Take the Faith Promise Challenge
This is your challenge—should you choose to accept it. With the start of the new year, the national BGMC office is in the second year of a nation-wide challenge. We are setting a two-year goal (2007-2008) to see 100,000 kids each year make faith promises to missions through BGMC. Present the faith promise challenge at the start of the new year in January, at your missions convention, or on National BGMC Day in March.
Teaching kids about missions goes far beyond encouraging kids to ask their parents for coins for their Buddy Barrels. Quality missions education teaches kids to have a missions heart, and gives them the opportunity to hear from God about how they can make a difference. Setting a faith promise goal helps kids touch God through prayer as they are challenged to consider what God is asking of them to sacrifice in time, effort, and resources.
When kids are presented with the challenge to seek God for an amount He would ask them to give, and when they spend time with their parents throughout the week to give this matter time and prayer, they often have a very divine moment with God. They learn to hear His voice, and they take note of His instructions for them to follow. Kids then turn in their faith promises and begin to seek ways in which they can earn money for missions.
Kids who make a pledge/goal have something to work for. It gives them an incentive to raise money for missions. Without a personal goal, they may just throw an occasional quarter in their barrel instead of working hard that month to meet their pledge amount. Kids need to be taught to do their best to earn their money for missions, and they need to be taught to make sacrifices for that money. If kid's don't learn that now, they won't do it as adults. God asks all of us to do our best to help supply the needs of His Kingdom.
It's amazing to see the faith of kids grow and multiply through this process. They hear from God when they make their faith promises, and very often they hear from God throughout the year as they work to raise funds. Their faith is stirred. Their knowledge of God grows. Their ability to hear His voice increases. They discover that God is a real Person who will talk to them if they listen. Kids who learn to make faith promises year after year often grow to have very intimate times with God.
Ask the kids for monthly testimonies and reports on how they are doing to meet their goals. These reports will produce excitement and will encourage the other kids to keep on working. It will also give other kids ideas on how they can earn money. Plus, every time the child meets his/her goal, it becomes a real "faith" builder. We personally have seen tremendous spiritual growth in kids who make faith promises and then trust God to help them and provide.
We are challenging churches in every district across the nation to teach kids about faith promises. Once you have finished launching this faith promise challenge with your kids, contact your district office and let them know how many kids made a faith promise. The district will tabulate the totals and pass that information on to the national office. Our goal: 100,000 kids making faith promises to missions and BGMC!
Faith promise brochures and cards are free and available to you. Look below for available BGMC resources.
