Book Winner: Leading a Special Neesd Ministry

Well that was easy!

Last week, we offered to give away a free copy of the book Leading a Special Needs Ministry. And we have a winner!

Shelly Burkey -- please contact me to send me your address, so you can get your book.

If you didn't win, you can still buy this book from the Orange store, with a discount. From now until the end of the year, use the Coupon Code LSNM2 to receive $2 off the cover price. 

Edit: Now available to buy on Amazon. 

What We Spend -- and Don't Spend -- to Raise a Child

About a year ago, I shared a story about a conversation I had regarding The Cost of Kids.

From this article in the New York Times, it turns out that calculating how much parents spend on their children is not one-formula-fits-all. The amount spent depends on the income level of the parents.

• Low-income parents (who earn less than $60,640 annually) spend about $173,000 from birth through high school.
• Middle-income families (earning between $60,640 to $105,000) spend about $240,000.
• High-income families (bring in more than $105,000 each year) spend nearly $400,000.

Therefore, this report from the USDA doesn't so much show how much it costs to raise kids, but what is NOT spent on some children, particularly on those growing up in poverty.

The difference between children from the lowest and highest income groups is about $12,000 per year. So, those children are missing out on $12,000 of resources, opportunities, and benefits. At the least, they are dependent on others (outside of their parents) to provide them.

It's not that children from low income families cannot succeed. But when you look at the bigger picture, it becomes obvious that the well-resourced families can provide better opportunities for their children, who in turn are able to provide better opportunities for their children. And so on and so forth.

"When you look at the forest, rather than at the trees, financial statistics like these do reflect different outcomes for the children whose experiences they shape: true economic mobility is becoming more a pipe dream than the American Dream, and children are likely to stay within the income category to which they are born."

For additional reading, check out these posts from my other blog:

• The Cost of Child Poverty  
• Inequality and Poverty  
• College and Finances  

**image courtesy of Nick Nguyen via flickr

Book Review: Leading a Special Needs Ministry

Does your church have a ministry to children who have special needs? If so, do you wonder how to have a bigger or better impact? And if your church doesn't, are you looking to start one?

If you answered "yes" to any of these questions, you MUST buy Leading a Special Need Ministry by Amy Fenton Lee.

Far from remaining at the theoretical level, this book has a subtitle that says it all: "A Practical Guide to Including Children and Loving Families."

It would be easy to read through this book and feel  overwhelmed, since it contains so many tips and applications from churches across the country. But Amy does this for a purpose. She wants the reader to pick out what is helpful, and to ignore the rest.

Of course, I have a tender spot in my heart for Appendix 7.3, "Training Event for Church Hosts and Sunday Morning Greeters." This section was based on an equipping event we led for Children's Ministry Volunteers at Grace Church. (You can learn more about the special needs ministry at Grace Church by clicking here.) 

And there's more good stuff. . . . We will be giving away a FREE copy of this book. All you have to do is leave a comment with your full name and one sentence explaining how this book can be helpful for you.

(If I don't know you personally, you should also email me your email address, so that if you win, I can get your mailing address. If you are having trouble leaving me a comment, you can email me your name and your sentence, and I will enter in your results.)

The contest will close on Sunday October 13. If you don't win, be sure to buy your copy from the Orange store.

**And more good news!!!  From now until the end of the year, use the Coupon Code LSNM2 to receive $2 off the cover price. Don't miss out!

Edit: Now available to buy on Amazon.

Related Links:

• Special Needs: Managing or Ministering?  
• Top 5 Books I Read in 2013   

Surprising Ways Your Brain Works

Lately, I've been fascinated by the brain. Not anyone's brain in particular, but how the brain works. It must be the nerd scientist in me.

I've written a lot about the brain on my other blog. For example:

• Children and Poverty and the Brain 
• Poverty, Stress, and the Brain  
• Cuddling Is Good for Your Child's Brain 
• Poverty Impedes Cognitive Function

Are you intrigued? Then here's another great post that you may find interesting: 10 Surprising Facts About How Our Brain Works. You should read that post, so you can learn . . . .

