Have You Tried This? – Part 5

Interecclesial activities:

• At least two ecclesias presently sponsor biennial Bible schools.
• Combined CYC activities.
• Informal get-together with other ecclesias.
• Joint Sunday school entertainment programs.
• Joint Sunday school picnics, outings.
• Planned trips to gatherings.
• Regional CYC activities (study and devotional time) hosted by the ecclesia (Thanks to a small ecclesia for this big idea.).
• Sunday school exchange visits.

Interpersonal activities and events:

• Chili cook-off, soup and pie cook-off. (These can be carried out as fund raisers).
• CYC hosted in family homes.
• “Evening with the Teacher”.
• Family days; family nights every six weeks: skating, bowling, tobogganing, etc. followed by a potluck supper. (Some assume you live in the North of America!)
• Get-together throughout the week.
• Mother’s Day celebration.
• Secret friends (aunt/uncle and child).
• Social time with snacks between Sunday school and Meeting.
• Tribe Sundays. All members of the ecclesia are grouped in tribes, bridging the age levels. On “Tribe Sunday” members of a tribe get together to participate in a common activity.

Parties, picnics, and banquets:

• Costume parties.
• Mother-Daughter Banquet.
• Pancake breakfasts.
• “Pizza and Readings” evenings.
• Potluck lunches / suppers on a regular basis.
• Sunday afternoon outings (e.g., picnics in the park).
• Sunday school kickoff breakfast each semester.
• Sunday school picnic.

Recreation:

• Activity days (e.g., recreation in the afternoon followed by a theme dinner).
• Baking, biking, bonfires, bowling, camping trips, canoeing, carnivals, craft programs, hayrides, kite making and flying, mini golf, outside game days / inside game days, ping-pong, rocket launching, (ice) skating parties, sledding, sleepovers, summer swim parties, zoo trips.
• Fun days combined with dramatic presentations.
• Nature hikes to see God’s handiwork, trips to the mountains.
• Recreation day held at a local college facility or gym.

Service projects:

• Card making and sending.
• CYC runs one or two days of activities for the younger kids.
• Fund raising for Agape-in-Action²(Thanks to a young Granite State sister who told me about this project.).
• Hall care day; work days that include the Sunday school children.
• Leaflet pushing, preaching efforts.
• Neighborhood barbecue as an outreach project.
• Organizing a special Mother’s Day luncheon (the children take charge of this).
• Preparing and distributing Thanksgiving baskets.
• Save the Children³bake sale.
• Taking the younger children on an outing or helping them in some other way.
• Visiting nursing homes.
• Visiting shut-ins.
• Volunteer work in the community.
• A Boy’s Club (This idea was proposed in The Tidings magazine in December, 1958, by our late Bro. Fred Buckler of California. It’s worth republishing. Does anyone know how this project turned out?):

“Our Sunday School is going to organize a Boy’s Club. We would be happy to have any boys from other Sunday Schools, between the ages of 8 and 12 attend. The main object of our club will be service to others. We hope to make things for people in Christadelphian homes for aged or any other project of serving others. By meeting other boys and working with them, we hope to teach them that the Christadelphian way of life is a life of service to others and that serving others brings joy to our own lives.”

Bro. Buckler puts things into perspective for us. When all is said and done, we need to be wary of activity for activity’s sake. The point of extracurricular activities is not to have a calendar full of grand events and polished productions that do little more than entertain the children, if that. Spur-of-the-moment activities can often be as effective as well-planned ones. And in all the doing, we must not let the children lose sight of the fact that ecclesial life is not about “What can I get out of it?”, but, rather, “What can I put into it and what can I do to help?”