A Smile from God?

This week, this Thanksgiving week, I have been feeling a little heartbroken over the pain in our world. A dear friend is suffering and being close to his pain has increased my sensitivity to sadness in places I might normally overlook.

Like the young man walking down the row of cars while I was stopped at a red light. He passed me twice with his worn out sign begging for help. I avoided eye contact with him. I didn’t even read his sign. I thought Employers are begging people to come to work. Why isn’t he working? And then I remembered that some people can’t work because of mental illness, physical limitations and other life circumstances. Some of them are people I love.

That’s when my heart broke a little for this too-thin, living-on-the-bottom-of-the barrel young man. I saw him for the human being he was, a man made in God’s image, but someone who needed help. I rolled down my car window and on his third pass by I waved a handful of single bills at him. He ran to my car, thanking me profusely as if  I had just solved global warning or a world-wide pandemic. He was so grateful. So thankful.

 We exchanged some human chat.

 “It’s cold out here today,” I said. “You okay?”

 “Oh yes! I prefer the cold to the hot. Thank you, thank you, thank you for your help. It’s really been a slow day.”

I drove away feeling blessed that I was able to help him.

Maybe that’s why, a few minutes later, doing my Thanksgiving grocery shopping, my eyes were open to the young cashier at the checkout counter in the grocery store. The line was long. Five people were in front of me Welcome to Thanksgiving lines during a worker shortage I thought. ! I watched as each person paid for their groceries without saying a word to her or really seeing her.

 When it was my turn, I could see how exhausted she was. “Bunny,” I read her name tag, “how long have you been standing here today? 

 “This is the end of my 8-hour shift.”

“Oh that’s a long time.” I said.

“Yes, there aren’t enough of us to cover the Thanksgiving shopping, so we are all working long shifts.”

“Well, thank you so much for working so hard so we can enjoy Thanksgiving.”

 And that’s when we saw it. My groceries were bagged, in the cart and paid for except for my large and expensive $40 turkey.

 We had been talking and neither of us realized our mistake. What to do?

 “Oh, just ring it up separately.” I said. Of course, that was the answer.

 And that’s when I heard him say, “Oh, its okay. I’ll cover it. Happy Thanksgiving!”

The man behind me, the next one in line, a complete stranger, paid for my turkey dinner!

 I had not expected to be a blessing to anyone that day. I hadn’t expected to give. I hadn’t expected to receive. I had my “to do” list and my agenda. But odd as it may seem, it seems like these two “giving” events seem linked.

Could it be when we give we also become recipients of blessing? I wonder what happened to my turkey buyer? Did he win the lottery? Did his stocks and bonds explode upward? Was he deeply appreciated by someone he loved?

What will you and I bring to the Thanksgiving table this year? Will we give love, joy and celebration of the people we are with? Will our hearts open just a little more to each other’s humanity? And will we somehow receive a linked blessing intended just for us because we dug a little deeper , found compassion and cared?

A fist full of dollars? A turkey paid for by a stranger? Both seem to be special…almost like a smile from God.

Hope this is true of you this year…that you experience the smile of God.

Have a Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Thanksgiving 2021

Have I Ever Seriously Thanked You, Joni Eareckson Tada?

Those were the words that were forming in my mind recently when Awana received a request from Joni for an endorsement for a new children’s book she has written about heaven. Just at a time when I am thinking about her, Joni’s request for an endorsement comes across my desk. Is that a coincidence?

Here’s a little background on Joni. She is my age…a Baby Boomer. She has been a quadriplegic since a tragic diving accident in her teens. But despite that huge loss, for decades now she has been a faithful witness to God’s love. She suffers. We can see that, but in the midst of her limitations, she sings hymns of hope. She paints, holding the paintbrush in her mouth, and shushes our interior voices of, “But I can’t do that!” Her writing gives glory and credit for overcoming a lifetime of hurdles to God. She is strong even while she is forced to live humbly dependent on those around her for basic life care. Her life could have been shattered, but instead, she shone like a gem, a rare exquisite gift to all of us.

As I read her book, The Awesome Super Forever Party, I thought that heaven must hold a lifetime of hope for her. And like many of us, she must sense that eternity is near.

