SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to another episode, the place where we talk about kids ministry and take a peek behind the scenes. We try to share a little bit of what we've learned that works for us and some of our failures so you can avoid them. We release a new episode every Friday, and this is your Backstage Pass to see the magic or disaster that happens behind the scenes of our kids' ministry. I'm your host, Gabe Baker, and today I'm joined by Anisha and Shaylee, backed by Popular Demand.

SPEAKER_01 0:44

Oh, hello, everyone. How are you guys doing? Good. Good. How are you?

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Good. Wonderful. All right. So, Shaylee, what are we talking about today?

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Today...

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It's

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on

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the script there. And that's exactly what the kids think is cool. So we can try to get the kids to focus on the right things. And then this gives us the opportunity to make, to teach, teach them and to like make it stick, you know, make it stick in their

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mind. I think a great example of it is in Sunday school and on this past Sunday and the battle.

SPEAKER_00 2:13

Oh

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yeah. And it was so chaotic.

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We have video of that. And I

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haven't watched it cause I'm embarrassed. I did not know what was going on the whole time, but I think it was like, they had fun and I think it's because like that participation I think that the reason people sometimes don't do audience participation is because it is can it has the potential to be a lot messier and a lot more chaotic but it's fun for them like that's what yeah it's their favorite part I remember in Sunday school I was like oh I always wanted to be like okay well can we all go do it you know like always wanted to be

SPEAKER_00 2:49

yeah if somebody would have walked in like a Sunday school teacher walked in They were like, this Sunday School classroom is out of control. Yeah, out of

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control. I walked out there from the back, and I saw Shaylee sitting on a bench, waving a sword around,

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screaming. So Shaylee was Deborah, the judge. She was definitely cheering the kids on. Definitely.

SPEAKER_01 3:16

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 3:16

I was leading Israel in the battle. Oh, yes. I have a video. She's in her outfit, her whatever, blue silk or whatever. Yeah, blue silk, waving a sword around. She's on the bench. She's like, ah!

SPEAKER_01 3:26

So embarrassed.

SPEAKER_00 3:30

And then she even, I don't think you got this on video, but I saw it when somebody threw a ball because we had these little, we had these little, they're like a Nerf golf ball. Yeah. And we use these for battles. They're perfect. Yeah. So we throw, the kids get to throw these at each other. And so we used to use paper, wadded up paper.

SPEAKER_01 3:49

We would have to like tear up brown paper and like

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make the ball and put it in a box. I remember that. We had boxes of, even printing paper

SPEAKER_01 3:57

yeah any kind of paper

SPEAKER_00 3:58

yeah but we graduated to these golf balls and so they might hurt a tiny bit when somebody gets hit close so we use those but anyway so uh somebody threw one i caught one i was in the sound booth but shaylee like hit one out of the park with a

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sword

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yeah

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you guys don't have my permission to release that video anyway

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I think if we post this, we'll have to attach.

SPEAKER_01 4:29

Oh my. This is a little clip of all the screaming.

SPEAKER_00 4:34

So, um, but yeah, so that's definitely, it can seem chaotic and messy, but that's like the kid's favorite part. And so that's what they'll remember is the battle between Cicero's army and Deborah and Barack's army. So, um, I have a few notes here, but one of them is why cool themes are important. And so I know not every Sunday school is Ours is a bigger, I guess you could say like venue or whatever we have ages five through 11. So we kind of combined the ages. And so I know some, some classrooms are smaller cause I split them out, but, or it's just a smaller church, whatever, but we combine those ages. And so we, we thrive on themes. Themes are like a big deal for us. And

SPEAKER_01 5:19

it's like, it's such a blessing to be able to have it set up for a long time. Like not having to take down and set up every Sunday. Like, Like we used

SPEAKER_00 5:27

to be. Oh, man. Yeah. Yeah. Now, were you guys ever part of, because you guys were pretty young as far as in the Sunday school realm, because you guys were both kids in Sunday school. That's why I say that. But were you guys ever part of the set up take down every week when we did it?

SPEAKER_01 5:43

I wasn't ever a part of it. I was here just because you were here.

SPEAKER_00 5:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:47

But I was never like a Sunday school staff. I think I was for a really short time because, and I think it was right at that like transition point where I went I was just like right over the age. So I think it helped. I think it helped a little bit. And then I wasn't in it. I wasn't in it like immediately. And then, yeah, it was that transition to where we moved into the building. So I was only there for a couple of times.

