card and everyone else looks at their Rock Cards (bible verse cards) and turns one in that they feel would be helpful in the pressure situation. The person who placed the pressure card then reads the rock cards and decides which one best matches the pressure and they award diamonds to the winning card.
3. Small Group discussion about pressures. There are also Small Group Discussion Questions included with the cards that can be used over the course of four weeks.

The cards can be purchased at diamondcollectorcards.com or for ministry leaders you can go to fourfivesix.org/diamonds where you can purchase a 100-ministry pack which is enough for 5 students.

Have a question about preteen ministry or a unique preteen ministry idea that we can feature on our podcast? Send it to podcast@fourfivesix.org. Looking for a great community of preteen leaders that you can plug into? Join us at http://fourfivesix.org/.