Spyence Mission #1 Curriculum
“70% of teenagers involved in church youth groups stop attending church within two years of their high school graduation.”
I bet that statistic scares you to death as a children’s ministry leader.
And what’s worse, it’s such a huge problem, with so many root causes that, really… what can you do about it?
It feels like your only two options are to A) ignore the data or B) try harder.
Obviously, you’re not going to do A.
And B only makes the problem worse.
Why do I say that?
Think about the areas we usually try harder in:
- Using your time with the kids on Sunday mornings more effectively.
- Helping students connect with a small group leader who will pray for their requests each week.
- Teaching parents to read the Bible and do a devotional with their kids during the week.
Those are all great goals, and we should continue to work on them, but…
We’ve been strengthening those areas in children’s ministry for years, and the statistics keep getting worse. Why?
Because it ignores the reason kids leave the church…
Because their faith isn’t their own.
It’s their parents’ or their Sunday School teacher’s faith.
Think about those three goals we mentioned:
- Use our time in Sunday School more effectively, which is a great goal, but can inadvertently teach kids to come to church on Sunday morning so their Sunday School teacher can explain the Bible to them, implying that they’re too young to read and understand the Bible for themselves.
- Help students connect with a small group leader who will pray for their requests each week – can communicate to kids that they need to share their prayer requests with an adult if they want prayer for them. Implied: Your prayers are okay, but not as powerful as a grown-up’s.
- Teach parents to read the Bible and do a devotional with their kids during the week. Of course we want families to do devotionals together, but even this can reinforce the idea in our kid’s minds that the Bible belongs to their parents and Sunday school teachers, not them.
We should continue to emphasize all three of those worthy goals, but only IF… we also teach kids to read the Bible and pray for themselves.
By themselves.
As equal members of God’s family, just as capable to hear from God and talk to God as any adult.
Call it quiet times, or personal devotions, or hanging out with God – whatever you want – kids need to learn how to connect with God personally, with no intermediary.
That’s how they make their faith their own, not their parents’ or their Sunday School teachers’.
If your kids are connecting with God on their own, then each of those three goals becomes 100 times more powerful:
- Your Sunday morning time can reinforce what kids are learning on their own. They’ll have questions about what they read in their quiet times during the week, so they’ll come on Sunday morning eager for you to get into the Bible!
- Your small group leaders can do more than just pray for their kids — they can model and teach prayer to their kids. Kids won’t just feel good because someone prayed for them – they’ll learn the discipline of prayer from godly men and women and practice it at home!
- And parents… can you picture how grateful they’ll be when they see their kids reading the Bible and praying for themselves, taking ownership of their faith, making it their own? And can you imagine how much that will energize their family devotional time at home?
If you’re ready to get started teaching the kids in your ministry how to spend time with God, please avoid this one trap that I’ve seen in too many curriculums out there:
Don’t use all your time teaching your kids how important it is to spend time with God.
Instead, teach them HOW to spend time with God.
They already know it’s important, they just don’t know how to do it.
We’re talking the actual nuts-and-bolts of how you do a quiet time here:
- How can they read the Bible without getting bored?
- How can they pray without their mind wandering?
- When should they do their quiet time?
- How can they avoid distractions from all their electronic devices during this time?
- And many more.
Let’s help kids answer those questions, so they can get to know God better themselves.
And just think how their spiritual growth will take off! Instead of getting a weekly dollop of Bible truth every Sunday, they’ll get to know God better EVERY SINGLE DAY.
And then, instead of leaving their “parent’s” church when they reach adulthood, they’ll know they ARE the church.
So let’s get started!
Spyence Mission #1 is a 6-week curriculum for Kindergarten through 5th-graders that teaches kids how to spend time alone with God. You can use it in Kid’s Church, Sunday School, AWANA, etc.
Spyence Mission #1 comes with everything you need – a teacher’s guide with a full script, video segments to show the kids, opening activities, science object lessons, review quizzes, small group questions, teacher’s training videos, and more.
Not only does Spyence Mission #1 include all of our best lessons on how to have a quiet time with God, but you’ll share those lessons through a super-fun Spying/Science/Secret-Mission format.
Bring the Mission to your church.
-Mike Riley,
Nebraska Cornhuskers Football Head Coach
All The Details About Spyence Mission #1, with Samples:
Videos and Activities Your Kids and Adults Will LOVE!
- Each lesson in Spyence Mission #1 alternates between teacher-led activities and the following 5 video segments.
- And each activity and video are laser-focused to reinforce the main point for the week.
1) The “Status Update” Video – Your students review last week’s Bible lesson with Captain Curt’s science-experiment-gone-wrong, and then Tom and Larry pique their interest for this week’s Bible lesson.
2) The “Spyence Briefing” Video – Your students learn the main Bible point from Captain Curt and Bob the Dragon, then Secret Agent K reinforces the main point with a verse and an object lesson from the Spyence Lab.
3) The “Memory Verse” Video – Your students learn the week’s memory verse with fun motions and get to stretch their legs and get the wiggles out at the same time.
4) The “Spyence Vs. Evil Robots Review Quiz” Video – Your students review today’s lesson while helping the Shark-Rat Super-Sisters protect the Spyence Lab from Evil Robots.
