Orange Is Coming To Valley Bible Sunday School This Fall

What is Orange? The color orange comes from blending two colors, red and yellow, in order to produce a more vibrant and visible result, orange. Orange curriculum is designed to blend two forces in the church so they work together. The two forces are church leadership and the family.

What does Orange look like in a church? One answer is that it is any church trying to do a better job of strengthening the partnership between church leaders and parents to do a better job influencing the next generation for Jesus. The idea of this is to improve the way we work together as a team, communicate to children and teens, partner with parents, rally church leaders to act as disciple makers, and affect the spiritual direction of a generation.

We are announcing a change of Sunday School curriculum for students pre-K through Grade 6. To simply say that we are changing curriculum is somewhat incomplete as a statement. We feel it is more like we have found something that will help us do a better job of reinforcing what we seek to do as a church with what parents want to do in the home. We believe this will give parents encouragement, support and materials and help to raise that next generation as followers of Jesus. It should work in a healthy circular way. If the church can help the home do its job for Jesus, the church will be made up of healthier families. Healthier families will make for a healthier church who seeks to follow Jesus to reach our community and our world with the message of the gospel of Jesus.

There is definite purpose in this decision. Our goal is never to make a decision based on the latest trends or on squeaky wheels but always to fulfill the purpose and stay on track with the direction that we believe God has called us to as a church, to be and to make disciples of Jesus Christ. That begins first in the home. Therefore any program or ministry of the church must fit into what we are doing in our purpose of making disciples of Jesus beginning with our children and teens.

We had a team to research materials that were available. We looked at over a dozen choices and in the end were unanimous in our agreement. The curriculum that we will use is called "Orange." You can find out more about it at http://www.whatisorange.org. There are multiple resources for church leaders, families and teachers that come with the biblically based lesson material.

I want to thank Lia Pedersen and Jackie Denison for their hard work over the past weeks to do this investigation. I believe they used outstanding criteria to evaluate the options and make the choice. I am really pleased with the conclusion. We have a lot of work to prepare for this fall but I cannot wait to see what God will do in us and through us in Sunday School beginning in September. See you there!

- Pastor John Westerholm