SPEAKER_00 6:08

Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Cause we used to set up every week and yeah. So it's so much better to have it set up permanently. Yes. And with themes, there's, there's a few things go into themes, but one of the things we're kind of talking about is the decor. And so even if you have like a small classroom, you can still like, In fact, I would argue that with a small classroom, the expense is less. So you could go all out on decor.

SPEAKER_01 6:33

And it's easier to cover up the room and really transform it, I think. I think it can be hard in here because it's such a big space. And you're like, wow, we have to create so many things to fill this up.

SPEAKER_00 6:44

Like, yeah, if you think of square footage of a wall, like we got at the peak of this, we have. I can't be doing measurements. At the peak of this. Square footage and I went. 16 feet tall. I mean, so that's really tall by, you know, 30 feet wide or whatever. And so when you're thinking, okay, I got to cover this wall and make it look cool all the way up that high. Yeah. It starts getting expensive, you know, and you have to get really creative. Definitely. But the cool thing about the themes is that's like your first impression.

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Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:18

Oh, yeah. So kids walk into the room, even if it's a small room, and if they're just like, whoa, you know.

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Blown away by

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it. Yeah. And then it also sets the tone yeah it does because then when they walk in like the example i like to think of is if if a kid is expecting maybe traditional sunday school coloring pages and i mean you know that's fine if that's what somebody does but we don't do that so if somebody's expecting coloring pages and um a little bible lesson or something and and kind of expecting to be bored i guess is what i mean and where i'm going with that coloring pages are not necessarily boring but but if so if a kid is expecting that level of Sunday school and they come in and it's you know maybe a table set up with a craft or something and it's just the room is bare and there's nothing no decor or anything then you are proving their expectation and then whenever like you start to do something, they're viewing it through that lens. Like, okay, this is what I expected Sunday school to be like. Whereas if they walk in and it's like, you got sound effects going, you have, you know, like

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a sore

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fight. When they walk in, you blow that expectation out of the water. And so now they're like, then now when you do something that's quote unquote boring, a humdrum lesson their expectations are so high that they're

SPEAKER_01 9:00

like okay this is probably cool yeah I think that just I've never thought of Sunday school as oh that's gonna be lame but I think that that is the expectation that's set for a lot of kids whether they're in church or not like when they're just out in like the world and they're gonna expect oh well that's so lame

SPEAKER_00 9:20

yeah right

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and so then they walk in and it's just like so unexpected and so it's just like going to be so cool and it's outside their expectation it just

SPEAKER_00 9:29

yeah well and you know this i don't want to get too far off topic topic but this goes into the effort that we put in too yeah um i remember i'll tell a story uh it's part partly on you so years ago so i was youth leader a long long time ago i think before you were born or right when you were born or something but a And then I retired and there was other people that came up and they were youth leaders. Well, I had to cover for somebody one night and my wife and I had to cover for youth and we hadn't done it in a long time. And you and your brother had heard, you and your brother Logan had heard that we were going to be running youth. And this is, I just thought of this. This is a great example. Was I in youth at

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the time?

SPEAKER_00 10:20

You were in youth. You guys were both in youth and you had never been under us. You had always had other youth leaders and You heard that we were going to be running it. And I guess, I don't know what this speaks to, but you guys were just like really worried that it was going to be really lame.

SPEAKER_01 10:33

Oh, no.

SPEAKER_00 10:34

That's so funny. You guys were just like, oh, man. Really? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:39

I don't remember that at all. That's so funny.

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So then what happened is you guys came and it was really good. You thought it was awesome. He's like, it

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was amazing. He's like, of course.

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So what happened is you guys went home. So your dad, Pastor, called me. And he said, you guys were just raving about youth night. Like this youth night was so incredible. It was out of this world. He said, he said, Shaley was describing Frito boats as if it was filet mignon.

