Shoal Creek Student Family Connection - 7/28 Edition

Hi Families, here's your "need-to-know" info for your Buya and Crash Students:

1. "Fun Fridays" Every Friday In July - Shoal Creek is starting a relationship with the Clayview Terrace Apartment complex on Church Rd. We are going to do 5 kid-centered fun events every Friday from 11:00am-1pm in July to build relationships that we hope lead to "Homework Huddles" in the Fall of this school year. 

• Here's where you can sign up for our last one THIS Friday!

2. BBR Success! If you're wondering what happened to all that was collected for the Brown Brag Revolution at Shoal Creek, here's where you can see the impact we made!

Here's what's available to students and how we communicate to student families weekly.

1. "Buya" program every Sunday, 9:30am and 11am in the Underground for all 6th-8th grade students.
2. "Crash" program every Sunday, 11am only, in the Attic for 9th-12th grade students.
3. Join the "Buya Parents" or the "Crash Parents" City groups if you want weekly info on upcoming events.

Wanting more information about what Shoal Creek offers for students that you don't see here? Contact Justin Talley, or start following our Shoal Creek Students Twitter account--@SC3Students--to be connected with the latest happenings. 

Shoal Creek Student Family Connection

Hi Families, here's your "need-to-know" info for your Buya and Crash Students:

1. "Fun Fridays" Every Friday In July - Shoal Creek is starting a relationship with the Clayview Terrace Apartment complex on Church Rd. We are going to do 5 kid-centered fun events every Friday from 11:00am-1pm in July to build relationships that we hope lead to "Homework Huddles" in the Fall of this school year. 

Here's a snippet from Eric Haynes of what happened at the first Fun Friday: 

Thanks for everyone who came out to help on our very first Fun Friday event!!  There were some great connections made with the families there and some amazing stories shared.  In one event, we may have connected someone to a new job, gave a child in a wheelchair a fun memory as he participated in the water fight, and saw some new friendships happen.

• Sign up for the THIS week's "Fun Friday" here
• Find links to the other upcoming Fun Fridays here

2. Crash Summer Small Group Session DONE for Summer. This summer session was only a shorter, 6-week session. Our Crash small groups will now be on break. In August we will have a signup period that will run for a couple weeks so that students can give us their best availability, and we will start up a Fall Session of Crash small groups that will run for 8-10 weeks.

3. Helping Our Teens With Their Insecurities - Here's an article I ran across this week with some tips on what kind of mindset to try to shoot for when interacting with our teenagers, who can often be walking time bombs of insecurity.

Here's what's available to students and how we communicate to student families weekly.

1. "Buya" program every Sunday, 9:30am and 11am in the Underground for all 6th-8th grade students.
2. "Crash" program every Sunday, 11am only, in the Attic for 9th-12th grade students.
3. Join the "Buya Parents" or the "Crash Parents" City groups if you want weekly info on upcoming events.

Wanting more information about what Shoal Creek offers for students that you don't see here? Contact Justin Talley on the City by message, or start following our Shoal Creek Students Twitter account--@SC3Students--to be connected with the latest happenings. 

Suffering As A Shield?

Sufferings can be a shield--they can defend us from the illusions of self-sufficiency and blindness that harden the heart...   -T. Keller, "Prayer" (paraphrased)

It's hard to swallow any concept that suggest that our sufferings may actual be a protective force in our lives. Any modicum of suffering usually sends me into either a cursing or cowering fit. I'd rather yell and scream "Injustice!", or be yellow-bellied, and find a hole to hide in until the discomfort passes.

But perhaps those moments of pain, suffering, and discomfort of any kind--from the deep heart wrenching agony of close, personal loss, to the minor inconveniences we deal with daily--could be protecting us from the greater danger of feeling secure in our own abilities apart from concept of a Fatherly God that loves us and wants what's best for our eternity more than we want for our present.

I just received a new set of prescription glasses this week. The first updated prescriptive glasses I've had in 10 years. The experience has been entirely disorientating. My old prescription felt more comfortable and I knew how to operate with what I perceived to be efficiency. The new prescription glasses are stronger, more accurate to the way the real world actually is, and will be better for me in the long run--in the doctor's prescription I am forced to trust. But in the short term, I'm adjusting to a different perspective of how things really look.

If self-sufficiency (a trust in my own talents, treasures and abilities to secure my long term happiness) is actually the central cause of most of the problems and sufferings in my life--as Jesus suggests--then trying to fight or fix my current circumstances probably won't be of any real, lasting good. Jesus himself, the proclaimed Son of the God of the Universe, didn't try to escape or keep the ultimate suffering of his own wrongful torture and death from befalling on him. He was given multiple opportunities to escape suffering, yet chose to endure the pain of his current circumstances to gain a greater, more lasting good.

In the midst of great pain and suffering, words do little (if any?) soothing. The only soothing that can come is born out of the ability to trust in the promise of something stronger, more powerful, and more reliable than ourselves. Jesus calls us to trust his Father as that stronger, more powerful, more reliable source, as he himself did.

Shoal Creek Student Family Connection 7/7 - "Fun Fridays"

Hi Families, here's your "need-to-know" info for your Buya and Crash Students:

1. "Fun Fridays" Every Friday In July - Shoal Creek is starting a relationship with the Clayview Terrace Apartment complex on Church Rd. We are going to do 5 kid-centered fun events every Friday from 11:00am-1pm in July to build relationships that we hope lead to "Homework Huddles" in the Fall of this school year. 

Here's a snippet from Eric Haynes of what happened at the first Fun Friday: 

Thanks for everyone who came out to help on our very first Fun Friday event!!  There were some great connections made with the families there and some amazing stories shared.  In one event, we may have connected someone to a new job, gave a child in a wheelchair a fun memory as he participated in the water fight, and saw some new friendships happen.

• Sign up for the THIS week's "Fun Friday" here
• Find links to the other upcoming Fun Fridays here

2. Crash Summer Small Group Times - Just a reminder, for this  summer small group session, times/places are:

• Girls - Wednesdays, 7:30am, at Morning Day Cafe (on north side of Liberty Square)
• Boys - This week, TONIGHT at 5:30pm-7pm, in the Underground at SC. (next week's day/time will be announced similarly)

Here's what's available to students and how we communicate to student families weekly.

1. "Buya" program every Sunday, 9:30am and 11am in the Underground for all 6th-8th grade students.
2. "Crash" program every Sunday, 11am only, in the Attic for 9th-12th grade students.
3. Join the "Buya Parents" or the "Crash Parents" City groups if you want weekly info on upcoming events.

Wanting more information about what Shoal Creek offers for students that you don't see here? Contact Justin Talley or start following our Shoal Creek Students Twitter account--@SC3Students--to be connected with the latest happenings.