But my gratefulness to Joni has to do with something else she did. Something other people may not know. Joni broke the glass ceiling for the use of women’s spiritual gifts…especially speaking, writing and leadership. You see, she spoke the gospel in alto and by doing so, she gave more opportunity for other women (like me) to use our leadership and writing and speaking gifts. The gospel in alto, the gospel in soprano is still the gospel.

 I have been the “first” woman to speak and deliver a message from the pulpits of scores of churches…often under high scrutiny and expressed skepticism—after all, I hold no seminary degree or ordination. My generation of Christian women leaders were almost all outliers. Thank God that’s changing. 

 But, honestly, I carry bite marks from being the “first.”

·      The young pastor who whispered to me as I passed him on the way to speak the Sunday message in his pulpit, “Keep it short. I want most of the service for comments afterwards.” Ouch!

·      The pastor who essentially rewrote my message, changing the title from “Raising Kids in Scary Times” (too negative he said) to “Raising Christian Kids Today.” (It got changed back when 33 people were killed in the Virginia Tech shootings a few miles from this church just days before I was to speak.)

·      The opportunities not offered. The invitations never made. The ignoring of who God had made me to be and the role I was meant to play in the Kingdom.

 But there is Joni…faithful, joyful and strong, assuring a transitioning church that God’s gifts to the kingdom included those He had given to women. Sometimes I envied the ease with which she was accepted, given a platform and ministry. Did she have any bite marks? Without question, for sure. But likely, because of her overwhelming circumstances, any bite marks were put into perspective. 

And so I wrote an endorsement for The Awesome Super Forever Party hoping she will feel the love all of us have for her:

With exuberance and high anticipation, Joni Eareckson Tada, embraces heaven. Her words describe a new heaven, a new perfect earth, a new me, and Jesus as King! This Biblically inspired book belongs on every child’s bookshelf as well as on every nursing home bedside table. Read it to someone you love and then keep your dancing shoes nearby. You will feel like putting your arms around each other and celebrating God’s love for eternity.

And so Joni, from the bottom of my heart on behalf of Christ-following men and women all across this country and around the world, Thank you, Thank you, Thank you!!!

 Only eternity will reveal the huge impact you’ve had on the Kingdom…and on me! Thank you!

Thanksgiving 2021

 Valerie Bell

Awana/CEO

Radical Love Could Have Saved Nikolas Cruz

That’s what I said during a radio interview with WRMB in South Florida recently. Even as I said it, I realized it might sound like a simple over statement to many people, including some Christ-followers. But who knows what each of us is capable of without the redeeming work of God in our lives? What have we been saved from becoming? Of all people, we know the power of God unto salvation, the reality of changed and freed lives, and the impact of radical love.

I check my own heart as I say the words. Yes! I believe it! Radical love could have saved the Parkland shooter from targeting his pain and suffering into the world until 17 innocent classmates lay dead at his feet.

I believe that. And I believe something else; the church already knows how to lead our violence-wracked, divided country into a place of healing. The national debate on gun control is a stuck needle and impotent. Looking to our government for hope or solutions that will protect our children and others as well is already too little too late.

But even as the news swells with accounts of radical Islam, and radicalized-by-hate students rampaging through their campuses, we cannot give up hope. 

The hope for our culture is found in the Jesus way. The church has been traveling this pathway for thousands of years. We know how to love radically. We don’t always get it right, but when we do…everything can change.

“Well, what does radical love look like in our churches today?” the radio interviewer asked me.

It starts with kids. Really. When we love a community’s children, we will have more influence and more church growth than we can handle. We may also heal a child who is on his or her way to pumping the world with his pain from the trigger of an AR-15 assault rifle.

Radical love is the kind that opens a church’s door to every child within its reach. That means every child…the kid with behavior problems, children from dysfunctional and hard-to-work-with homes, the children of poverty, children who are already social outcasts, children with special needs, children of different nationalities and tongues. The others. The different. The quirky. The odd. The left out. The overlooked. The abused. The neglected. The hungry. The lonely. The bullied. The ones already sliding into despair. When Jesus said, “Let the children come,” I’m pretty sure he wasn’t thinking about only church kids whose lives are supported by believing, loving homes. His words were meant to carry those “other” kids through our church doors and into our hearts.

