Daniel - Stand Up Against Peer Pressure

It was great to see the kids tonight!  We so enjoy having them at class and we know that their parents/grandparents make it happen!!  Thank you!

We missed Morgan, Butch, Keanu and Peyton!!

Before we started our lesson tonight, the kids decorated their Djibril notes and they are ready to be mailed.  If your child missed turning them in... bring them Sunday.

This week we launched a new three-week series on the topic of "Dangerous People".  Each lesson focuses  on a biblical character who did the right thing despite the risk of alienation, death or rejection.  We talked this week about Daniel, using Daniel 1 as our primary passage of Scripture.

Daniel and three friends chose in this chapter to do the right thing.  They were captives in Babylon, part of a group of young potential Israelite leaders who were taught about the government, culture, language and literature of Babylon - basically trained to serve in their captive land.  When told to follow the king's rich diet, they chose to go a different way.  At the end of 10 days, these four guys looked healthier than all the young people who followed the king's diet -showing that God's way clearly the better way.

We encouraged our students to recognize how doing the right thing:
Allows God to use us
Increases our Trust in God
Allows others to see God

We regularly pray for you and your family, and trust that this week is a great one for you!

Mr John and Ms Kim

You're One of Many Pieces

Tonight we completed the 3 part series called "Better Together".  

The first week we discussed the First Church and the need of the local church as a place to grow together and fulfill God's plans and purposes for our lives.

Then last week we discussed A New Command where focused on the "glue" of a healthy ministry - love.

This week we finished our "Better Together" series with a lesson called "You're One of Many Pieces".  We're continuing to see how as followers of Christ need the local church as a place to grow together and fulfill God's plans and purposed for our lives.  This week, we examined several New Testament passages that describe how the church is a body and a family.

Most of us battle one of two tendencies:  We either see  ourselves as better than we really are, or we see ourselves as less significant than we really are.  It's vital that we grasp Paul's messages in Romans 12:3:  Have an honest evaluation of who you are.  Don't think too highly or lowly; recognize that you're valuable, essential, important - and so is every follower of Christ. 

Our job is to find unique roles in the body, the family, the puzzle or the team, and then help others find their roles, too. We need to discover, develop, and use our spiritual gifts, passions, abilities, and experiences to honor God and serve others.  

To introduce the concept that we are one of many pieces, we put together a puzzle.  It had a few pieces missing.  We were able to "see" the picture still but it wasn't complete.  Missing pieces are those people who don't get connected to the body of Christ.  We all have a role to play a part at Terrace Palms and when we don't do "our" part... it hurts the whole body.

To remind us that we are one of many pieces - we all received a puzzle piece and wrote Romans 12:5 on the back - our memory verse:  We are many parts of one body, and we all belong to each other.

Thank you Victoria for Snacks!  

9/9 - Butch will bring snacks!

9/16 - Missions Night with guest speaker and backing toiletry bags for homeless
9/23 - Abbie brings snacks!
9/30 - NERF NIGHT!  Bring your nerf gun and bullets! (please don't buy one if you don't own one, we will have plenty to share)

Better Together!!

It was GREAT to back together tonig
ht!

We continued our Better Together series this week by focusing on the "glue" of a healthy ministry or church - LOVE.  If we're committed to becoming a "body" and a "family" with deep, authentic friendships, we need love.

Love is more than just words or a feeling.  It is primarily an action, and Jesus commands his followers in John 13 to love one another.  Jesus also tells us that non-Christians will know that we are his followers if we truly love one another.

ZG kids saw how love holds us together  - it binds, unifies and strengthens us - like Krazy Glue!  We become more effective because of love.  We become more like Jesus because of love.  We have an impact on our world because of love.

To explain how love can bind us together we used Jenga blocks and built a tower.  Easily, with a tiny push all the blocks toppled over.

We then used Legos and built a tower.  Because the Lego's interlocked, the tower didn't over topple over as easily.

Our lesson was based on John 13:35 - "So now I am giving you a new commandment:  Love each other.  Just as I have loved you, you should love each other"

With school starting back - we don't want to stress the kids out with scripture memory.  So I'll record a video tomorrow and send it to them to help them memorize it!

We missed you Victoria and Keanu!  So glad to have our first visitor friend Butch joining us!

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!