SPEAKER_01 11:12

That's so

SPEAKER_00 11:16

funny. So something as simple as Frito boats, which is chili with Fritos, for those that don't know, cheese and other toppings. But she, she, the Frito Boats were just incredible amazing because the youth night was amazing

SPEAKER_01 11:33

so he's like you're the reason I have to now do youth I was probably like 11 the Frito Boats were divine he's like you're 13 yeah

SPEAKER_00 11:47

so anyway that's themes are important we thrive on themes in our Sunday School and that's one of the reasons why is it can make such an impact on kids and set their expectations um and then another thing is stories so we're big on themes and we're big on our story and there's a couple different ways we were talking about pre-show and you're asking like what kind of stories bible stories or theme stories and i think both so we thrive on um themes and so our themes have a storyline yeah that is uh is usually 16 weeks or 13 weeks whatever our theme is we typically do 16 weeks and so it has a beginning all the way there's a climactic ending at 16 weeks and so oftentimes there's a cliffhanger too like you know we're in week five and something happens to the hero we don't know what's going to happen you got to come back next week to find out you know and so that in itself can create interest and create you know kids like especially kids that don't go to church here they want to come back and see what happens yeah and then our Bible stories are I would say 99% of the time are full-on acted out with costumes. There's like 1% of the time where we just tell it. And

SPEAKER_01 13:03

even the Bible stories we do sometimes like part one, part two. Like if it's Joseph, we'll do part one this week, part two next week, maybe even longer

SPEAKER_00 13:10

than that. Yeah, we do like a mini-series. We did a mini-series of Samson. It was like a five-part series.

SPEAKER_01 13:15

Yeah, that was a very funny series.

SPEAKER_00 13:18

Shout out, Brent. Even this past Sunday, the one we were joking about with Deborah, but that one even was kind of a two part. So what we did is we did the, we did the first part where Deborah comes out, asks for, um, tells her servant to go get Barack. So Barack comes, he's too scared and all that. And so she, she's like, okay, well, I'll go with you, but it's going to be a woman that wins, whatever. And so, um, so we did that. And then, um, we go all the way up to, we set up camp. We, we Split the kids up so it was 100% participation. All the kids got to be used. So we had Barack's army and then about – that was about a third of the kids. And then the other two-thirds was Cicero's army. And so they're on one side of the room. So we're not in a theme right now. So we had like a pretty wide open room.

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Wide open space.

SPEAKER_00 14:13

Yeah. And then we set up the benches like to – as a barrier. And they set up camp. We turn off the lights, you know. And then Brother Aaron comes out as a spy. And so – Had some silly spy music, cartoonish spy music.

SPEAKER_01 14:31

Yeah, and he hops along

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to it. Yeah, and he's going to it and everything. And so he's spying with his... We got these donated, but these really cool... Oh,

SPEAKER_01 14:40

the glasses? The spectator? Is that what they are? I don't know what they are. That's what we used them for originally. That's why it's stuck in my head. Because they were like... I think it was in the Pearl of Great Price, and he was looking at all of the things and inspecting the price. Yeah, because it has one little magnifying glass over one

SPEAKER_00 14:57

eye yeah and they have a light it has a light on it you turn the light on so anyway he had that on and and then he had a spyglass too yeah so he's spying out and then he goes and tells sisera of course that you know barack's army is coming so sisera and his whatever 900 chariots or whatever get all you know ready to go and so then anisha is passing out the golf balls we talked about earlier and uh and then oh and then uh deborah was supposed to give the signal and somebody's wires got crossed somebody else just started i

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was like it was oh i think it was when it was sisera was like we need to attack those people and then they just started and i was like wait

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too late

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and i was like okay

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yeah because i was like go stand by the light yeah you say go stand by the light and then turn on and so i still did i was like

SPEAKER_01 15:48

all right let's roll attack and turn on the lights and then that's when they started so they were very good they waited for my school see that's why they once they start throwing So that

SPEAKER_00 15:55

was the interactive part, which we do a lot of, too. But that was the interactive part of the Bible story. So they got to do this big battle. It was messy, chaotic. And that was probably a couple minutes. And we have a saying that two minutes is an eternity in Sunday school. So they go for two minutes. And then, of course, Sisera and the staff over there had instructed them, you have to go to battle, but then you have to die. So we always ask, do we have any good actors here? So they want to die.

