Preteens: Seeing God in Creation

We did something new last night for our preteen midweek service.  For worship, I played the music video for God of Wonders by Third Day.  I asked the group to listen to what God what speaking to them during the song & to think of ways God shows himself through creation.  Each preteen was given a washable marker.  During the song, they were instructed to write or draw on their hands and arms ways they see God in creation.  I hijacked this idea from my friend, Jim Kast-Keat, preteen programming director at Mars Hill Bible Church in Michigan.  He did something similar (but I changed it up a bit) at a preteen service awhile back.

The worship experience was awesome!  They were really into it!  Everyone’s arms and hands were covered in artwork.  Afterwards, preteens shared what they wrote/drew with the rest of the group.  Really cool!  But there’s more to the story.

My son was a part of the group.  He came home and earnestly tried to wash off the marker.  He was unsuccessful.  He woke up the next day and went to school with his arms and hands covered in tattooed God sightings.  The thought came to me that he isn’t the only one.  Everyone else was in the same boat.  I had a group of preteens who would go to school with God graffiti all over them.  My first reaction was all the moms out there who might send me a nasty email.  So, I texted all of them I had in my contact list.  I got nothing but great responses from all of them!  They were glad to send of their preteen with a reminder of God tattooed on them.  Wow!  Imagine that, preteens would have something to look at all day long reminding them of God.

On the way to work, I started to think about how this would impact their friends.  I imagined the comments and questions they got from classmates.  The preteens in my group live in La Jolla and the surrounding area (San Diego).  Most people aren’t Christians around here.  What a great way to bring up conversations about God with their friends and classmates!

i thought the markings would wash off and am not sure why they didn’t.  But I am excited about what happened.  I guess God had other plans!!