Duct Tape

Starting tomorrow I am offering duct tape classes at church for our day camp type program called xplore 2011.  Now… for those of you that don’t know this – I am a little duct tape fanatic.  I love that there are different colors, I love that you can cut it and mold it and shape it and make just about anything with it.  My biggest projects have been purses and wallets, but I also have made tiaras, necklaces, earrings, hair bows, jackets.  I was commissioned by Duck Brand Duct Tape to do the jackets as well as make a lot of flowers.  I think it is a lot of fun!

In these camps – we want to have some type of children’s message and I have been struggling to figure out what exactly I was going to talk about until a lady from our church yesterday informed me that we were going to be having a lot of kids from the lower income section of our town coming to this camp.  For my – my response was FANTASTIC!!!  She then reminded me that I needed to make sure that the other kids were bing kind to them since they are different.  So, here is my message to the kids….

You know what?  I LOVE Duct Tape- it is awesome.  Some of it is pink, some of it is black, there is orange, green, yellow, purple, camo – I just love that I have all these different colors of duct tape.  By itself, every roll of duct tape is really rather neat.  It is pretty, it is STICKY and it is very usable. 

I look at this hot pink duct tape- I love it – it is pink it is awesome.  

Lets say I dropped this piece of duct tape on the ground- what is going to happen to it?  It might stick to the ground and get stepped on, it might get covered in dirt.  If we aren’t careful- it might stick to itself and get ripped trying to take it apart…  so, what is your favorite color?  (I will have a few of the kids tell me)- alright – lets say you are that color of duct tape.  This piece of duct tape is you.  I have decided that I am going to be mean to you and drop you on the floor.  Now you are dirty…  I decided that I might tell you that you are gross- that makes you withdraw to yourself and there you have it.  If I am mean to you, or to anyone, you could end up a dirty stuck piece of duct tape… 

Lets say that I like you though – I am going to be nice to you even though we are not the same-  even though we have never met before.  So I am going to be this RED duct tape- so I decide that instead of throwing you on the ground, I am going to throw you a party now look – how pretty is this?  (I hold up the piece of two colors together.) 

That is awesome right?  Well the back of this is still sticky – so now, I am going to show you something really awesome.  I can stick to just about anything that I want to stick to – and be pretty useful, but, when I choose to stick to something like Jesus (a different color- that I have stuck onto the sticky side so that there is no sticky still showing- then I cut off the ends and make a quick change purse out of it) – I can be something that is very useful, something beautiful, something nice and I can bring my friends along with me and we can be useful together.  Isn’t that neat guys? 

The Bible tells us in Ephesians 4:32 “Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as Christ forgave you.”

Now over lunch we will get to all eat together and hang out – and we will hear about the love of Jesus.  He loves you guys so much – he wants to stick to you and never let you go!  Isn’t that awesome?  He can help us be kind and compassionate to each other.  So lets learn how to make an awesome change purse and we will go from there.