We had 15 children the first week of a new inner-city school club. Five children prayed to receive Christ as Savior! That day, I was made aware of children wanting to go to church, but their parents choose not to go to any church.

One of our club volunteers said to me that their family would be willing to bring one little girl and her brother to church. When this volunteer spoke to the mother about it … the little girl said, “Mama, even if you don’t want to go to church, I want to go to church with them!”

In the other family, another club volunteer was talking with the mother of a girl who wanted to go to church. The mother said she has 4 children and this girl is her youngest. She always is talking about God and wanting to go to church. The mother went on to say she doesn’t go to church, but sometimes she lets her little girl go with the grandmother when she is able to go.

Parents have their reasons, but it is sad when children want to go to church. We not only need to reach the children, but we must reach the families. It is our prayer that the ‘adopting churches’ of our school-related clubs will do careful and important follow-up with unchurched children in our clubs.

At that club that day, I had the privilege of counseling an 8 year old girl, I will call her Tajah, for salvation. In the middle of our counseling time, Tajah broke down and wept. She was so overwhelmed by what Jesus did for her on the cross. I began to cry, too, because the Lord reminded me that even though I have been saved for many years, how easy it is ‘to forget’ what a high price was paid by my Savior for my sin.

Learn more about Good News Clubs.

I asked Erma Boswell to share her testimony about Good News Clubs. “For me, there are so many testimonies from Good News Club that impacted my life. It all started with a child in my oldest son’s class bullying him, especially on the bus. I heard you speak on WMHR about CEF and Good News Clubs and that’s when I decided to start one in our home. We invited this boy to the club, and he came along with his sister. At that time we weren’t able to do clubs in school. I had 10-12 student’s getting off the bus at my home for GNC. Through GNC this young boy went from being a bully to being a friend.

“Later, we learned that this boy and his sister had been abandoned by their mom and had to move to our area to live with their father. They were new to our community and were hurting from their abandonment. Once schools were open to having GNC, I began meeting at the school. Over the years, we grew from 12 to 36 students weekly in our GNC.

“I learned so much myself as I prepared each weekly lesson. Though I had heard or read many of the Bible lessons myself, I learned so much more as I studied and prepared each lesson. I learned from the students who always had great questions. I came to know the students well enough to anticipate the questions they were probably going to ask, and this in turn helped me in preparing each lesson.

“When I first started a GNC in the school, I was not an employee there. I found that after I became a teacher aide in the school, my connections with the students and families became stronger. Seeing the students throughout the day allowed for them to share their memory verses with me, tell me how much they enjoyed the Bible story, or share a prayer request. I often heard, ‘See you at GNC, Mrs. Boswell!’

“There was a time that we actually had a tornado warning while at school and we all had to move to a certain hallway where it was safe. We were sitting shoulder to shoulder along the walls of the hallway. The kids were scared, and I have to be honest, I was concerned myself. One of the students next to me attended GNC. She told me she was scared. We talked and I asked her what we have learned in GNC. She told me that she learned that God is with her and she can talk to him any time. I encouraged her to pray and that I would do the same. After a few minutes, I asked her how she was feeling. She looked at me and replied, ‘Just a minute, Mrs. Boswell, I’m still talking to God.’ The storm passed and we were all fine. I will never forget our time in the hallway and how God used what we had learned in GNC to help that student and me.”

Connie shares a testimony from her club, “On Mondays at the school where I help with after school ministry, this year the attendance was lower than usual. Our program is not a traditional Good News Club as we run after school care from 3:30 to 5:15 for one age group on Mondays and another age group on Thursdays. The kids who sign up can choose to stay in the cafeteria to work on homework, do board games, a craft, or they can choose to play games in the gym.

“Another option for them is that they can choose to go hear a Bible story with “Miss Connie” in one of the kindergarten rooms. They pick an activity for 20 minutes and then can either stay or switch to a new activity while they are with us.

“We have a few teenage helpers from a city work program who help us by leading activity time in the gym. Because we have not had that many kids this year, there have been weeks when no kids went to the gym. There were several weeks in this last semester when that happened, so two of the teens from the city work program came to my room to help “supervise” the kids for the Bible lesson.”

“One of the teen helpers was mostly on his phone, but the other listened intently to the lesson when I taught. The series I taught through in February and early March before Covid was on Queen Esther. This young man had not heard this story from the Bible before and he was glued to the plot and the cliff- hangers that end each week’s lesson.”

“When wicked Haman had to bring Mordecai through the streets on the King’s horse with royal robes declaring how great Mordecai was, this young teen helper was stunned saying, “NO WAY!!” and laughed out loud at the twist of fate.”

“Of course because it is CEF material, the opportunity to present the gospel is given in every lesson. Though this young man did not make a profession of faith during the time he was with me, he had repeated opportunities to see and hear the gospel presented several times this last semester.

“One week, during prayer request time he asked me to put a prayer request into the “God Can” that we use for the kids’ requests. He was having a job interview that week and asked me please to pray. The next week when I came in to the school as soon as he saw me, he got a HUGE smile on his face. I took one look at him and said, “You got it -didn’t you!?”

“He said, “I didn’t get just one job, I got TWO job offers!! Thank you for praying for me!!!” We high-fived and the kids there asked what we were talking about. It gave me an opportunity to talk about how God hears us when we pray to Him and that sometimes the answer is “yes”, sometimes it’s “no”, and sometimes it’s a “wait”… but that GOD always knows what is best for us. This time we could rejoice with this young man that God had answered with a yes, and we could all give God the glory for answering our prayers for him.

“When I show up each week at this school, it’s to teach the kids, but God has in mind exactly who He intends to be there for the lessons. I don’t know this teen’s heart or whether he is even a believer yet, but I am praying that the gospel messages that he heard repeatedly, hearing the way God used Esther to shine for Him, “at such a time as this,” and seeing God answer his prayer for a job will go a long way in building his faith and trust in God!”