Saturday, we had our monthly KOZ meeting at my place in the Lockhart area.
Our outdoor lesson was on turkey hunting so I brought out a couple of my taxidermied birds to show what a wild turkey looked like and we had a shooting range set up with “gobbler head targets”. Since I have a couple of ponds on the property we also provided fishing poles for the boys. Jayden caught his first catfish! But that’s not the highlight of the day.
Later, while we were at the shotgun range, I noticed Jayden hanging out in the back, obviously afraid. We had a short conversation about gun safety and he was convinced to give it a try. But when it came time to actually put his finger on the trigger he couldn’t do it and he backed away with a defeated look. This cycle repeated itself 3 times over the next 30 minutes, each time leaving him defeated with 15 other boys looking on. Amazing, how God uses us and gives us the right word at the right time. The next time he got the 410 in his hands, I put my arm around him and softly asked him, “Is this fear coming from Jesus?”. He answered by shaking his head, still defeated. I said,”you are right, that fear is from the enemy, he wants you to be afraid and stay afraid because he knows when you learn to overcome fear, you will go on to accomplish great things, and as long as you’re afraid, you’ll do nothing. When we do nothing, the enemy wins.” He faced his fear and fired the little gun. Immediately after shooting the boys who had been watching erupted in cheers and applause, it was awesome to witness their support for a boy who was struggling. Jayden was proud of himself but not necessarily ready to shoot again.
We took a break for lunch but before we eat, we always do a short bible lesson and have them fill out a card with 3 things on it; name, something you learned today and a prayer request. Check out what he learned!
While we were eating, he came up to me and politely asked if we could shoot again after lunch! He shot at a bunch of clays thrown with a hand thrower and eventually even broke one!
It turns out, he was so afraid because he’d only been taught the negative about guns but now he knows about every of the positives.
If you don’t have a similar ministry in your local church, I encourage you to check out KOZ. https://www.kidsoutdoorzone.com/
The rewards are priceless!
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Our outdoor lesson was on turkey hunting so I brought out a couple of my taxidermied birds to show what a wild turkey looked like and we had a shooting range set up with “gobbler head targets”. Since I have a couple of ponds on the property we also provided fishing poles for the boys. Jayden caught his first catfish! But that’s not the highlight of the day.
Later, while we were at the shotgun range, I noticed Jayden hanging out in the back, obviously afraid. We had a short conversation about gun safety and he was convinced to give it a try. But when it came time to actually put his finger on the trigger he couldn’t do it and he backed away with a defeated look. This cycle repeated itself 3 times over the next 30 minutes, each time leaving him defeated with 15 other boys looking on. Amazing, how God uses us and gives us the right word at the right time. The next time he got the 410 in his hands, I put my arm around him and softly asked him, “Is this fear coming from Jesus?”. He answered by shaking his head, still defeated. I said,”you are right, that fear is from the enemy, he wants you to be afraid and stay afraid because he knows when you learn to overcome fear, you will go on to accomplish great things, and as long as you’re afraid, you’ll do nothing. When we do nothing, the enemy wins.” He faced his fear and fired the little gun. Immediately after shooting the boys who had been watching erupted in cheers and applause, it was awesome to witness their support for a boy who was struggling. Jayden was proud of himself but not necessarily ready to shoot again.
We took a break for lunch but before we eat, we always do a short bible lesson and have them fill out a card with 3 things on it; name, something you learned today and a prayer request. Check out what he learned!
While we were eating, he came up to me and politely asked if we could shoot again after lunch! He shot at a bunch of clays thrown with a hand thrower and eventually even broke one!
It turns out, he was so afraid because he’d only been taught the negative about guns but now he knows about every of the positives.
If you don’t have a similar ministry in your local church, I encourage you to check out KOZ. https://www.kidsoutdoorzone.com/
The rewards are priceless!
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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