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Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:22

So some of them do pretty good, too. They'll be really dramatic. It's very funny. You can catch it. It's really cool. I

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think that was probably me when I was in Sunday school. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:33

yeah the other day i don't i don't know if it was i don't think it was this sunday i think it was a couple weeks ago but uh my wife was up here and she pointed out she's like look at look at ashton my son my six-year-old and he had died and he was he had died a little early and there's kids like stepping like almost on him and stuff and he's laying there sprawled out super committed to it yeah he's committed he's got his eyes closing he every once in a while like peeks but he was committed he was he was he's So, and then, but anyway, so that was like our split between, we didn't really have it as part one, part two, but that was our split. So then we like, okay, everybody calm down, put the balls back. Everybody goes back and sit down on the benches. And then we had JL come out. And I remember I wanted to establish for the kids that, okay, this, this battle is happening while JL is over here, you know? And so you had to do that with scenes that are live, right? Like if it was video, you could kind of cut to it. or something. But so we had to establish like, okay, this is happening at the same time. So we had the servant, like we had a, just a random servant come out and like tell jail that he was going to go check on the battle. He heard some yelling and stuff. She's like, okay. So he leaves. And of course Cicero comes in. And then, you know, I think people are, I think I heard Odyssey do this and they were really delicate about

SPEAKER_01 17:57

how they are very delicate

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about how Cicero gets killed. And, you know, I don't know. I used to be pretty delicate and we were still careful, I think.

SPEAKER_01 18:09

No, I had her hack off his head with an ax.

SPEAKER_00 18:13

Well, so we try to be a little bit delicate, but I remember, this is back when I was trying to protect you as a little butterfly, snowflake or whatever you want to say. And we avoided the word kill.

SPEAKER_01 18:29

Oh, interesting.

SPEAKER_00 18:30

Isn't that interesting?

SPEAKER_01 18:31

Very interesting.

SPEAKER_00 18:32

I never knew. And so we would tell the kids and And then they got rid of him.

SPEAKER_01 18:37

Oh, that's good. That's funny. That's funny. Now it's like, JL, slaughter Cicero.

SPEAKER_00 18:46

So we didn't really go into detail, but we did have the steel hammer sound. Did you

SPEAKER_01 18:52

really? Oh, no. I didn't hear that part. I think in Odyssey, they just have a scream happen, and then they're like, and if you want to know what happened, go ask your parents. That's good. Well,

SPEAKER_00 19:05

I was telling the staff in practice that I had read, I have like a, on one of my apps, I have a King James version side by side with the message version. Because it's kind of funny. At youth, I read the message version sometimes, you know. And so it says, and usually the message version will be referencing something from the King James. But the King James has nothing like this. But the message says, he convulsed and died.

UNKNOWN 19:33

What?

SPEAKER_00 19:33

Yeah, he convulsed. So we were contemplating having Sisera convulse. Convulse.

SPEAKER_01 19:40

There's one part I just listened to. I was listening to the Absalom one,

SPEAKER_00 19:46

Odyssey. Oh, on Odyssey? And

SPEAKER_01 19:47

she's like, what happened? He's like, it's not something someone your age should know about or something like that. It's super funny. Or they'll say like, well, this is a family show. Yeah, this is a family show.

SPEAKER_00 20:01

That sounds like something Brent would say. Yeah. Like, especially as the news guy. As the news person,

SPEAKER_01 20:06

yeah. I think he was on a thing of, like, BTV. Yeah. Probably.

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He would be like, well, since this is a family show.

SPEAKER_01 20:13

Yeah, it was on the Elijah one. Am I kicking something? Am I kicking? He's like, it's on the Elijah one, and they're asking, like, how he died or something. The horrible demise, which is not appropriate for children's listening or something like that. They go, like, into a super fast, like, news announcer

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voice. Like the disclaimer? Yeah. That's so funny.

SPEAKER_01 20:33

Whoa. horrible advice that is not appropriate. I can't remember exactly how he says it, but it's so funny.

SPEAKER_00 20:38

You know, I was going to, I just brought up the news theme and I was going to say something in reference to, in my little opening dialogue or monologue about the, sometimes we think things are cool that kids don't. Well, one of the things I thought of a long time ago was with benches. So we ended up just buying cheap benches. We got the, what are they, Lifetime or whatever benches and they're just white and you can't really paint them. I looked into it and it's really hard. But anyway, so we got those benches but years ago we built some of our own. Yeah, they were

SPEAKER_01 21:17

those benches. And

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then we carpeted over them for padding.

