Starting in June of 2009, our Children's Ministry team decided to do quarterly events to encourage our church families to invite their oikos to church. Oikos - greek for household (for more info click here)
On January 30-31, 2010, we held our first AMPED weekend of the year. The theme was Winter Olympics. We brought in 10 tons of snow and had each grade compete for the gold medal. Here's the video from our "Opening Ceremonies," as well as some highlights.
The event was fun. The snow was cool. Our volunteers were great. But the best part about the weekend was the God moved and our families responded to the challenge of bringing their oikos to church. We saw our numbers go from 650 on a normal weekend to 977 kids in elementary alone! We also saw 146 kids who had never been to our church before! Not only that, but our adult attendance numbers were noticeably up as well.
If you helped make AMPED happen this weekend, THANK YOU! God so badly wants to reach our oikos and our HDC families are getting it. They are changing their worlds for Christ!
Thanks to the HDC custodians, maintenance workers and facilities crew for allowing us to destroy some grass, clog vacuums, and create a mess of fake snow. Thanks to our families for responding to the challenge of inviting oikos families to church. Thanks to all our volunteers who spent time with kids this weekend, cheered for them and encouraged them in their olympic feats. Thanks to our coordinating team. Without you, we would not have been able to do this. Thanks to Debbie and Kati for running games and services, for directing volunteers, and for making sure everything went smoothly. Thanks to Todd and Jeff who not only provided oversight and vision for the event, but also got their hands dirty (literally) and did whatever needed to be done. Thanks to Sara for organizing and planning, and then adapting and changing those plans and ideas.
I love serving with all of you and look forward to our next AMPED weekend! If you are wondering, the next AMPED weekend is May 22nd and 23rd... mark your calendars now!
