Today was my birthday. It wasn’t one of those very noticeable numbers, unless you consider that I grew out of my own “target audience” today. In my years of talking and writing about young adult ministry, I’ve always been in that age group. I called it 18-30 for a while, and then it morphed into 18-35. Today I turned 36, and now I am officially and unavoidably a not-young adult. (No one I know extends the “young” description past the early 30s, unless you count sociologist Robert Wuthnow, who defines “younger adults” as 21-45 in his book After the Baby Boomers.)
In these last few days of young-adulthood, I have been preparing to teach the Bible-story learning station at my congregation’s Vacation Bible School next week–five mornings of church camp with games, songs, crafts, snack, and, of course, Bible stories. Our Children & Family Ministries Coordinator wrote the curriculum with some friends, so I’ve been learning their way of telling the stories, inspired by a method called Godly Play. With roots in Montessori teaching methods, Godly Play helps children enter into stories with imagination, intentionally leaving things open-ended.
I’ve been quite taken by this imaginative open-endedness, which is summed up for me in the way Godly Play leads children into “wondering.” The storyteller “wonders” out loud throughout the Bible story, for example: I wonder if the merchant has a name? I wonder how many sheep the Good Shepherd has? I wonder if you have ever been close to treasure? I wonder if you know a place like this? I can’t wait to try this with kids next week and see what happens. But in the meantime, the “I wonder…” mantra has cross-fertilized my annual birthday-contemplation. Here are some “wonderings” on this birthday (not exactly the “top 10,” but the first 10 that come to mind)… (more…)
New Houses from Old Bricks 