SPEAKER_01 21:19

I wasn't in here when they were carpeted because I remember one Sunday morning I wore like a, it was like tool or something and I had to like go get my jacket out of the sanctuary and come and lay it down because I was like, it's going to rip my skirt. And so I came and laid it down on the things and sat on it i remember like two out of whatever 10 benches were like way more fuzzy carpet and so we would always fight we would run oh really try to get those benches first oh yeah carpeted benches they would like be random and they'd be moved every sunday so we'd try to find the back in my day we sat on the ground

SPEAKER_00 21:53

that's what yeah we used to sit on the ground but one of the things i was gonna say about the benches is we had talked about painting them all like red and blue and you know bright colors kids colors, you know, a mix of colors. And then I remember thinking like, well, it'd be cool if they were all like, you know, all blue or something. And then somebody pointed out like that it wouldn't be as cool to kids. I was like, that's true. You know, as an adult, I was like, okay, all black benches. And that's what I was about to say. It's like, I would be like, okay, all

SPEAKER_01 22:25

the benches are going to be black,

SPEAKER_00 22:26

but yeah. All black benches. But that's boring, right? And kids walk in and it's a rainbow of colors. They're like, yeah, this is really cool. Yeah. So, but... Anyway, go back to the theme, the news theme. And it went really well. It did go good. It was a short theme that we did. It was nine weeks.

SPEAKER_01 22:43

It's pretty funny.

SPEAKER_00 22:44

It was funny. We had a lot of funny characters and did a lot of comedy in that theme. And I think the kids did enjoy it. But it was not one where if you tell the kids, like right now, if we told the kids we were doing Narnia, they would just be over the top like, oh, yes, this is so exciting. This is cool. But when we said, it was a secret too. And we announced it like, it's a news theme. It's like.

SPEAKER_01 23:07

Dead silence. Oh,

SPEAKER_00 23:09

no. The crickets, you

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know. Oh, see, if Adrian was a true comedian, he would have turned on crickets.

SPEAKER_00 23:17

So it was like, and then I remember a boy from another church came up to me at a youth rally we were at a few months ago. And somebody, one of our kids must have told him. And he was like, he's like, gives up breathing. Brother Baker, so why did you switch it to a news theme? And I was like, well, it's not going to be a news theme when you come in August. It's going to be something different. He's like, oh, good. He's like,

SPEAKER_01 23:47

oh, good. I'll come. I guess I'll go. I'll be there.

SPEAKER_00 23:50

So anyway, but as adults, all of the staff was super excited about the news theme. We were like, oh, yeah, this is going to be so cool. We had ideas for costumes and characters and everything. And so it's just an example. And like I said, I do think it went well and the kids liked it. And if we do it again, we probably will do it again, then the kids that remember it will be like, oh, yeah. They'll remember and

SPEAKER_01 24:11

be

SPEAKER_00 24:11

like, oh, yeah. But it's kind of interesting that it wasn't nearly as cool for

SPEAKER_01 24:15

kids. Yeah,

SPEAKER_00 24:16

yeah. Okay, so another thing I put in the notes is create specific scenarios to obtain the interest of the kids. So we use the stories, the Bible stories. We use the theme skits that we have, the theme storyline. And we use our characters, everything. But then we create specific scenarios sometimes just to direct the kids' attention to something really specific. But we did this one where Sammy, that's Brennan's character, it's a dunce character, but Sammy got scared. And so he had the sickness of fear. So we had the doctors come out. And the Sunday School doctors, of course, we've talked about them several times on the podcast but they're legendary so this the doctors come out to treat him for his fear you know and so and that was what the lesson was I can't remember I thought it might have even been a dynamic opening and it was a way to open it and create this whole thing because the kids love the doctors yeah and so it was like this whole thing where they would remember and know about this specific thing fear you know

SPEAKER_01 25:27

I remember one time too like hiding God's word in your heart and the doctors came out like

SPEAKER_00 25:32

trying to put a Bible in the heart in his heart yeah of the surgery, yes, yeah. I remember that,

SPEAKER_01 25:36

yeah. I think something that stuck out to me a lot with that is it's similar to the, what we talked about, the themes to immediately engage like the kids when they walk into the room is one year at YouthQuest, I think it was the first year that I like really helped out and there was like gladiator, we did a coliseum. Oh, gladiators. Right, and there's gladiators in the front and the lights were just flashing and going crazy and there was like all this fighting and they were like swinging around and they were jumping off the stage and stuff and I remember the kids like walking in in and just like their eyes going really big and like stopping and just standing you had to be like go sit down yeah and like kind of push them to their chairs because they were just like

