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November Internship Report – Kevin and Alisha Greene

November Internship Report – Kevin and Alisha Greene

Published November 18, 2016

North Annville Bible Church, Annville, PA

Kevin

Ministry Highlights

We had a successful corn maze youth group event on October 23rd. This has always been a favorite event by our group. We rent a tent at a local corn maze for three hours on a Sunday night and get lost in the corn maze. After we find our way out we meet back at the tent where there is lots of good, hot chocolate and a fire. There are also lots of games to play on the corn maze grounds. Two high school students had a great time playing lawn Jenga and were so excited about the HUGE tower that they built together. It’s a great time for the youth groupers and leaders to continue to grow their friendships with one another. It’s also a popular event to invite friends to, which many did again this year. It is always exciting to meet the friends of the students in our youth ministry. We have also had a couple friends come to our church and youth group as a result of an invitation by a family in our youth group.

We had a successful start to our new outreach focus by serving well at the park on Oct. 22. We had a group of about seven adults serve at a local park’s fall festival. They got a good turnout from the community, and we were able to all help in the concession stand and one man drove the tractor for the hayrides. It was such a blessing working with the coordinator who expressed many times how appreciative he was for our help. It was very neat to see others from our church interacting with the guests at the festival who were ordering food and also working with others from our community in the concession stand. Of course the question would come up of why we were helping out and we were able to talk to everyone about our church. Personally, I also got a chance to meet one of the community leaders which was very cool. We talked about our common connection with the local college and how God had directed me into ministry. Overall, I think we were able to love and serve lots of different people and the word got out about our church through not only our conversations but also the conversations the leaders of the fall festival were having with their connections. It was great to be appreciated by our community.

Our Young Adult group had two good meetings again at LVC. One of the weeks we talked about politics because of the upcoming election. It’s always exciting as a leader/teacher to show a group of people something from God’s Word and how it directly relates to our world and lives today. One of the girls in our group said to us that she was thankful for our meeting and the information shared because it helped put everything into perspective. It was also very cool this month to reach out to a young adult who sort of moved here from CA right from high school. She attended our church one time but I hadn’t seen her since. Finally, after a couple weeks I sent her a card with a gift card and said that we missed her and wanted to invite her again to YAC. Well, next week she showed up at church! It was so great to see her and we connected on facebook. What was even more exciting is that she was already friends on facebook with a girl in our YAC group! Sure enough, she had visited this other girl’s church and met her there. It was exciting to hear from her realize how blessed she was by God for Him to be providing all these neat connections in her life. She was very thankful and let me know what when she is in this area of PA she has a church home here at NABC.

One of our high school students felt like he was finally able to put his faith in Jesus Christ! Praise God!

Alisha and I offered to watch eight kids (ages 1-16) for a couple from our church. We actually did it twice this month. They are going through a rough time, and three of the kids are foster kids. I’m thankful that they gave us the opportunity to do this for them and they accepted our offer. We hope that we were able to provide them with a much needed break from the hectic life raising that many kids and helping the foster kids feel a part of the family. These two times watching the kids were also great times for us to connect with them. It’s neat to think that we had and have the privilege to be a strong influence in these children’s lives. They really were looking forward to us coming over and they all had fun when we were there. We are praying that God helps this family overcome some things in their life and they get back to where they need to be.

A young adult who attends our YAC group accepted a position with DiscipleMakers. This is so awesome! This is also a big life direction change for him. He is now working on raising support so that he can devote his life to serving in this ministry full time. It’s been exciting to come alongside of him and give him a variety of ministry experiences. He is so excited about serving the Lord and it’s great to help prepare him for his ministry when he raises enough support. I am praying that God will provide for him and everything continues to go smoothly. It is always exciting when someone in your ministry accepts God’s call for full time ministry service!

Key Prayer Requests

God has answered your prayers for our YAC ministry reaching out to LVC by putting it on a group of lady’s hearts to provide cookies and winter accessories to the students as a simple way of getting to know students. It was so neat to receive that phone call this month. We have been praying about this and here is how God is answering! Dec. 8 we are going to the campus to hand out cookies and meet students. Pray that God will provide many opportunities to talk to students and let them know that there is a church in this community that cares very much about them and wants to invite them to church. I’m praying that some of the students that we talk to on the 8th will be able to start not only attending church but also our Young Adult ministry.