1. Why your brain does better creative work when you're tired.
2. How stress can make your brain smaller.
3. That it is literally impossible for your brain to multi-task. 
4. That naps improve your brain's performance.  
5. Why your vision trumps all other senses. 
6. That introversion and extroversion result from different wiring in the brain.  
7. Why we tend to like people who make mistakes more.
8. How meditation can rewire your brain for the better.  
9. Why exercise is good for your brain.  
10. How to trick your brain into thinking that time is going slowly.

Read the full article to learn more, and to see how your life can be different as a result of these 10 facts.

You can also check on these related posts on this blog:

• The Stress of Parenting 
• Bad Behavior: He Can't Help It    

Favorite Tweets from September

It was a good month:

My daughter turned 12.

I got to eat at Moe's.

And I read (and wrote) some good tweets.

Pssst -- you can follow me on Twitter (@EspinosaJoey)

Tweets I Read

@BackRowBaptist:  My church wants to have a "revival." I don't remember the first time we were vivaled.

@JimGaffigan:  Whose bright idea was to have cooked broccoli smell like urine?

@JulianWasHere:  I'm going to invent a mechanical arm that mounts onto my chest and never stops feeding me pistachios.

@CoachWithLove:  Failure is only the opportunity to begin again, this time more wisely.

@KenBlount:  One of the goals of parenting is to shape your children to glorify God with the unique imprint He's put in them!

@LACavin:  So thankful for the Camp Grace men who are meeting before services to discuss leading & teaching elementary classes. @GraceChurchCM #invest

@Compassion:  The key to ending poverty? Hope! http://cintl.us/1ni

@Gospel_Project:  In all other religions, people are not truly serving God but themselves. They do good works in order to receive salvation and forgiveness. 

@JimCook_:  I needed more than just a sympathizer to my broken situation, I needed the power of a Savior to free me! @gracechurchsc

Tweets I Wrote

It's #football season. Or, the time of year when millions of people say "WE won" even though they never did so much as watch a practice.

8 elementary students signed up for the #chess club in #AllendaleSC. Big thanks to @pedrodeabreu, @CMateFoundation, & the local schools!

• Edit:  Now we have 16 students signed up.

"Faith is primarily about obedience, not risk." http://buff.ly/18LJkyG  via @theresurgence

"When we use volume to manage our kids we unwittingly turn ourselves into toxic high controllers." @Family_Matters http://buff.ly/15XzjSU  

When you place an order at the drive-thru microphone at Hardees, & the response is, "Ok, drive around, Mr. Joey.".... :) 

Scary moment: When you're watching "World War Z" & your son comes out of his room sleepwalking. Remember: #zombies aren't real (I hope).

One Small Thing: Washing Dishes

In our home in Allendale, we don't have a dishwasher. Not an automatic one, at least.

Since we moved to this house two-and-a-half years ago, all the dishes have been washed by hand. Most of the time, my wife has done them. Our older two kids have been washing them after breakfast. Sometimes guests have washed them (that's what interns are for, right?).

But I've had a very small part in washing dishes. So this month's task was easy: wash dishes every day. Usually, I alternated between washing them in the morning (in place of my kids), and doing the dishes in the evening (to serve my wife).

More than anything, this goal made me appreciate the work that my family does. I often take that for granted, so it was good for me to step back from my "busyness" (because aren't we all?) and serve them.

So I commit to washing dishes more often. Maybe not every day, but definitely a few times each week.

And despite the fact that my wife told me I was doing it wrong, let the record show that no one in our family got a food-borne illness this month.

October Small Thing: Remember the Positive About Each Day

My "one small thing" goal for October also has to do with "stepping back." I was inspired by this article on How to Make Positivity a Habit.

Each evening, I will intentionally reflect on the day and take note of one good thing that I saw.

You see, I am an extreme pessimist. It's not that I call a half-full cup "half-empty." It's so bad that I see a cup that is 90% full, and I call it "10% empty."

Living life this critically (of others and of myself) can be draining. So this month, I will work to remember the great things that I observed. Especially, I want to notice when I see others doing acts of kindness.

I'm positive that this will be an emotionally-lifting experience for me.

How about you? How are your monthly or yearly goals coming along? Let me know in the comments.