Radical love looks a lot like Oakwood Baptist Church in New Braunfels, Texas. This church started Awana a year ago. I spoke to the Senior Pastor, Ray Still, and their Executive Pastor, Rusty Rice recently. They were eager to tell me what their first year had been like.

Rusty started their story, “We thought we might have 300 kids come, but instead 500 are showing up. Everyone on staff from our senior pastor and down through the ranks is working at Awana—registering kids, leading small groups, organizing game time, listening to verses, and leading the large group time.”

They were smiling. This wasn’t bad news. They were excited to share the news of their abundance of children with me.

“Yes, and we decided to feed them pizza every night.”

Magic formula right there! I thought to myself.

Ray Still, the senior pastor, talked about a special kid in his small group of nine grade school boys.

“I have this one kid in my group who is a nightmare. He is a full-time job for me almost every week. Recently, I met his mother. I said ‘I would like to talk to you about your son.’

I saw her face drop as she prepared herself for the familiar-to her bad news.”

I knew what was coming. Or at least I thought I did.

He continued “We love having your boy at our church. He is always welcome here and we are doing just great. “

Ray was smiling now. “I saw her face light up. She had steeled herself for the usual bad report. You could see how surprised she was that finally there was a word of encouragement coming from somewhere in the world about her child!”

That child is an accident waiting to happen to all of us without the church in New Braunfels, Texas. A couple of hours a week in the presence of caring adults and a loving community can turn a child’s life completely around.

Here’s to the radical love of a pastor who gets out of the pulpit once a week to love and disciple kids from his community!

Here’s to the radical love of a church that feeds 500 hungry kids every week as a regular part of their church budget!

Someone sent me a picture of just such a pastor recently. It’s Jeremy Elam of Peavine Baptist Church of Rock Spring, Georgia. He’s lying on the floor at his church playing video games with a kid and a stuffed animal. I’m pretty sure that’s not in his job description. I just love that picture. Can’t even tell you why except…

That’s what radical love looks like. If we do the math…with over 9,000 Awana churches in the States, 52,000 churches internationally . . . what if we all got it right? What if we started with the kids and loved them in the Jesus Way?

Radical love could have saved 17 kids in Parkland, Florida. It could have saved Nikolas Cruz as well.

Do you believe it? If you do, will you do one more thing?

If you know a pastor or church that is practicing radical love in their community, would you write us and tell us that story? We would so love to hear it, applaud it and pass it on so that we can all be inspired to love the “other” more radically.

Awana is a world-wide nonprofit ministry focused on providing Bible-based evangelism and discipleship solutions for ages 2-18. As the global leader in child and youth discipleship, Awana gives children the opportunity to know, love and serve Jesus, no matter their background. Through equipped and empower leaders, God is using Awana to reach over 4 million kids every week in 120 countries through partnership with 50,000 churches around the world. If you are an Awana leader, parent or pastor with Awana in your church, you are part of this amazing global God-story.

What does Jesus look like? You might be surprised.

In a perfect world children are loved, protected, cherished and nurtured. But, in an imperfect world  of populations that are seismically shifted by war, economic instability and prejudice, some 26 million children are lost, expatriated, refugees, displaced, exiled, vulnerable, exploited, and often unaccompanied. There have never been so many children in this condition in the history of the world!

Recently, while I was in the Dominican Republic with other women on an Awana vision trip those statistics became flesh in the form of one young boy’s story.

We were visiting Fountain of Love Church, They have an Awana program and preschool. Johan was there to welcome us. He told us his story. He is a doctor and cares for a lot of children. But one day, as he heard the pastor speaking about the negative things happening in children’s lives — the exposure to things on the internet that destroy their innocence, the exploitation of and lack of care for children in their own town who were often left to roam the street unsupervised — he realized that he needed to do more.

Listening to that sermon, tears came to his eyes. He knew that if someone had not been there for him, he would have been lost himself.

He began to volunteer at Awana with 10-14 year-old boys. One of the boys was 12-year-old Jeremy. Jeremy, his father and two other siblings came to Dominican Republic to find work and to escape the economic instability of Venezuela. Unfortunately, his mother was not able to get a visa and she was left behind. This family had to make an excruciating choice between starvation and separation. Jeremy often cried when he spoke of his mother. He was deeply worried about her. Johan felt an immediate connection to him. Johan noticed how quickly he memorized his scripture verses and how he was always asking questions about God. Johan’s heart was deeply moved by this boy’s displacement and separation from his mother.

