BETTER TOGETHER week 1: The First Church

LOVED teaching the ZG'rs God's Word tonight!
We missed Mr John but know he had a GREAT opportunity to show Jesus' love to other kids!

We are beginning a three week series called Better Together.  Our big theme is that we as followers of Christ need the local church as a place to grow together and fulfill God's plans and purposes for our lives.

To understand what the church is we watched this short video: it's bit silly
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=INsNTdaBIG8

God created the church to be a place where we can develop deep, authentic friendships.  Those kinds of relationships should lead us to genuinely care for others - and care and concern should lead to action.  This week, the ZG'rs examined Acts 2:42-47, which reveals how the earliest followers of Jesus built solid friendships and put their concern into action.  These Christians studied the apostles' teachings.  They shared meals. They prayed.  God used them to perform miracles.  They met together, shared possessions, and sold things so they could help the needy. (Just like ZG'rs did last spring).

We encourage ZG'rs to see these verses as a model for what God desires.  We can pursue and develop deep, authentic friendships, and we can care for one another.  God's plan for the church hasn't changed.

In order to put "caring for one another" into practice... we made cards for those at Terrace Palms who aren't feeling well.  I know they will feel the LOVE of God when they open the card!

The kids are doing great memorizing scripture. This week we are working on...

'And all the believers met together in one place and shared everything they had.  They sold their property and possessions and shared the money with those in need.' Acts 2:44-45

I didn't print out a copy of the scripture memory ... please pass it on.

We pray that you and your family have a great week.

We missed you: Peyton, Keanu, Corrina, Mercella, and Victoria

Don't forget:
Glow Golf on Saturday from 1 - 3
Movie Night Outreach July 17... pray about who to invite.




Ms. Kim

Who is God? Week 3: God the Holy Spirit - Our Counselor

We had a GREAT night tonight!  So thankful for a evening to study God's Word with the Zero Gravity amazing kids!

To start out the night, we paired up in teams.  Keanu & Morgan, Sammy & Corinna, Peyton & Abbie and Mercella & Brianna (new friend)!!  For each pair, one child was blindfolded and the other was the guide.  We walked outside while the kids experienced being blind or being a guide and then they switched places.  (I should have taken pictures!!)

Back in the classroom we started the final week for our series on who God is, and we turned our attention to God the Holy Spirit, whom the Bible describes as a "counselor" or "comforter" or "advocate" for those of us who follow Christ.

After Jesus returned to heaven, God sent the Holy Spirit, and this reveals how God genuinely wants the best for us.  God knows we need help to live truly meaningful, significant, impacting lives.  We receive this help through God the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Trinity.

Giving us the Holy Spirit also shows that God wants a close relationship with us  because of his incredible love for us.  God sends his Spirit so that we can remain in constant communion with him until we arrive in heaven.  The Holy Spirit allows us to be connected to God at all times and to understand God's incredible plan for our lives.

We missed you: Victoria
Snacks next week:  Keanu and Peyton

Memory Verse:
When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all truth.  He will not speak on his own but will tell you what he has heard.  He will tell you about the future.  John 16:13

4th of July Parade - Meet at 6132 Whiteway at 9 am.  Bring your own water, snacks and chairs and be ready to share the love of Jesus with those around us.

11th of July - GLOW GOLF

19th of July - Game, Pizza and Movie night!!

Who is God? Week 2 God the Son - Our Savior

We started out the night talking about home remedies for common problems:

stomach ache:  charcoal
ear ache: onion
toothache:  ginger and cayenne paste
cough:  slugs

We discussed how we didn't like those remedies... then bridged into the fact that Jesus is considered a remedy.

We then watched this youtube video called The Cure and discussed it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KGdxd9K65Yg

Finally we talked about the meat of the lesson - Jesus - God the Son.  The Bible reveals that Jesus was both fully God and fully human.  He lived a perfect sinless life.  He performed incredible miracles - multiplying food, raising the dead, healing the sick.  And the greatest demonstration was his victory over death - his resurrection from the dead.

Jesus also experienced human emotions and pain.  He cried when Lazarus died.  He felt compassion when he saw the crowds of hurting people.  And when Jesus was crucified, he bled and suffered excruciating pain.

This means that as God the Son, Jesus is powerful enough to save us completely.  As someone who was fully human, Jesus understands and sympathizes with us completely.    AMEN!!

To close out our lesson we made of list of people we wanted to share our remedy - Jesus - with.. then we prayed for them and challenged ourselves to pray for them throughout the summer.

None of these names represent TPCC members... :-)

Scripture Memory:
Because God's children are human beings-made of flesh and blood - the Son also became flesh and blood.  For only as a human being could he die, and only by dying could he break the power of the devil, who had the power of death.  Hebrews 2:14

Upcoming Events:

July 4th Parade!  Meet at Ms Gloria’s house (6132 Whiteway) at 9 am!  We will WATCH the parade together!!

July 11th  - 1 to 3 at 15732 N. Dale Mabry Highway, Tampa, FL 33618        Cost $12
July 17th - Pizza and Movie Outreach Night.. INVITE FRIENDS
July 19th - Engage Tampa 2


Thank you for the snacks: Corinna and Mercella
Next week snacks brought by: Keanu and Peyton
We missed you: Abbie and Victoria

Who is God? God the Father - Our Provider

Tonight at ZG we have jumped into an exciting new three-week series examining the topic of who God is.  The first week focused on God the Father, and we saw how he loves us, hears our prayers and provides for our needs.

