How should your church celebrate
Easter?
Many say "we celebrate
Christ's Resurrection every Sunday" therefore, there is no need
to do anything else. Others celebrate Lent from Ash Wednesday
through Palm Sunday, on to Easter morning. Children's Ministry
International (CMI) has a wonderful series entitled, "IT
IS FINISHED" that allows your church or home to have as
many as four, 45 minute lessons that cover all the major themes
around Easter.
The major themes of Easter are:
-
Jesus' calling to go to Jerusalem
-
His triumphant entry on a donkey
to Jerusalem
-
His last days in the temple
-
His Betrayal
-
The Last Supper
-
Jesus' prayers and arrest in the
Garden of Gethsemane
-
His trial
-
His time before Pilate
-
His Crucifixion
-
His Burial
-
His Resurrection
-
Jesus' Ascension to Heaven
That's a lot to cover
in four weeks! But many churches only have Palm Sunday and
Easter Sunday to teach these concepts and modify the series to "fit"
into their schedule.
Remember, our materials are:
-
non-consumable - use this
Easter Series year after year -- emphasizing different themes
each year)
-
non-dated - take the four
weeks or expand it to eight to go deeper
-
for multiple ages - kids
from 3 to 12 will enjoy this series!
Yes, CMI
materials are DIFFERENT.
Here
are some other "extras" you'll find in the "IT
IS FINISHED" booklet.
-
Crafts to help our
covenant children actually learn key verses
-
colorful hold-up stories
(not flannelboard).
-
coloring book for
the children that will reinforce everything they learn.
To help you make your
choice this Easter, CMI is offering a 10% discount on the above
items and anything else you may want to order over the next few
months. Use this code "EASTER07"
when you order through our web page. Don't delay, Easter will
soon be upon us with the wonderful story of Christ taking our sins
upon Himself, overcoming death and ascending to heaven to continually
intercede in our behalf.
****************************************************************
NEW YEAR....NEW CURRICULUM?
2007
is CMI's 25th Anniversary! Yes, 25 years ago in the Atlanta
suburb of Tucker, retired pastor Hank Thigpen and his wife, Carolyn
started CMI in their home. The first "curriculum they developed
is what we have continued to update and revise over the years.
It took around 15 years to take every 145 basic questions around
what a Christian should believe and put it into a colorful, Bible
centered, song saturated, review game oriented curriculum in which
children actually memorize the concepts. We have added song
CD's, upgraded the crafts, improved the color visuals (flannelboard
based) and added other teaching helps to present you the "Bible
Building Blocks of Faith"
There are 14 Series, topically arranged covering everything from
Creation to the "final days". Your children will learn:
Each series takes at
least one quarter (3 months) to teach. You can start with
3 or 4 year-olds and continue on to 11 or 12 year olds.
Try our
Series
A today, taking advantage of the
10% discount.
******************************************************************
CMI Seminars
It seems like our
seminars are being utilized over and over again in churches
that want to start home devotions/worship, have a Covenant Life
Parenting Conference, or motivate their Sunday School teachers
to greater work. Check out our web page and get back to us.
Many of you have seen some of the articles CMI's Director Brad Winsted
has written for "EQUIP Magazine" on "The
Lost Art of Family Devotions" or "Why
Bother Catechizing our Children". You can also see these
articles on
CMI's
web page.
*******************************************************************
HOLIDAY Series
Yes, we announced last month that our "Holiday Series" would be
available in January. We had the prototype completed, but
then our writers and editors saw some problems with it so we are
in the middle of a rewrite again. CMI, in the past, had similar
problems with other series. Why? Well, we want all of
our materials to be different in the best sort of way. We
don't want to confuse, we want to edify and be completely faithful
to Scripture. When you look at many of our secular holidays
we get "mixed messages" and confusion, on how to redeem them, if
we really want to redeem them at all. Pray that we will "get
our act together" and get these three booklets out!
For the children,
Brad Winsted, Director
