September 4, 2000
'Jesus' video for kids opens eyes to gospel
___By George Henson
___Staff Writer
___LUFKIN--A movie and popcorn may be all it takes to change a child's life.
___That's the experience of Steve Sparks, associate pastor for students at Carpenter's Way Baptist Church in Lufkin. Sparks and members of his youth group took the video "The Story of Jesus for Children" with them to Mobile, Ala., this summer "not really knowing how we were going to use it."
___But a good use for the video presented itself the first day of a Backyard Bible Club in ahousing project. A sudden torrential downpour forced the group to leave the park and move to the gymnasium of a local community center. There the video was shown to the children.
___The video is an adaptation of the "Jesus" film that depicts the life and ministry of Christ and has been viewed by millions worldwide. The children's version is not animated. It uses footage from the original motion picture and adds a storyline of a group of children who follow Jesus around because of their curiosity. The film runs only 62 minutes to accommodate the attention span of a child.
___"It worked out really great," Sparks said. "We took enough people to Mobile that we could sit with the children in our laps and answer their questions about the film as they came up."
___Sparks said it worked well for the video to have been shown the first day, because that enabled the group to counsel the rest of the week with those who made decisions for Christ. By week's end, more than 70 adults and children had made professions of faith.
___The next day, the group was setting up when a man drove up looking for "the people from Texas." Sparks said they feared they were going to be accused of violating some ordinance by sharing the gospel in a public park. The man, however, was the director of a Boys and Girls Club several blocks away and wanted the group to show their film to the 75 children who gathered there each day.
___The Texans showed the film there a few days later, and more children accepted Christ.
___"It opened up a lot of doors for us to share the gospel in a non-threatening way," Sparks said.
___The success created a problem, though, because the church in the area, Walls of Salvation Gates of Praise Church, does not have enough leaders to carry on the nurture and discipleship needed as follow-up with the new believers. Sparks hopes to change that by returning to the church for a training conference for adults.
___"There is such a need for these kids to be ministered to in an ongoing way, and the pastors there are just overwhelmed. There seems to be others who would help if they knew what to do, though, so hopefully we'll be able to help with that," Sparks said.
___The church found the video worked just as well back home in Lufkin after the group returned.
___"It's just one more medium for us to use to try to communicate the gospel to these kids," Sparks said.
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