One night, when the Awana Director asked the boys who loved them besides Jesus … Jeremy pointed to Johan, his small group leader, “Johan is my best friend.”

This story touches me. It puts flesh on the 26 million children in the world with torn up and displaced lives. It shows that what the experts are saying is true. One caring adult can make all the difference in a child’s ability to cope and survive their life circumstances.

But that is not the only reason I am moved. I sense that God has a plan for Awana in 2017 and beyond. It involves a unique space in children’s lives that He is asking us to fill. What does Awana have in abundance? Caring adults. Every week 450,000 adults in over 120 countries show up to minister to 3.7 million children!

I take comfort from knowing that God is not surprised by this crisis in the lives of the world’s children. Sixty-seven years ago He creatively prepared a highly relational kid ministry, one with a high adult to child ratio to fill in the gaps for children. Awana, through the local church is the most stable, most present, most loving adult presence in thousands of child’s lives.

And whether these children are ever asked, “Who loves you besides Jesus?” they will know a place where they are loved, sheltered, treated with kindness, and where Jesus looks a lot like a caring adult who shows up in their lives every week.

The Gospel is Going Viral in Vietnam

Viral. That was the word they used. 

 Viral. That was the word they used to describe what they are seeing. When I attended Awana’s International Summit in Korea recently, our internationals were full of viral stories. They weren’t describing the movement of a super bug or spread of disease, but rather the movement of God’s spirit in the world…revival starting with children.

What did they report?

•   In Africa 1,366,955 kids are coming to Awana clubs. That’s a 38% growth over last year.
•  South Asia, including India, has nearly a million clubbers with also a 38% FY growth.  
• China is experiencing a 41% FY growth.
•  Latin America is up 51% over last year.

If these were stocks experiencing this kind of growth, we would be rushing out to buy them. From my vantage place in the kingdom growth is approaching revival levels in some parts of the world.

Let’s talk about Vietnam for a moment.

In just four years Vietnam has gone from no children to 47,500 clubbers. The leaders from Vietnam told us it is common for a club to run 500 kids with all of them coming to Christ.

“Are they coming as individuals, or en masse?” I asked.

“Both.” they said but then added, “It’s the strangest thing. When they come to Christ, they fall down on their knees…not something that is usually done in the Vietnamese Culture.”

“Why do you think they are doing that?” I wondered.

They answered. “After years of communism the hope they are finding in Jesus is just overwhelming.”

What are we seeing? What are the reports indicating to us? We may not know what to call it, but the Spirit of God is alive, moving and well as children all over the world are coming to know, love and serve Jesus.

Whatever your vantage point is in the kingdom, we hope this viral report gives you great encouragement and hope in your own world.

The Secret Sauce in an Achy World

Words are shifty things—they morph. Time messes with their meaning.

For instance the word meat used to mean all food; but now it means just edible animal product.

In Roman times addicts were debtors who sold themselves into slavery to the people to whom they owed money. But by the 1600s its definition broadened to mean enslavement to someone or some practice.

Then look what happened to the word awful. In the 1300s awful originally meant inspiring wonder and was a short version of full of awe. But now…well, it’s awful what happens to some words.

So, in light of languages ability to morph, I would like to nominate a couple of words for a meaning makeover—an upgrade, a lift, a redo. 

Look at the words volunteer and amateur. See how they shrink in the shadows of a word like professional—which is loaded with greater perceived value and prestige.  But let’s reexamine.  A volunteer chooses to enter into service of his or her own volition, free will and without pay. The word amateur comes from the Latin word “amo” which means to love. Amateurs are the ones who do something for the pure raw love of it! 

For the love of children, all across the world this week, volunteers and amateurs will show up to run children’s programs in churches, Sunday School classes and mid-week ministries.

Because she cares, a young mom will hurriedly feed boxed mac and cheese to her own kids so she can make it to church this Wednesday night to grease the skids of the children’s ministry at church.

A man will rush home from work, wishing he had more time to prepare his lesson for the children he will shepherd before the day is through. He hopes he’s doing enough.