To really understand now God provides for us... for our first activity each child became a creator and made a creature.  Along with making a creature, the creature had to have a name, what food it needed to be fed, AND what they needed to survive.  The creative side of the kids came out for sure!!!

We discussed that God does not provide out of obligation or guilt or manipulation.  God provides because of a deep, unconditional perfect love for us.  We encouraged the ZG'rs to remember all the big and small ways God has provided for them because the more we are aware, the more thankful we become - and the more we nurture our love for God.

We pray regularly for you and your family, and we hope you have an awesome God-blessed week!

Don't forget Memory Verse is Matthew 6:33 (NLT)

NEXT week we will enjoy a presentation from Team Haiti.  Parents are invited to attend!

I-Dentity: Discovering Who God Created Me to Be

It was a GREAT joy to meet with the new and improved Zero Gravity!  We had a GREAT time and enjoyed learning new things about each other with our Ice Breaker game called Spider Web.  We passed a spool of blue ribbon back and forth in our circle as we answered some great questions about our likes/dislikes.  We created a unique web that if one person was gone, it would look different.  In the same way it's important that we all take part to make the group what it is, unique and special.

Here's a picture of a class - not ours- playing the Spider Way Game.

Tonight we wrapped up our three-week series called "I-dentity".  Week 1 we covered "Who I am" and Week 2 we covered "Who I am NOT".  And this week we talked about being the body of Christ - how each of us has been given a unique set of gifts and abilities to something that honors God and serves others.

Using 1 Corinthians 12:14-21, we focused on how each of us is unique, how we need other people, and how other people need us.  

We discussed the gifts and talents that God gave us to serve others.  We also talked about what job in the church they would love to do.  The answers included be on the worship team, teach the children and hand out communion.

We are going to work on weekly scripture memory... this weeks is 1 Corinthians 12:18... "But our bodies have many parts, and God has put each part just where he wants it." 

Have a great God-Filled Week!

Ms Kim and Mr. John 

Testimony and Mission Night - We traveled the World!

On the third Wednesday of the month, all the youth groups come together for Testimony and/or Mission Night.  Tonight we combined them!

First we heard from Jonathan and Katy about their trip to Peru.
(It was recorded and should be on our website, terracepalms.net).

They shared the who, what, where, how and why of their trip to Peru.  It was great hearing their stories in such a relaxed manner.  After they shared, they opened the floor for Q & A - what a joy to hear the FANTASTIC questions of their peers.  Every question was on point and gave Jo and Katy to share what they learned from their trip.

Next, Ms Jen led us in preparing our hearts to pray for the Haiti Team.  

Dustin and Ms Lynn

Jonathan and Mr. John 

Katy and Ms. Kim

We started our time by seeing this video.  It was filmed in Jacmal, Haiti which isn't too far from Petit Goave... where the team will be.  Take a minute to enjoy!

Next we broke into 6 teams and prayed specifically for each of the team members.  What a precious moment to see all the youth groups, praying together for their church family.

Finally, we all chose a Sewn with Love Dress ... and we prayed for the little girl who will receive it.  What a joy to think that in less than a week and little girl in Haiti will have a BRAND new dress.

We finished out the night serving the church by stacking up all the chairs in prep for the work day and then having cake to celebrate birthdays.  

We had a great night and are thankful for the opportunity to reach beyond the walls of Terrace Palms.

Ms. Kim and Mr. John

PS  Next week we will be in Haiti - Ms. Tara and Ms. Jen will be leading a game night with both STOMP and ZG.

PPS  We are in search for a pool to host a pool party on June 20. ... let me know if you are aware of one we can use! 

We missed you Victoria and Keanu!! 

Promotion Night - ZG has a new LOOK!!

Hello!

I am so excited to announce that I am teaching Zero Gravity with the Amazing Mr. John.  I am looking forward to understanding the WAYS of ZG.

Tonight, here's what I learned:

- ZG sponsors Djbril in Africa.  ZG has been sponsoring him for a few years so we will continue to support him.  I look forward to learning more about him and writing to him soon.  We are a smaller class, and we'd like to cover the entire cost of supporting him so please bring in $3 - $5 dollars every 3rd Wednesday.  Morgan will be collecting and recording the money donated.  I encourage you to have your child "earn" this money.  Makes giving it much more meaningful.

- There's a ZG mascot.  Tonight I met Henry! He is a paper stuffed snowman that survived the New Years Lock-In.  He is a cutie and the BEST student.  Very well behaved.  He's in our class picture.

- I was educated on snacks!  The kids told me families sign up to bring snacks weekly.  Sammy volunteered to head this up.  You'll be getting an email from him shortly.

- Abbie volunteered to take and share prayer requests!

- Keanu volunteered to encourage Scripture memory.

I think our group is shaping up to be a GREAT team!

Upcoming Weeks:

May 20 - Testimony night from Katy and Jonathan about Peru AND prayer for team going to Haiti

May 27 - Ms. Kim and Mr. John will be in Haiti - so STOMP and ZG will have a group game night.

So excited about the year to come!

If you need me?  Please reach out to me!

I'm here to help your child glorify God and Enjoy Him forever!