5) The “Good News Worship-Intro” Video – Captain Curt shares the Gospel in a creative way each week, getting your students ready to praise God during your worship time. (You can show this video first if you do worship before the lesson.)
Would the kids in your children’s ministry love how Bob messes up the main point each week? Would they love how the Shark-Rat Super-Sisters battle the Evil Robots during the review quiz? If so, get this curriculum now.
For $147, you get everything your teachers need to lead kids right to the throne-room of God with confidence. You’ll start hearing stories from parents about how their kids are sharing what they learned in the quietness of their room.
-Jana, Teacher, Portland, OR
“What stands out most to me is the integrity and passion Curt brings and gives to his audience.’
-Adria, Teacher, Salem, OR
What makes Spyence Mission #1 so powerful is the teacher-led activities between video segments.
And to make sure the teacher has everything they need to lead these activities, we’ve included these resources for the teacher:
1) A Teacher’s Guide PDF – Your teacher will have the whole lesson in one place, including…
- an overview of the key points
- a full script
- list of materials
- questions for small group leaders
- and much more.
- Click here to get a sample. Really – you should check it out – we think it’s pretty amazing. We even tested it on a brand-new teacher, leading large-group for the first time ever, and she ROCKED all 6 lessons!
2) An “Overview” Video – Your teacher will understand the thinking behind each part of the lesson
3) A “Science Explanations” Video – Your teacher will learn how to do the science object lesson with your students (if they want to — that’s an optional part of the lesson plan).
4) A “Welcome/Attention-Getter” Video – Your teacher will learn how to do the fun opening activities from Captain Curt.
5) Personal Help – You can email or text Captain Curt with any questions you have, and get personal help. He’s a full-time Children’s Pastor and he wants to help you impact the lives of your students.
6) Flexibility – And because the curriculum is divided into short video segments and short activities, it’s totally flexible. The teachers can pick and choose and rearrange to their heart’s content!
Don’t miss this life-transforming curriculum — your kids and leaders will love it!
-Patty, Teacher, Camas, WA
“You are awesome. Don’t change a thing!’
-Jan, Media Specialist, Beaverton, OR
And Spyence Mission #1 includes our Zero-Risk, 110% Money-Back Guarantee.
You take ZERO risk! We take 110% of the risk.
If you don’t absolutely love the curriculum, just use our “no-hassle-no-questions-asked, thanks-for-trying-us, God-bless-your-ministry, we’re-all-just-working-to-share-the-Gospel-together” 110% money-back guarantee within 30 days.
That means you get a complete refund plus 10% of the purchase price, so you literally have nothing to lose!
The Storyline in Spyence Mission #1:
Tom, a student in Miss Emily’s Sunday School class, wants to start having “quiet time alone with God.”
But when he tries to read his Bible, he gets bored. When he tries to pray, his mind wanders. He’s about to give up on the whole idea, but first, he reaches out to Spyence Headquarters.
Can this mysterious organization help? What do spying and science have to do with reading the Bible and praying? How can Bob the Dragon, Secret Agent K, and the Shark-Rat Super-Sisters help Tom get to know God better?
There’s only one way to find out and solve this mystery: Bring this exciting new Children’s Church Curriculum to your Children’s Church, Sunday School, or AWANA.
This teacher-led, video-based curriculum is designed for “In-The-Trenches” Children’s Ministry Leaders.
How do we know? Because an “in-the-trenches” children’s ministry leader, Curt Nelson, designed it for the teachers at his church. (Curt is a former Walt Disney Imagineer and the current full-time Children’s Pastor at Northwest Hills Community Church in Corvallis, OR, where he has served for the last 7 years).
This curriculum is a labor of love from start-to-finish, from the exciting opening activities to the Spyence videos, to the detailed Teacher’s Guide that contains everything you need to ROCK Sunday.
Then, just to make sure you’re 100% successful, we added three instructional teacher videos, plus real-life help from a real-life Children’s Pastor, whenever you have questions!
And you get all this for a low price of $147! (Go ahead, compare our cost to other video curriculum and we think you’ll be pleasantly surprised!)
“70% of teenagers involved in church youth groups stop attending church within two years of their high school graduation.”
Don’t let your kids fall prey to that statistic. Please teach them how to make their faith their own!
- Teach them to read the Bible for themselves, without an intermediary “explaining” it to them
- Teach them to pray to God themselves, without needing an adult to pray for or with them all the time.
- Teach them that they don’t go to their parent’s church, they ARE the church.
If you have another curriculum that covers these topics, answers all your kids’ questions about the nuts and bolts of how you do a quiet time, and your kids are already making their faith their own through their time alone with God – that’s great!
But if you don’t have a series like that in your current curriculum yet, please take 6 weeks and share Spyence Mission #1 with your kids!
Curt Nelson is an expert on how to make learning fun and “sticky.”
Many authors have written about doing ministry the Disney way, but Curt actually worked as a Walt Disney Imagineer, contributing to rides such as Pirates of the Caribbean, Stitch’s Great Escape, and Thunder Mountain Railroad.
He’s also been an AP Physics teacher, Inventor (holds 13 US Patents assigned to HP), Children’s Book Author (with three printings of his “Roosevelt Rat” book), Professional Full-time Magician, and has been a Children’s Pastor for the last 8 years.
Now he draws from all those careers to make laugh-out-loud videos you can use to illustrate profound truths from God’s Word – how fun is that?
