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For nearly 11 years, more than 14,000 Beach Club volunteers have been sharing the gospel with elementary school children inside the walls of their public schools. One of the ways to measure the incredible impact KiDs Beach Club® has had on more than 77,000 children is that nearly 7,500 children have made Jesus their “Forever Friend” by asking Him into their lives during Beach Club.

KiDs Beach Club® invites all third through sixth graders to attend Beach Clubs and while many children continue attending Beach Clubs each year through sixth-grade graduation, KiDs Beach Club® recently discovered the increasing mobility rate in public schools has significantly shortened the window to reach many of these children with the gospel.

“With the frequency of parents moving in and out of school districts, the mobility rate of elementary school children is at an all-time high,” said Paul McCollum, vice president of school relations for KiDs Beach Club®.

“In many cases, we only have one year to reach these children and get Bibles in their hands,” he said. “As a former school principal, I can attest to the fact that it is a dual-edged sword. On one side, you have opportunity to impact a greater number of children in any given time frame, but on the other side, high mobility creates the need to be stealthily targeted in your resulting impact. If it is important for their education, it is imperative for their salvation.”

For many years, KiDs Beach Club® provided only 24 Bibles, one per week, to each Beach Club to give out during the 24 weeks of Beach Club.

In 2015, God clearly spoke to the KBC team that every child in every Beach Club should receive a Bible and through His provision KiDs Beach Club® started Great Treasure Day, the special day to hand out Bibles in each club, in the spring of 2015. On Great Treasure Day that spring, we handed out more than 11,000 Bibles. The expectation was that from that point on, KiDs Beach Club® would need about one-fourth of that amount or around 4,000 Bibles, to hand to incoming third graders plus any new child that would start attending Beach Club.

What KiDs Beach Club® discovered was that the number was closer to 50 percent, which reflects the high mobility rate within the public school system. In reality, because many of these children may only be in a school with a Beach Club for one year, the window to reach these children is much smaller than originally thought. The KBC leadership believes God is orchestrating events in the lives of many families, to allow children to be in a school with a Beach Club, even for one year, just so they can get a copy of His word.

In the first two years after implementing Great Treasure Day, KiDs Beach Club® has handed Bibles to 26,758 children, bringing the overall total for the ministry to 47,823.

Three times in the final chapter of the final book of the Bible, Revelation 22, in verses 7, 12 and 20, John wrote about Jesus coming quickly. It has never been more urgent to get the gospel to a lost and dying world than it is today.

KiDs Beach Club® is praising God that He continues to keep the doors open to the public schools to share His word in after-school clubs across America and give these children, many who don’t have a church home, the chance to hear about Him for the first time and receive their very first Bible so that even if the family moves, those children can take His word with them for direction in the years to come.

If you would like to make a tax-deductible year-end gift to support the continuing efforts of KiDs Beach Club® to provide every child in every Beach Club a Bible, please visit kidsbeachclub.org/give.

KiDs Beach Club® will welcome two new board members in January. Ron Cornelius will rejoin the KBC board of directors after one year away, while Julie Dalavai will join her husband Emmanuel Dalavai as a board member.

Cornelius has actively attended church since his youth and came to know the Lord when he was 13 years old. He grew up as the fourth of six kids on a 16-acre farm surrounded by hills near Springfield, Oregon, where his mom still lives in the very same house. Cornelius graduated from the University of Oregon in 1981 with a bachelor’s degree in business management and an interest in real estate. After graduation, he left Oregon to see the world including backpacking through Europe. In 1983, the Texas real estate market was doing well so he moved to Texas and in 1991 started his own commercial real estate company.

His heart for people and love for travel in the United States and abroad has taken him on mission trips to Africa, Russia, China, Brazil, India and Ecuador. He works with prison ministries and Big Brothers Big Sisters, where he is currently mentoring two young men that have been released from a Youth Correctional Institution in Gainesville, Texas. Cornelius and his wife Sherry married in 1985 and have two children, Tiffany and Logan. Ron feels called to serve the Lord with his time, talent and treasures through various activities and is excited about what God is doing with KiDs Beach Club®.  

Julie Dalavai began following her calling of international missions after working on Capitol Hill in Washington D.C. for two years. With the Journeyman program, she was able to work in Paris, France on a church-planting movement.

After her time in France, Dalavai started working for Inventiv Health, coordinating logistics for medical education programs and has served there for more than 10 years. 

At church, Dalavai has helped organize and lead mission trips to France, South Africa, Armenia and Iran. She has also participated in mission trips to Tanzania, Columbia and India. Dalavai loves to watch musicals, read and travel with her husband.

Dalavai accepted Christ as her savior when she was 8 years old and currently serves alongside her husband at First Baptist Church of Euless. She is a graduate of Baylor University with a bachelor’s degree in foreign service.

“I am reminded all the time that we do not have to go to another country to be able to build relationships and share the gospel with individuals of other backgrounds and religions because our Metroplex is so diverse,” she said.

KiDs Beach Club® looks forward to seeing what these two community leaders bring to furthering the vision and strengthening the mission of KiDs Beach Club®.

