Lake Highlands WyldLife kicked off the New Year with our annual Bus Tour. For those of you who aren’t familiar with Bus Tour, it’s an all night event where we take kids to various places throughout the night on school buses. Last Saturday, we took 135 kids to a Mavericks game, had an all-area club (with over 400 kids), had a huge snowball fight, went to Main Event, and finished everything off with donuts and a movie that morning. Everyone had a blast, including the leaders. It’s always funny to read about kids’ reactions to an event from their Facebook statuses. My favorite was “Bus Tour 2011 = amazing.”
The best part about Bus Tour is that it’s twelve straight hours of leaders getting to hang out with kids. Sharing experiences like these together tends to start great friendships between kids and their leaders. Towards the end of the all-area WyldLife Club, we had a staff member give a talk that explained the Gospel to kids. The talk was centered on Jesus’ interaction with Zacchaeus, a tax collector from Jericho. When I asked a guy in my group what he thought about the talk, he said, “It was really cool to hear that story from a different perspective.” The speaker focused on what it may have been like to be Zacchaeus, what he might have gone through before his encounter with Jesus, and what he might have been like afterward. The fact that one kid understood what Zacchaeus went through and that Jesus had reached out to him and knew his name is huge. With junior high kids it’s always hard to figure out whether they’re actually tracking throughout a talk or not. I have confidence that the kid in my group wasn’t the only one who understood that Jesus knows everybody’s name and wants to have a relationship with them.
So not only is Bus Tour a time for kids to have fun and an opportunity for leaders to get to know their grade of kids better, it’s also a time for kids to meet Jesus.
With the beginning of a new school semester comes the beginning of a new semester of WyldLife. The spring is always a fun time for our junior high ministry. Our club night switches from Fridays to Tuesdays, and we also throw in a few fun events for the kids throughout the semester.
Thank you so much for taking the time to read all about our Bus Tour and the beginning of the semester. I would really appreciate your prayers throughout the spring. One of my biggest prayers for us to find more leaders. We are always in need of solid men and women of Christ that are willing to sacrifice their time to share Jesus with junior high kids. If you are interested in serving, or perhaps know somebody who would be, please contact me at brody.lyons@gmail.com. We're always looking for more help!
Blessings,
Brody