We need God to raise up a new wave of ministry volunteers. Youth group, YAC, and Kids Ministry all need more adult leaders to minister to those involved. This month God answered our prayers in this area by leading me to a few particular people. Pray that I can set up a time to meet with them and talk to them about the possibility of serving in these ministries. Pray that they will be open to the added responsibility in their life and help me to do a great job showing how by taking this position they can influence so many more people for Jesus! We also need a few of our families that have been “visiting” our church the last couple weeks to choose to settle here so we can plug them in. We have ministry holes and it seems like not enough people at the moment to fill them all!

Pray that we can start to reach out into our circles of influence in a programmed and yet random way. We had a great start to this by serving at a community park festival October 22, but we need to keep the ball rolling. I need to meet with each of the LifeGroup leaders this month and share with them my vision for their group’s outreach. Pray that the groups will be open to this vision and be excited about reaching out to their circles of influence.

Prominent Lessons

This month I had the privilege to spend the morning splitting wood for an older couple in our church along with five other men from our church. We had a great time together and we all knew we were helping in a great way. I could see a similar event be an event that falls within our outreach efforts in the near future. If someone knows someone who needs a similar job done it would be awesome to get a group together and go do it. No questions asked. No money accepted. Just a humble act of service wither prayer that God will use it to open their heart to Him and ask questions and know that people, and most importantly, God cares about him.

The cruise my wife and her mom were on got into a terrible hurricane and had to dock in NJ. I also had to meet with a family from church this week that have been a source of a lot of issues over the years. These situations reminded me that we have a big God that is bigger than any problems anyone can have. We are following the Great shepherd of the church and the church is bigger than just me trying to do my part. It also reminds me that there will always be those people in any situation. But it is just very interesting trying to seek God’s will for this situation and how to get the people to realize what they need to do. They have rejected so much help and counsel from our church that it is very sad. But getting to the point to enact church discipline is a little tricky and it’s interesting to think about what exactly that looks like in this situation.

One Friday night this month my wife and I sent parents of five kids and three foster kids away for an evening, and we watched the kids. Saturday night we volunteered at a community park serving lots of people food at the fall festival, and Sunday night we had a youth group corn maze trip that is always loved by everyone who came. I am reminded that as busy as we think we are there are always people that are doing way more. As busy as we think we are the more time we carve out of our schedules for others the more God blesses in return. We can never out give God, and I believe that even comes when giving our time. I have heard it said we can be so busy doing good things that you can get burnt out or miss the point God has created you for, but if you really are doing the best things, and giving your time for others, God has a way of using that in amazing ways.

One Tuesday of this month we saw two basically complete opposite reactions to what was happening at our church in a span of about four hours. One lady was so excited about what God was doing through our church and couldn’t wait to offer her help, and a man who had brought his family to visit another church the last couple weeks and was wondering if we really were doing what was best. The man is another example for me that believers who are not radically committed to the local church are stuck. What I mean by that is that God has gifted him and given them a passion to be on mission for Him but their unwillingness to submit themselves to the leaders and structure of the church result in a very confused and stuck person. They have so many great things they want to do, and they can do them if they ever wanted to do it through the church, but instead they attack the church by saying that we are not doing these certain things. It has also shown me that you cannot please everyone. Two people usually never see the same thing the same way. That is why you have to keep the main thing the main thing and seek to glorify God in everything that you do; because if you try to please people you will never accomplish anything.

This month we started practicing for our children’s Christmas play. Our first Sunday of practice rolled around and the plan was to introduce the play and start learning some of the songs. What ended up happening was that the songs were not what we thought they were, and the director wasn’t quite sure what direction she was going to take the play. It was a great reminder that although we might have these big plans to start off well you never know what will happen. In the end, I think what makes this year different is that we have a good group of adult and high school helpers that are available to help and if something doesn’t go exactly right for the Christmas play we have a good “default” kids program that we are in the habit of doing. So when the music didn’t go as planned, we were able to “default” back to the original kid’s ministry plan. When we didn’t have enough information to practice the whole time we went into our small group time. It’s great to be prepared, and we are excited to see how this all comes together!

