One night, after we finished reading stories to our kids, I leaned down and started to pray with my five year old McRae. She quickly put her tiny hand over my mouth and said “Mom already prayed for me.”

I’m pretty sure right before that moment I was congratulating myself on raising such amazing, Godly kids. I only have two speeds, believing I am the best parent in the world, or the worst. Those are my two go to modes. You might be different.

But one of the things my wife and I are constantly talking about is how do we get our kids involved in some of the big, amazing projects that are going on around the world. We’ve talked about talking them on a trip overseas with us, but most of the organizations we’ve talked to have said 5 and 7 is too young right now. So eliminating the option of giving my 5 year old a mission trip machete and trekking her through the jungle to a remote village, how do we find ways to give them chances to serve and learn and be inspired by giving?

That’s the question that encouraged me to partner with Rice Bowls. They’ve got a program right now to “redefine the happy meal.” As a dad who has bought a bajillion happy meals, that was curious to me. So I dug a little. Their mission is pretty simple:

1. Fuel awesomeness in kids.
2. Partner with great orphanage directors to make sure food is provided and vicious cycles are broken.

They love seeing kids help kids. Which is exactly what the Acuff family is going to do. We’re taking the 10 bowl challenge. What’s that?

1. You order 10 free Rice Bowls.
2. You give them to a few friends.
3. You fill them up with change.
4. You send the change back in to feed orphans around the world.

I ordered them and soon a big box of bowls will be arriving at our house. I think my kids are going to love it. It’s going to start a ton of conversations for our family, shine some big light on the joy of giving and help kids in Haiti, Rwanda, India and all around the world.

I hope you’ll give the 10 bowl challenge a try, but I have to warn you, the Acuff family is pretty competitive. So don’t go into this thing thinking you’ll beat us. Number 1, it’s not a competition. Number 2, you won’t beat us.

Click here to learn more about Rice Bowls.

Question:
How do you as a parent get your kids involved in giving right now?

(It’s guest post Friday! Here’s one from Some Guy, an engineer from Michigan. If you want to write a guest post for SCL, here’s how.)

Sword drills 2.0 – By Some Guy

“Hold on while my Bible loads.”

That’s what someone said the other week in Sunday School when she was asked to read a verse. That’s where we are these days with all these gadgets.

Back when I was in grade school, we ran sword drills (or Bible drills for those of you who are less hardcore) the old-fashioned way–we had to turn the pages of our printed Bibles.

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I know it’s probably not going to happen.

I know that at this point in my life, the chances are pretty slim. I dreamed about it so often as a seventh grader that I thought there might be a chance though. I thought maybe when I was older it would be easier, you know? Every guy wants to. You see it on TV and it looks so simple when your heroes do it but then you try it in real life and it’s next to impossible. I’m starting to think that it will never happen.

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I don’t want to color my hair.

My dad is gray or white or whatever word you use to describe your hair color when it lacks color. He’s not a little gray, he’s super gray. In fact, a few weeks ago at Lowe’s, someone turned to him and said, “Anderson Cooper!” That’s just how the Acuffs get down.

And lately I’ve run into a few friends who haven’t seen me in a while and they’ve all said the same two things:

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How did this happen?

How did life end up like this?

I mean, I was never a “pew gypsy,” one of those church attendees who can float about the sanctuary sitting in a different section every week. I never bounced from balcony to front row and back again with never a care in the world, but it was never this bad.

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Last week, I committed an unpardonable sin while speaking at Cross Point.

I didn’t mean to. I mean that’s my home church. As a speaker, the last thing I want to do is mess up during one of the 5 services I spoke at that day. If that happens out on the road, I can hang my head in shame and retreat back to Nashville, resting in the knowledge that I probably won’t see those folks again.

But when it’s your own church and you mess up during a sermon, those poor people have to make eye contact with you the next Sunday and the Sunday after that.

What did I do from stage that was so erroneous?

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My dad is a pastor and growing up I often watched him try to perform magic with the ridiculously small budget he had to work with.

I know it’s weird to say “pastor” and “magic” in the same sentence but if you’ve ever worked or volunteered at a church, you know that’s what you have to do sometimes when it comes to funds.

You get a budget for your ministry, usually around a nickel, look at the people in your community you’re trying to reach, usually around a bajillion, and then you go to work. And you hope and pray that the small amount of budget you have will reach the big amount of people you have a heart for.

That dynamic is why I was excited when I heard about Only 144. Now normally, if someone says the phrase “it’s a Christian version of ______” I throw a smoke bomb and exit the conversation during the confusion. We don’t need a Christian Google. I promise. But what I liked about Only 144 was that it’s not just a Christian version of Groupon. Their heart is for churches and ministers and volunteers. People like my dad, people like you maybe who have far too little budget to reach far too many people.

So they put together ridiculous deals on real resources and then offer them online for 144 hours. It’s that simple. As an example, on August 12 they’ll be offering a huge Children’s Ministry Resource Bundle with $1,070 worth of resources for $97. (You can signup to find out about when the next deal is.)

And today, because they’re sponsoring SCL, I get to give away $600 of small group materials to one reader. The materials are from Matt Chandler, Mark Driscoll and Tommy Nelson.

Want to enter? Here’s how:

1. Leave a comment on this post with an answer to the question, “Have you ever worked at a church?”

2. Twitter a link to this post with this link: http://bit.ly/qdHepC . If you don’t have a Twitter account, you can use Facebook. You can write your own or use this example. “Win small group materials from Matt Chandler, Mark Driscoll & Tommy Nelson on @jonacuff’s blog http://bit.ly/qdHepC ”

3. On Saturday July 30, we will pick 1 winner. We’ll announce them the following week and you can email your address if you’re the winner.

That’s it. Dad, friends who work at churches, people who volunteer, check out only144.com!

(John Crist is a longtime guest contributor to SCL. His guest post last week was hilarious! Today he’s teamed up with his college/20-somethings pastor Aaron Stern to write about secrets. Stern just released a new book called What’s Your Secret?: freedom through confession available on Amazon. Enjoy!)

Confessing Secrets by John Crist

I’m in an accountability group with seven guys from church and our college/20-somethings pastor, Aaron Stern. Every week we go around the circle with the obligatory “what terrible decisions did you make this week?” and usually, someone’s got a secret to tell. But there’s an art to confession. It’s the exact opposite of eating a Reese’s Cup, there are plenty of wrong ways to do it.

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Who is Ben Arment?

The short answer? A genius.

The long answer? He’s the founder of the wildly successful “Story” conference and the creator of Dream Year. In Dream Year he coaches a select group of people for the entire year as they work on the tactics, strategies and real world plans that turn their “what if” dream into a “what is” reality.

And he’s joining us at the Quitter Conference. He speaks around the country, is one of the smartest people I’ve ever met and is going to blow you away with both his kindness and his insights.

If you haven’t signed up for the Quitter Conference on July 30th, in Nashville, TN, there are still a few spots left. Click here to reserve your spot!

And if you want to check out Ben, here’s something he wrote the other day that I think is brilliant. “140 Character Friendships.”

Want to know a secret?

Want to know what people say when they don’t think what you’ve just said is funny?

I’ve discovered this by saying approximately 1 bajillion unfunny things in the last 35 years. This is not a theory, this is a time tested, bad joke proven law of conversation that most people follow without even knowing it. Here it is, if you say something unfunny to someone, if you tell a story that is funnier in your head than it is coming out of your mouth, this is what the person you are talking to will say:

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