St. Paul Presbyterian Church -Christian Education

The LOGOS program has the following elements:

--Snacks (not shown on schedule) are served as the elementary students arrive from school.

--Recreation is a time for structured play under the supervision of a recreation leader. The games promote respect, mutual understanding and Christian principles.

--Bible study is an age-appropriate exploration of the meaning of God’s Word for our lives. It is intended to supplement, not replace, the Sunday School curriculum.

--Worship skills is a time to learn worship songs and learn about the various aspects of the Sunday worship service.

--Dinner is “LOGOS family time.” Children of all ages are seated with “table parents” who promote conversation and appropriate behavior. The meal usually has a theme, described in the menu/schedule.

LOGOS -by Shelley Dreibelbeis

Sr. High Student Ministry -- High School Mission Trip

During the first week of August, seven of St. Paul's own will be on a mission trip to Kokomo, IN.  Such a trip takes financial resources, a caring adult taking time off of work, time out of summer activities, lots of preparation, hard work, and the support of families and the congregation.  Is it really worth it?  Here's what youth ministry guru, Mark Oestricher, had to say about the subject.  
"Q: Why are (or why aren't) mission trips good for building students' character? How high of a priority should they be in youth ministry?

A few years back, a handful of thought leaders in youth ministry were in a room that I also happened to be in. We were talking about what spiritual growth actually looks like in teenagers. But we experimented by starting the discussion with stories from our own lives of when we experienced significant spiritual growth. 
After we'd all told a bunch of stories, and themes from the stories had been placed with sticky-notes all over a wall, we noticed something interesting.  All of the stories fell under one of four umbrellas, or contexts: meaningful community, pain or failure, victory or success, and perspective-altering experiences.

Missions trips offer all four of those contexts. Seriously, what else do we do in youth ministry that offers all four of those contexts in a compact span of time? There's some bad short-term missions trips out there, to be sure.  Drive-by missions, or missions-vacations, or "lets go see the poor and destitute so I can feel both bad about myself, then better about myself because I felt bad about myself" trips. But a theologically and missionally thoughtful trip can from what I've observed have a more lasting impact on the faith formation of a teenager than anything else I even did in youth ministry."  (http://youthworkers.adventures.org/?filename=qa-with-mark-oestreicher-discipleship-missions-the-evolution-of-youth-ministry)

Thank you for your support! We look forward to sharing our mission trip experiences with you! 

CHAOS CORNER by Robyn Mills

For those of you new to CHAOS (Christ Has All Our Solutions), we are the Middle School Youth Program at St. Paul. We are so excited to have your child in our group this year. Thank you so much for entrusting your children with us each week as we are excited to have your child in our group. We have a spectacular group of kids this year and we look forward to many adventures as we grow in our spiritual journey.

We’d like to take a moment to recognize and celebrate a CHAOS leader who will be taking a break this year. Val
Nichols has been a youth leader at St. Paul for over 10 years and has shepherded an entire generation of kids at St. Paul through their middle school years and on their faith journey. If you see Valerie, make it a point to thank her for her many years of service!!
Next, we want to thank Annie Temple for volunteering to help lead CHAOS…she has helped in almost every aspect of our LOGOS program through the years and we are honored that she will lend her time and talent to CHAOS! Welcome, Annie!!

CHAOS is many things to our middle schoolers…if you ask those that have been through the program, I think they would tell you that CHAOS gave them a place to belong, to feel safe, and to be themselves. LOGOS’ motto that “we are all children of God” is very important at CHAOS and we strive to make each child feel valued and important. At CHAOS, we strive to have equal amounts of fun, fellowship and learning. We’ve found with this age that sometimes
kids learn the most when they are playing games and working as a team.

CHAOS officially begins with an intergenerational dinner at 6:00 P.M., although some come at 5:30 and sing with Nathan and the elementary LOGOS. At 6:45, we begin most nights with different games to let the kids unwind, then we will go into the CHAOS room for a lesson. This year, CHAOS will be over at 8:00 PM. There may be times when we are on an outing that we will be later, but we will try to let the parents know in advance.

Service is a very important component of our CHAOS experience. We try to stress all types of service to our church and the community at large. Each month, we will be doing a service project to help the church or a variety of organizations in the community. This gives our kids a better understanding of how they fit into a larger community and how much it matters for them to help. When we schedule service projects or fun activities outside of St. Paul, we are required to have a signed permission slip from each of the parents.

Our lessons this semester will focus on the many facets of who God is and the different ways we respond to him. Then we will look at the fruits of the spirit or exploring the wonderful talents that God has given us and how we can use them to serve God and others.
We just wanted to give an update on the activities that we have planned for the fall, so that you can get them on your calendar. All of this is subject to change and we will update you often so that you know what we’re planning.