SPEAKER_00 26:11

that was the wide eyes yeah yeah exactly it was so

SPEAKER_01 26:15

cool I captured their attention and they were like locked in because they knew like when the gladiators left I feel like they were so locked in because they were like okay are they coming back like what's gonna go on what's gonna happen yeah yes they were like watching over their shoulder I remember in that theme there was people in Sunday school that weren't ever in Sunday school like specifically Brother Santino

SPEAKER_00 26:34

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 26:34

And he was so scary. Like, cause he's so big. I don't know if I was inside his school or in like helping, but I remember like him, like low key scaring me.

SPEAKER_00 26:43

Yeah. He was the main nemesis. The main

SPEAKER_01 26:46

guy. I think that kids were crying personally. It was youth quest,

SPEAKER_00 26:48

right? I remember. So, uh, sister Emma, um, had helped in, in the setup. So we had a lot of help on that setup, which was really

SPEAKER_01 26:57

cool. Yeah. A

SPEAKER_00 26:57

lot of people in the church. The

SPEAKER_01 26:58

call scene was amazing.

SPEAKER_00 26:59

Yeah. So nobody that, I mean, a lot of people, not, not nobody, but a lot of people that had never, been in Sunday school at all helped with the setup on that one I think it was like the first time that we had that

SPEAKER_01 27:09

yeah

SPEAKER_00 27:09

and so but sister Emma and she was just Emma back then because she wasn't married or anything but sister Emma was up here and she still wasn't like an actor or anything but she had been helping with setup and everything so she was up here when we started that and all the kids came up for the dynamic opening so the music starts and I still have the track it's so cool it's like it does this loud it's like And then it's got this undertone, and then you hear this audience. And I created it, several layers, but you hear this audience start to roar, and it comes in. And then we had sword sound effects. So maybe I'll play some of that on here. But anyway, so we had sword sound effects. And then it started, and that's when, and it was a signal for the downstairs when they heard that, ba-boom, to send the kids up.

UNKNOWN 27:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 28:13

So then the kids come up and the strobe lights are going. And I remember Emma standing there, just like what you said, Shay, who the kids were. She stopped because she was like going to get the juice ready or whatever, you know. And she stopped and she was like, oh, my word. This is

SPEAKER_01 28:29

awesome. Goes and just sits down in the middle of the benches.

SPEAKER_00 28:33

Because we had the actors in they were in full costume. They had Roman

SPEAKER_01 28:40

outfits. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 28:41

And so and then we had like, I don't know. It was several gladiators all the way out there. Yeah. It was

SPEAKER_01 28:47

like sets of people like sword fighting each other all around. We had practiced it. Yeah. It was almost like choreographed. Yeah. How do you say? Okay. Yes.

SPEAKER_00 28:55

Yeah. We had practiced the sword fighting and everything. And so, yeah. So, and that's really my goal is one day, every dynamic opening, every single week is at that level.

SPEAKER_01 29:09

At that level.

SPEAKER_00 29:10

It's not that same thing because we might be doing a different theme and doesn't always have to be a battle either right those are the easier ones easier

SPEAKER_01 29:16

ones for sure

SPEAKER_00 29:17

but if if it could be at that level where kids walk in and add and I know not every Sunday school is the same like some some Sunday schools already the kids are in there for a little bit before they start so I think there's a disadvantage there but when kids walk in and it's just like happening you know

SPEAKER_01 29:36

yeah

SPEAKER_00 29:37

where we can set that expectation

SPEAKER_01 29:39

I think that a huge part of that is the the lights like we don't like obviously nothing set up right now but like the flickering lights and stuff adds like a aspect of the drama

SPEAKER_00 29:50

different colors

SPEAKER_01 29:51

yeah just like all everything is going crazy and you're just like you can barely see and stuff but I think that even like whenever even just like in youth when we would do games up here and stuff and then people would like flicker the lights a lot the whole time and it just adds like that yeah you're like hey like discombobulation almost and it's like yeah I think it adds to it like with the the army in Sunday school like when the lights came on and stuff just like changing that