Everywhere this week people will turn down invitations to a night out with friends to keep their regular commitment to the kids at church. Instead, they will drive the church bus to pick up children in outlying neighborhoods and drop them off for kids’ programs at church. They will greet and register children with welcoming smiles and high fives. They will lead games and sing silly songs to delight children. As they teach and listen, they will take children into their hearts and surround them with prayer and care. Then they will top it all off with ice cream or cookies and candies. Then they will repeat it all again the next week.

And more. This week global volunteers will take hope into slums, refugee camps and places unnamed but all sharing the common characteristic of danger. They will reach out to kids who are hungry, oppressed and forgotten by an achy world. They will meet resistance, intimidation and threat… all to help kids come to know, love and serve Jesus.

Volunteers are my heroes. They are the secret sauce that brings hope to this achy world. They are the unmatched global force of love and caring. That’s why the word volunteer needs to include the idea of being held in high regard. Weekly, these amateurs bring it all…their hearts, their enthusiasm, their dedication and their high prioritization of their time and focus. 

So let’s morph the word volunteer to mean hero—for that’s what these people actually are.  A million thanks to you volunteers. And I literally mean a million! Soak in my words as an enormous appreciation from me for the more than 400,000 Awana volunteers across the globe who work with 3.5 million children every week. Thanks for giving your heart, your life, your all. I hold you in high esteem!

Your awesome faithfulness, enthusiasm, dedication, love and in some cases bravery is so enormous it can’t even be measured.

If you’re a volunteer, take this appreciation into your heart.  

And, if you know another hero who needs to be thanked…pass this along when you tell them you couldn’t agree more.

Or if you’re not yet a volunteer…think of investing your life for something you will love…open your heart wide and become a volunteer.

This . . . Across My desk. Four and Five Year Olds in the News.

There was a lot of clutter noise in the world this week: pampered American Olympic swimmers behaving badly in Brazil (and lying about it,) political noise that most of us hoped the Olympics would drown out for a blessed while, firestorms in the west and dust storms in Arizona, flooding in Louisiana.

And buried beneath this global noise, news surfaced –at first far from the front page and the international press corps convened in Rio—news from the four and five-year-old world.

His five-year old face stares out beneath a mask of blood. He is obviously in shock, past crying, rescued after an hour of digging to free him from his Syrian home turned rubble by bombing.  His face looks unsure . . . as if his deliverance into a world gone war-mad might not be such a good thing after all.

Omran. You break our hearts. You are too young to carry the weight of our insane adult world on your small dust and blood covered shoulders! We cry out for the children of the world caught up in our adult hatred and wars. Oh God! Omran is every child. We want to take him in our arms as if he were our own and comfort him. We want his innocence restored. We want him safe and protected. Still, I thank God for giving us this image. Omran, stunned and covered in blood, woke us up to the fragility of a child’s life in a war zone.

Then a friend, Pastor Shawn Thornton, sent me this news report. The headline from the Washington Post shouts domestic evil if ever I’ve seen one:   A 4-year-old found beaten and abused said she thought her name was ‘Idiot,’ according to police.

Covered in bruises, a black eye and ligature marks on her wrist from being zip-tied for punishment, this little girl suffered unspeakable abuse at the hands of her mother and her mother’s boyfriend. When this wounded child was asked by police her name she actually told them, “Idiot.”

The boyfriend said he thought calling her Idiot was a joke.

In 2012 child protective services report 3.4 million children were abused or neglected. 80 percent of the perpetrators were parents.

Oh God! This is the American child. A vulnerable little girl (not much more than a baby) in the merciless hands of sadists, awakens us to her unthinkable every day horrors. We want to rename her Cherish, or Precious or Jewel. We know this child. She is a neighbor, a school mate; the child we sometimes suspect is not OK at home, the child attending an Awana club with a friend.

That’s the sad, sad news from the four and five-year-old world. The world should pay more attention. It should care more and stop the madness that costs thousands of children’s lives or well-being.

The news from the four and five -year-old world this week was not good. But if we are paying attention it will drive us to our knees. It is a week to say a prayer, to cry a tear. It is a week to take the disgust, anger and repulsion you feel and reach out to a child in need somewhere in the world or right next door.