#1smallthing

Risk Your Kid

"Her" goose was much bigger

Today is memorable for us. On September 24, 2001, we ate Chinese food for dinner (bad idea), cancelled our Small Group (good idea), and then we checked into the hospital. Joanna was in labor with our first child.

Hannah was born early the next morning (Tuesday, September 25) at 12:29 AM. We were thrilled to have a healthy first child (even though she had the cord wrapped around her neck for a bit), and celebrated with family and a close friend.

One advantage of having a baby born just after midnight is that we got an extra day in the hospital (our insurance covered 2 nights, and a night only counted when it crossed midnight). We were nervous first time parents, and we were happy to have doctors and nurses watching over our every step.

Fast Forward

When Hannah was a couple of  years old, I remember our family picnicking at Furman University. We enjoyed our nice spring day, walking around the lake and feeding bread to the ducks and geese.

At one point, Hannah wandered over to a goose. It was a huge goose; the two of theme were at eye level. And they got close to each other. Really close. Like striking distance close. Close enough for Hannah to reach out and touch the goose.

Which. She. Did.

I'm watching the entire time. As she neared the goose, I wondered if I should step in. "Nah. Let's just see what happens." I gasped when she pet that perplexed animal, but the animal just stared at her for a few seconds, and then waddled away.

Now, half of you are wagging your judgmental finger at me, thinking I should have protected her better. And you are probably right. I was thinking the same thing afterwards. What if she got hurt?

My personality is more on the side of exposing my kids to risk, and I need to focus on being more protective. But if you fall on the side of protection and shielding your kids, you probably need to risk your kids a little more than you do.

Risk Your Children

Yes, we live in a scary world. We are surrounded with so much that can hurt our children. We must wisely protect our children, even when they are adolescents, since the adolescent brain changes drastically.

On the other hand, we can easily parent in fear, so we must remember that God loves our children much more than we ever will. We are called to trust God, and to trust God with our kids.

Tim Elmore cautions that two of the biggest mistakes we make as parents are 1) Risking too little, and 2) Rescuing too quickly. This is especially true for you moms. Don't let your God-given gift of nurturing control you.

We must not parent in fear, but in grace, in the full knowledge that our heavenly Father loves our kids much more than we ever will. Our children cannot be a "light to the world" or a "city on a hill" (Matthew 5:14) if keep them forever under our wing.

Risking Hannah

What does this have to do with my daughter? A lot, to me.

Hannah is now in 7th grade, past the half-way point of her schooling (not counting college). In a few years, she'll be driving (theoretically). Thirty years after that, she can begin dating.

Just kidding. That would be too strict even for me. I'll give her my blessing to date someone in only twenty years.

Already we have had to "risk" her. We've risked her by letting her climb on the monkey bars. We've risked her when we've allowed her to watch a movie at her friends house (we debriefed afterwards). We've risked her when she has sleepovers. We've risked her when we let her roam around our big yard in Allendale. We risked her (and Elijah) when we sent them to a four-night 4H camp that was almost two hours away.

We know that we have to let go.

At 4H Camp

Celebrating Hannah

We are students of our children. We learn more about them every day, month, and year.

Hannah is our creative one, and our messy one (do those qualities always go hand-in-hand)? She has a great eye for photography, art, and crafts. She occasionally dabbles with her blog Hannah's Brain (appropriately subtitled "a jumbled mess of creativity").

She loves to read and loves doing science experiments. She struggles with math and spelling, but is getting better at both. Her teacher from a science camp this summer specifically told me that Hannah "is very intelligent and innovative and helped the team keep moving forward."

And though she loves to talk (20,000 words per day would be a conservative estimate), she tends to be a watcher and listener when in groups. Her student ministry leader at Grace Church noted that when she would be in town, she would bring an air of calmness and peace to the group.

Hannah means "grace." And we pray that she would always be a giver a grace.

Happy Birthday, my Sweetheart!

Related Links:

• She's a Teenager! (2014)
• Little Girl, Big Girl (2012)
• Hannah's Birthday (2011)
• Facilitating Independence: Why We're Giving Our Daughter a Clothing Allowance   
• Birth Due Date Theory 
• Shopping, Purchasing, and Parenting