SPEAKER_00 30:18

changing having the

SPEAKER_01 30:19

lights on or off and then flickering them just like stuff like that adds the dramaticism or whatever don't edit that out that's

SPEAKER_00 30:27

not a word but the thing is is like a lot of times people feel like you have to have all these things and we we do try to go all out we have fog machines we have lights we have the sound effects we're big on soundtracks we have soundtracks basically playing 100% of the time and And then we'll do different – our sets are big and everything. But just little changes, even small costumage. If you're doing puppets, adding just little things. Use a flashlight in a dark room. Yeah. Light a candle. Just make something dramatic and make it different so you can set the expectation so it's not just this white chairs and white room and just plain and nothing – you can make it cool and interesting and you could play stuff on your phone for background music, whatever, you know, you can just, so it doesn't take everything. And then, but if you can always be looking to go to that next level to get on the cutting edge, you know, and we, we still strive to do more. We still want to do more than what we do. And so that's why we've gotten to the place, you know, wherever that is, that's why we've gotten to where we are is we keep on trying to push like, okay, how can we make this cooler? And so it's funny now, like, you know, when we, like, especially some of our newer staff, but when we talk about issues or problems, like it's funny, like to be talking about problems with the timer, for example,

SPEAKER_01 32:00

like the timer's not working.

SPEAKER_00 32:02

And it's like way back in the day, like a timer is a

SPEAKER_01 32:06

luxury.

SPEAKER_00 32:07

And so things like that, you know, but like, or a mic's not working, you know, we We used to not even have mics, but thank God we do. So things like that. Yes. So the last note on here I have is remember that you will have a lasting impact. And so this might sound like it's off topic, but here's what I mean by that is I talk about this all the time. Remember that we're setting an example and all that kind of thing. But also remember that it doesn't have to be just this sobering thought. It is a sobering thought in one way because we have a huge responsibility. It's like a burden. Like we could have a lasting impact, good or bad, on somebody. But it can also be fun is you can think about like you can have an impact on a kid that they will remember for a long time. And it could be that they remember like, you know, the reason that I got into singing was I remember way back when Anisha told me this in Sunday school.

SPEAKER_01 33:11

Yeah. Oh, that's

SPEAKER_00 33:12

scary. Yeah, it is scary. But it's like, wow. And then even with the themes and stories that we do, we can create that impact by just being over the top or going the extra mile with what we do. Yeah. I feel like kind of like how you said when I said the kid's dying or whatever, you're like, that was probably me or whatever. Oh, yeah. And so obviously there's personality in that. But some of that is probably from because you saw our staff do stuff like that. And so it has transferred.

SPEAKER_01 33:44

Well, when somebody is standing on a bench somewhere waving a sword and they say, well, one time. One time. When I was a child.

SPEAKER_00 33:51

When we get onto a kid like, get down.

SPEAKER_01 33:54

But Shaylee. Yeah, exactly. My hope is to be old and gray And someone being like, well, I worship like this. Cause one time Shaylee was waving a sword around standing on a bench. Yeah. A lot of times, like you don't even realize what impact you're leaving on them or like what they will remember. Like even us being in Sunday school as kids and then now being staff, like we have memories that the people in Sunday school don't even remember.

SPEAKER_00 34:19

Yeah. Or yeah. They didn't even notice that they were doing that. They didn't even notice that happened. They made a huge impression. Yeah. Yeah. That's

SPEAKER_01 34:25

crazy.

SPEAKER_00 34:27

It is. It's, it's, It's big. It's kind of like I told the story about, this is not exactly the same thing as doing acting or something, but there's a kid that is in our science school. He's still in our science school. He acts up quite a bit. He's gotten a little bit better, but his mom took him to the barber and he was like saying something. You can't really understand that he is talking very well sometimes. And the barber's like, what is he saying? And she was like, what do you say? And he's like, he wanted his haircut like brother Baker. Oh, That's so cute. And this is this kid that, you know, sometimes we have to take him out because he's so bad. And sometimes I'm like, oh, man. Oh, that's cute. So we make an impression sometimes that we don't even know.