Key Goals for the Next Month

Prepare for our outreach event at LVC December 8. Also, plan at least one other outreach event. As I am writing this I am hoping that a leaf raking event is able to work. Waiting to hear back from a man who is contacting their community’s leadership.

Have a successful Reverb youth group event on the 18-19. This event is a very memorable all night evangelistic experience. We have a good group of 32 people going. We are praying for the gospel to be shared in such a way that many in the group, including our group, will make decisions that “echo into eternity.” Over the last couple years many of our students have made decisions recommitting their lives and their faith in Jesus. Praying for a few unsaved friends who are planning on attending with us. I hope they not only have a great time but are able to consider the message of the gospel.

Recruit people to join the ministry teams. Specially, meet with at least one person who would be a great junior church teacher! We have to fill this spot soon since they will be taking over the teaching position in March.

Have a successful start to this year’s youth group Engage program. Engage helps students discover, develop and deploy their spiritual gifts and talents for the Lord and the church. Our first practice is Nov. 13. Our students have already been thinking about things that they can do, which is awesome! One of our leaders also had a great idea for a skit that I am hoping they will be able to do as well.

Alisha

Ministry Highlights

Participating in youth group and leading a girls small group.

Helping to lead YAC, our Young Adult Group. We have a wide variety of people who are attending from freshman LVC students to a married couple, to young adults from the community who never went to college.

Helping to lead our NABC Kids Sunday morning ministry. I lead a small group of six to seven kids and mentor high school students as they help lead the group as well.

My husband and I watched a family of eight children so that the parents could have some much needed time together. We brought dinner, pumpkins for a craft and had a blast. It was great to know we were able to give this couple a much needed break and they were very appreciative.

I was able to connect to a girl who is struggling in our youth group in a special way by giving her a special necklace. She appreciated it very much.

I was able to help serve at the Cleona Park Fall Festival alongside seven other members of our church. It was great to serve people and I got to meet a lot of new people.

Thankful that an eighth grade girl has started to look forward to attending youth group. I’m spending a lot of time connecting with her and was able to go through the corn maze with her and take her home afterwards.

We had 32 people attend our youth group corn maze event. This is always a very fun event.

I was able to spend time eating with a new couple to our church during our 5th Sunday Fellowship Dinner. It was great to make this new connection.

Babysit for family again that needs a lot of help. Neat to build those relationships, even in a difficult situation.

Key Prayer Requests

Thanks for praying for a good vacation with my mom. Although we did not ever get to Bermuda, or have a cruise, we made it out of the ocean safely. Now pray we have a great visit with family for Thanksgiving.

Continue to pray for a girl in the youth group that is struggling.  She has recently made some significant changes in her life and praying that although they have been very difficult decisions that God will use them to deal with the big issues.

Pray for my sister in law that is going through a lot difficult things in her life.

Help me to help others do what I do in the kids and youth ministry. We need more helpers!

That I have a good manual certification class and continue to learn a lot that can I apply to my job every day.

Prominent Lessons

Connecting with people during the week is a good way to show you care about them.  Even if it means something as simple as sending them a text message to let them know you are thinking about them.

I learned what it is like to take core of a family with a lot of young children. I learned the time commitment, patience and time it takes to make sure the children have what they need and are all getting along with each other. This also reinforced my desire to one day have a family of my own. However, probably nor eight children.

I was connected with a new couple at church and had the pleasure to get to know them more. Through this interaction I learned a lot about their backgrounds and where they are from. I also learned that if initially you open up to people and be real, most people will feel comfortable opening up to you.

Key Goals for the Next Month

Have a great Reverb youth group event Nov. 18-19.

Help the kid’s ministry Christmas play come together well.

Meet with an LVC physical therapy student from YAC and show her what pediatric physical therapy is all about.

Get together with other YAC people and continue to build those relationships.

To help a particular family to start coming to church again.

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