Trick or Treat?

The people of Emersons Green love Halloween! Each year more and more people decorate their houses and gardens and more and more children get dressed up and walk around the streets trick or treating. For many of us, we do just the opposite! We close our curtains, turn the lights off and go to bed early. But why?! There's no need to be afraid of the dark, Jesus is the light of the world! In fact, at this time of year, as people knock on our doors wanting something from us, why not use the opportunity to offer them light and life, hospitality and hope. Jesus says to us in Matthew 5:14-16, 'You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in their house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.' This year, rather than shying away how about shining out? Here are a few things we can do to let our light shine...

1. Share. Many of us use social media, and Halloween is a great time to share a video and tag a few friends you'd like to watch it. One of my favourites is Trick or Treat? by Glen Scrivener and Speak Life.

2. Decorate. If you're creative, or even if you're not, how about decorating your house and garden? Put some fairly lights up, make a window display or carve a pumpkin (even I can carve a heart into a pumpkin!)

3. Give! A pumpkin outside your house is an invitation to Trick or Treaters to knock on your front door, and when they do why not give them a bag of sweets, a couple of glow sticks, some colouring sheets and a gospel track? The Good Book Company or 10ofthose have a wide selection of Halloween tracks - one of my favourites is The Pumpkin Story by Ed Drew.

As the people of Emersons Green celebrate darkness and death, let's use the opportunity to celebrate and communicate the light and life of Jesus Christ.

Defending Faith, Family & Freedom

The Christian Institute have invited us to a public meeting on Tuesday 15th October, 7:30pm at Kensington Baptist Church. The Institute's staff will give important updates on key contemporary issues. This is what they say...

'We must defend gospel freedom because activitists want a law against 'conversion therapy' to impose LGBT theology on preaching, prayer, pastoral work and parent-child conversations.

Allowing assisted suicide would put vulnerable people at risk, but the most sick and fragile in soiety are still valuable because they are made in God's image. Meanwhile, in our schools, pupils are increasingly exposed to harmful ideologies and anti-Christian teaching. The good news is there are many ways Christians can be a positive influence.

Please join us to hear more about the difference you can make.'

Tuesday 15th October, 7:30pm

Kensington Baptist Church

208 Stapleton Road

Easton

Bristol

BS5 0NX

Reaching Families

The new academic year is well underway and so here's a lightly edited article by Ed Drew, the Director of Faith in Kids, about how to involve our children in evangelism:

I was in the first month of working for a church. I was young. I had no children. I was sat in the home of a couple from church (who I had only just met). That week their five year old had told them a story from school. She had got together with her best friend from church and had cornered a boy from their class. With their prey unable to leave, she told him, “You’re going to hell if you don’t become a Christian.”

There was a silence. My heart was in my mouth. My eyes bulged. I thought they were going to say, “That is the problem with our church. We’re raising closed-minded, bigoted children.”

Instead, they said, “She wants to be an evangelist! We told her a few other ways she could do it, but isn’t it great that she wants to tell others?”

I was stunned. This was the beginning of seeing how parents can do outreach with their children. Evangelism always takes courage. The awkwardness can be real. The goal is worth it: whole families turning to Christ. Those families are best reached by Christian families.

With a pre-schooler, you make friends

A new baby often shows us that we have no idea how to be a parent! We need help, support and advice. Ideally, that care would be local because it’s hard to travel with young children. This is why you talk to strangers as you push a swing or as you walk the streets with a screaming baby. Let your friends benefit from your amazingly supportive church family. Show them that having a baby does not need to be lonely, they can have a community. They need help!

With a 5-11 year old, you partner

At school, your children are making friends on their own. Partner with them as they learn how to show Jesus Christ to those friends. Get to know the parents of their friends. These are the families that your family can then pray for and hang out with.

Talk to your children about who to invite to church services, events or clubs. Talk to them about what this could mean for friends and their families. Pray with them. And when their friends can’t come, don’t want to come, or say they’ll come but don’t turn up, acknowledge your child’s disappointment, share their sadness and then pray some more.

With a teen, you support

Your children have grown up. You are less likely to know their school friends. You are much less likely to know their friends’ parents. The responsibility for their evangelism is now theirs and not yours.

Your children are now deciding if they want their friends to hear the gospel, and how they might make that happen. Support them. Don’t tell them what to do. Ask them good questions. Help them with their questions. You can make it a normal topic of conversation, and you can pray for them, and with them.

As with all parenting, practice what you preach. Get every kind of person around your table for meals. Exclude none. Love freely. Talk honestly. Listen well. Let’s reach out to other families with the gospel, together with the whole of our own family.