SPEAKER_01 35:12

One time I was, I can't even remember what part it was, some kind of princess and something. I don't even remember what it was. And there was a little girl who doesn't, she doesn't get to come very often. And she called me, she came up to me and said, hello. princess for like several weeks like way after that yeah and she like is not she's not here very much but and she like remembered it and i was like i barely remember being in that and it's just like a really short part too and like she remembered

SPEAKER_00 35:44

it yeah

SPEAKER_01 35:46

wow

SPEAKER_00 35:47

yeah it's crazy i mean really i think that probably everybody is the same with kids is more pronounced though but like i think really if you think about um Yeah. maybe a stage play or something that you see, you see all these things, but you could grab snippets of it and like, I like the part when he did this.

SPEAKER_01 36:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:09

Or I like the part when they sang this or whatever. And so you can grab snippets, the highlights, but it's more than just the highlights, but those are what you kind of grab out of

SPEAKER_01 36:20

it. Yeah. And remember.

SPEAKER_00 36:21

Yeah. All right. Well, just to recap. So why cool themes are important. So again, you don't have to do themes Like we talk about that. You kind of, we feel like you have to do ultra call. It should be a part of your Sunday school, but you don't have to do things, but it makes it pretty awesome.

SPEAKER_01 36:38

Yeah. It makes them want to come back

SPEAKER_00 36:40

and see what happens next. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And the decor, I mean, yeah. Like we talk about transporting kids into another world.

SPEAKER_01 36:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:49

We want them to, you know, walk in and be like, oh, wow, we're in Sunday

SPEAKER_01 36:53

school. You know, when it was another world was when that we had that like river and you walked in and And that has been, that's my favorite thing we've ever had. I was at Helping in Sunday School and I was not in Sunday School, but we did it for a youth conference. Oh, yeah. That was really cool. And I remember walking in it and just being like, this is the coolest thing I have ever seen in my life.

SPEAKER_00 37:13

So we had a live river. It was roughly four or five feet wide, but then the circumference of it was probably 30 feet. It was like all

SPEAKER_01 37:23

winding around,

SPEAKER_00 37:24

right? Yeah, it was winding around. It was big. You had to have a bridge to go across

SPEAKER_01 37:27

it. Yeah, it was insane.

SPEAKER_00 37:28

And then we had water pumps in it to make it run.

SPEAKER_01 37:31

There

SPEAKER_00 37:32

was one corner that actually literally had white water going around the corner. That's

SPEAKER_01 37:35

so cool.

SPEAKER_00 37:35

We put blue dye in it. That's insane. We put rocks.

SPEAKER_01 37:38

I remember that. I remember picking out rocks for

SPEAKER_00 37:40

it.

SPEAKER_01 37:41

I think I got grass for the edges. I remember going out there by the church and picking grass. I remember there was one Sunday, this kid, there was two of them. They was just goofing off. One of them pushed him. He either pushed

SPEAKER_00 37:54

him or he tripped. Pushed him to the water. Pushed

SPEAKER_01 37:56

him to the river.

SPEAKER_00 37:57

We did that whole thing for 16 And then we also did it at the youth conference.

SPEAKER_01 38:01

Bus kids are at home. What did you learn in Sunday school? I fell into the river. Like a river. Some kid pushed me into the river.

SPEAKER_00 38:08

They have a river. What?

SPEAKER_01 38:11

Yeah. Yeah. And then they go home and they talk about it. And then their parents are like, oh, my word, I want to see this. Yeah, we've had that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:18

Yeah, that's good. All right. And then stories keeps kids interested. And so that's the same kind of idea with the themes is like stories, whether it's Bible stories or the theme story. But we do full on acting and costumes and everything. So it keeps the kids interested and that's something that, and really, you know, we call this a kid's point of view, but really, or a kid's view, but really we're all like that. It's just that kids aren't afraid to say it. Exactly. Kids aren't afraid to say this is boring. So, and then create specific scenarios to obtain interest. So we'll use, we'll, we'll create those highlights that we talked about. You know, we'll create those on purpose, like specifically. Right. Let's create a highlight moment, you know. And then remember, you will have a lasting impact. We make a difference every single Sunday. We have the potential to have a huge impact on a life, you know, changing

SPEAKER_01 39:18

lives. All

SPEAKER_00 39:23

right. Well, that's a wrap.

SPEAKER_01 39:25

That's a wrap, everybody. That's a wrap. Thank you, guys. Thank you. you guys for listening to us drone on and on thank you guys for listening to our ted talk come back next week hopefully it'll be interesting