Equipping Families to be Strong in the Lord
Setting up our booth
From set-up on Thursday to tear down Saturday night, our weekend at the Kansas City Homeschool conference was busy and eventful. We did 3 sessions, and felt that they were well-recieved. We arrived home today today.
Here is our booth, finally set up! 🙂
On Friday night, we were invited out to dinner by the Ward Family, who help host the conference in Kansas City. We enjoyed the fellowship and the good BBQ meal. Here’s the “kids” table.
Our family was on our way home from MACHE, the Minnesota Homes School Convention a few nights ago. It was about 11 pm.
“What’s taking Dad so long? He’s been in there a half hour!” I heard Stephen say to my mom.
“He’s probably talking to someone,” I remarked and went back to sleep.
When Dad finally returned to the van, he told us what had happened.
As he entered the gas station, instead of finding a bored-looking employee behind the counter, he was surprised to be greeted warmly by a bright and cheery junior high boy who was buffing the floor. “I hope the restrooms were clean! How far do you have to go?”
Dad made a few friendly comments in return, and then left. After taking about 10 steps out the door it hit him, “I should have given that kid a dinosaur booklet!”
As Dad re-entered the store, the boy shut off his buffer.
“Here, I thought you might be interested in this. We’re trying to reeducate the country. We don’t think we came from monkeys,” Dad said. (That’s the “standard line” Dad uses when he gives these little Creation Science booklets away.)
“Monkeys?” the boy asked, looking confused.
“We believe the Bible supports Genesis,” my dad replied.
“Genesis? What’s Genesis?” he asked.
“It’s the first book of the Bible,” my dad explained.
“Oh! I should have known that.” the young man answered. “I was just confirmed yesterday. Catholic, I think.”
Shocked, my dad realized he needed to say more.
He continued, “Well, the world wants us to think that we just came from nowhere, but the Bible says that God created the world. People don’t want to admit this because they don’t want to deal with God. But the truth is that there is evidence in every area of science that is consistent with—and supports— Genesis. Did you know that there are sea shells in the rock strata of every high mountain including Mt. Everest?
Now the boy was shocked. I’m not sure if he was more surprised by hearing about sea shells on Mt. Everest or by the fact that he was getting a science lesson from a customer at 11 pm.
“So how could the shells possibly get there?” my dad asked him. “The Bible says that there was a worldwide flood. And the geologic evidence all over the world indicates that the geology of this planet was formed by a flood. In every area of science, the evidence is consistent with the Bible and not with evolution.”
The boy smiled with what seemed to be eager interest. “The real issue is God,” my dad said, realizing that what he really needed right now was the gospel, not a science lesson.
“Whether Catholic or Protestant, we both believe that God created man and that man has sinned. That’s the heart of the matter. God wants us to live forever in heaven but we can’t because we have sinned. And being good alone isn’t the answer because we could never be good enough. We would have to be perfect, and that’s impossible.”
The boy agreed.
“The solution is that God needs to forgive us. But to do that, somehow sin has to be taken care of. If God punished us for our sin it would destroy us, so He can’t do that.”
Again the young man smiled and nodded in agreement.
So my dad said, “The only one who can receive God’s punishment and not be destroyed is God Himself! That is what the cross is all about. God created man, then became man so He could die for us. It’s actually really simple.”
At this point, having given him the basics, my dad switched gears. “You need to read the Bible,” my dad told him. “It would be good to start by reading John. Matthew, Mark, Luke, John. It’s at the beginning of the New Testament.)
The boy went over to the counter, got a blank receipt from the cash register, and wrote “J-O-N.” He looked up, “Ok, and you said that’s in the New Testiment?” He wrote “N-E-W T-E-S-T-A-M-E-N-T.”
My dad was thinking to himself, “Boy, he really is a beginner! He still needs a lot more information, but I can’t stay and talk. Anyway, he’s supposed to be working. So he said, “Read the book of John and pray. Ask God to give you the eternal life He is talking about there in John.”
In addition to his friendliness, the boy also seemed serious and mature. Perhaps, even though he knew so little about spiritual things, he did have some interest in knowing the one true God (since he said he had just been confirmed the day before.) Perhaps the Lord was now providing some information to bring his knowledge equal with his interest. When one responds to the light he has been given, God will give more light.
The boy asked my dad a few questions about himself. “No I didn’t teach school,” Dad replied, “But we do try to help families. And we teach about God and the Bible. The Bible is our wisdom. It’s God’s book.”
Not wanting to overload this boy with too much to think about all at once, my dad left, reminding him to read John and pray about what he read. Our family has been praying for him.
Here are Stephen and my mom working at our booth. The conference went very well. One thing I appreicate about homeschool moms is that they are very encouraging and easy to talk with! It’s a good thing, too, because after two days of explaining the same thing, I stop thinking straight!
Some answers we give over and over like, “The age range for Bright Lights is approx. 10-15” and “Yes, Sarah, Stephen and I actually do get along” (It’s not like really have a choice now, anyway 🙂 ) and “No, we don’t have material for boys (yet)” and “I know, Sarah doesn’t look 28, but she really is”.
This weekend our family has a booth at the MACHE homeschool conference in Rochester, MN. Our day today has been long and tiring, but also very encouraging. Right now we are all in our hotel room making plans for tomorrow, deciding who has “first shift” working at the booth in the morning, and giving Sarah some more ideas for her up-coming session.
Stephen set up a video editing operation in our hotel room and spent several hours today up in the room making a new “Knights, Maidens and Dragons” DVD. (That is, in all the time we weren’t calling him to fix our cash registers downstairs at the booth. 🙂 ) He had quite the set-up here in the hotel room and made great use of the extra time he had. Knights, Maidens and Dragons is a presentation Sarah and my dad do on courtship and purity.
After months of studying the book of Acts, the “big day” arrived! Last Saturday we drove into Chicago and enjoyed a long day of Bible Quizzing. The competition is very intense, causing hundreds of kids to really study God’s Word. (Many quizzers memorize it word for word.) It was a fun day and my team and I did better than we expected.
My team is to my left in the picture: Lena, Laura and Edward
Three teams (12 quizzers) sit on pads in a half circle. The quizmaster begins asking a question and whoever jumps up from his pad first triggers a light on the quizmaster’s control box. That person then has 30 seconds to answer the question. After 20 questions are asked, the quiz is over and the quizzers go to another room for their next quiz.
Sarah and Stephen used to be in quizzing before they got too old, and my dad also was a bible quizzer when he was in high school. We’ve been so grateful for quizzing and for the Scripture it’s helped us to learn; we wouldn’t trade it for anything! The World Bible Quiz Association is a non-demoninational organization. www.wbqa.org
Sarah explaining about how to use the Bright Lights material.
Rebekah May, Sarah, Stephen, Dad, Mom, Me, Nickie Biegler, Chrissy Baskerville, Rachel May
Saturday evening after the conference in Cincinnati, we packed up, drove back to Indianapolis. We picked up the 4 girls who had run our booth for us at the Indianapolis Home School conference, and ate supper downtown Indianapolis at the Spaghetti Factory. We had a good time relaxing and sharing stories.
We were surprised at the busy night-life that downtown Indianapolis had! It was about 10:30pm, and there were traffic jams, busy sidewalks, and people partying everywhere. Watching the people, it was obvious that they were searching. They aren’t satisfied. We overheard a song being played talking about “meaning in life”. People don’t have it, and they are looking for it.
Nickie Biegler, Stephen, and Dad
Spring is here! For my family, spring means lots of state Home School Conferences. This weekend our family made plans to go to two Home School conferences (Indianapolis and Cincinnati) at the same time by bringing a team of Bright Lights leaders, dropping them off in Indianapolis, and then heading to Cincinnati with just our family.
We had fun setting up our booth during a thunderstorm, especially because we were setting up in a tent.
Stephen and Dad
Last night when the conference started, a lady came to our booth and gave Sarah an encouraging report. She said, “My kids and I heard you and your brother and sister speak about sibling relationships at a conference a couple years ago. We liked the way you used skits to demonstrate what you were teaching, so we decided to come up with a skit that our family could present together, which included the gospel. At first we just did it for just a very small group, but then the kid’s grandpa saw it and got excited about it. He invited them to do it for a larger group. One time, after we had done our skit for a group of about 300 people, a lady came and told me “I turned away from God and didn’t want anything to do with Christianity. But now—after seeing your kids—I’ve decided to come back to the Lord.” When families work together as a team, it makes a powerful impact for the Lord!
Something very special happened last weekend… Our first-ever Radiant Purity Conference was held in Alexandria, Minnesota! It was for girls 12 and up, and included topics such as modesty, dangers with the dating system, how to handle crushes, learning to delight in the Lord as our Prince, being open with our parents, waiting on the Lord, and having a life purpose bigger than marriage. The conference also included 2 chalk-talks, skits, wedding video clips, singing, discussion groups, and mother’s sessions.
This conference was a dream-come-true for us and many others. It was so exciting to see it all happen and see God’s hand working! Personally, I was challenged, refreshed, and exhausted when it was over.
We brought about a dozen older girls who are leaders in our Bright Lights group in Cedar Rapids. They led the discussion groups, ran registration, worked at the book table, acted in skits, shared testimonies, led the singing, and helped with set up and tear down. We’ve all learned a lot about how to work together as a team, how to run conferences as smoothly as possible, and how to rely on God’s power.
Hearing practical testimonies and teaching from real girl’s lives was encouraging to everyone.
I think it’s exciting to share ways we saw the Lord’s hand at work. Here are a few examples:
Laura Sisson, Grace Mally, and Elyssa Ertz in our “Old Fashioned Skit”
Elyssa Ertz, Laura Sisson and Nickie Biegler in a skit Friday night
About 650 mothers and daughters gathered in Burnsville, Minnesota for our 19th Bright Lights “Strong in the Lord Conference” in Burnsville, Minnesota. God kept things exciting for us as a large snow storm began just as the conference was starting! Our group of about 20 Bright Lights leaders from Iowa got “stranded” for an extra day after the conference, but everyone arrived home safely, and we enjoyed the extra time together!
A theme verse we chose for this conference was Psalm 46:1 “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.” No matter what the troubles or complications arise during a conference, God is not only present, He is very present! He’s the one that gives the victory. One of the things that especially encouraged us after this conference was the large number of girls who told us they were going to start reading their Bible everyday now.
Here are a few pictures from the conference:
I decided to undertake the occupation of “family journalist”. This is a site where I will post recent news, pictures and stories from my life and my family. Thanks for visiting! 🙂 -Grace