Fray Webster was awarded with the Distinguished Board Member award for his six consecutive years of service on the KiDs Beach Club® Board of Directors.

In 2014, Webster came to a board meeting with the question, “What if we gave every child a Bible?” The idea came to him in is daily devotion that KiDs Beach Club® give every child in Beach Club his or her own Bible, instead of giving only one Bible away each week. It took great faith to express this idea. But, because of Webster’s obedience along with the work and donations of countless others, we now celebrate Great Treasure Day. 

According to fellow Board Member Steve Thomas, Webster was “one of the best board members. Fray was generous in his time, ideas and monetary contributions. He devoted a lot of energy to furthering the message of KBC.” Thomas went on to say Webster was “tireless in his efforts.”

Webster will still be a friend of KiDs Beach Club® and will continue to serve the Lord at First Baptist Church Euless and through the entrepreneurship of his business, the Bramata Company.

Christmas is just around the corner. It’s a season of giving and for some people that presents its own unique challenges. We all have at least one person in our life that it’s hard to find the right gift for. Maybe they even tell you they don’t really want or need anything.

Yet, you still want to buy that person a gift and scour the Internet for just the right item. We have the perfect idea. Why not give a Bible in their honor?

You know that KiDs Beach Club® gives Bibles to children in public schools across the country. You may already even be supporting our ministry and our Bibles for Beach Club program.

“This is a season of giving. This is the Christmas season,” said Paul McCollum, KBC vice president for development. “What gift is better than the Bible? Why did Christ come? He came to save sinners. What did he leave us in order to help us? His word. Just as Christ came for sinners, we are still distributing Bibles to kids to fulfill that purpose for which Christ came.”

Giving Bibles in the name of your friend or family member is a meaningful gift and could have an eternal impact on children for God’s kingdom. It might even be an introduction for them to an organization near to your heart.

To give the gift of Bibles, please visit kidsbeachclub.org/bibles.

If you include the name and address of the person you want to honor or remember, we’ll send that person (or their loved one) a card to let them know a gift has been made in their honor or memory.

When making your gift, you have the option to support the Bibles for Beach Club program with a one-time gift or you can provide a gift on a recurring basis, like weekly, monthly, quarterly or annually.

“The message at Christmas is the message we give all year long,” McCollum said. “Christ came to save you. Essentially, recurring giving is a celebration of that gift – Jesus Christ – 12 months a year. Every month, you’re celebrating Christmas. Every month, you’re fulfilling the mission of why Christ came and why we celebrate His birth.”

Your support of the Bibles for Beach Club program is making a lasting impact on the nearly 10,500 kids currently enrolled in Beach Club. This year, alone, you have helped us put 8,981 Bibles in the hands of children. The other children previously received a Bible. Since 2005, we have distributed 47,823 Bibles through Beach Club in public elementary schools.

While those numbers continue to climb upward, we have even more clubs signed on to start after the first of the year. For that, we are incredibly thankful to God for our partnering churches and the fact that He is opening doors to more public schools across the country. But we need your continued support to ensure that we’re able to continue giving Bibles to every child.

We’re thankful the support you have already provided to Beach Club, but in this season of giving, please consider making a gift of Bibles or when someone asks you what you want for Christmas, tell your friends, family and colleagues that is what you would like from them. 

Together, with your support, we’re making a difference in the lives of children. We’re able to provide them with a Jesus experience within the culture of their public school. We are connecting kids to Christ and putting Bibles in their hands.

The greatest calling we have as those who are created in the image of God, is to share God’s love with others. Of course, there are countless ways of sharing His love and your support of KiDs Beach Club® has provided multiple opportunities every week to bring God’s love onto the campuses of public schools throughout America. 

Hodges Elementary in Balch Springs, Texas is one of the many schools where Beach Club is active in sharing His love each week. Earlier this month the campus suffered two tragic events, the passing of a sixth-grade boy from cancer and within a matter of hours, the unexpected death of a faculty member’s husband. Both were impactful and very difficult losses for Hodges principal Dr. Kim Broadway. 

“We lost a sixth grade student yesterday, so we had to go from classroom to classroom to tell the students,” Broadway said. “They already knew that he had been ill but most kids don’t realize that death is a real possibility, so when that kind of things happens, the main point of that message that I always want to share is that the only hope through death is through Christ. As a principal in the classroom setting, it’s not an option for me to throw that out there but in KiDs Beach Club®, it is. So I made that most important point with my sixth grade students today.”

Broadway, who was instrumental in bringing a Beach Club to Hodges this year, had previously marked her calendar to be present in the Beach Club on November 3, so she could help hand out Bibles to the club’s 207 children on Great Treasure Day. Those tragic deaths happened just one day before Great Treasure Day and little did she know the impact this day would have for both her and the children. At the end of club, she gathered the sixth grade students on the stage to be with them, talk about the tragedy and lead them in prayer.

“Yes, they’ve been talking about it and obviously dealing with grief is different for each individual but for most, just talking helps so they’ve been talking about it all day and definitely want to pray about it,” Broadway said. “We have a pretty good group of sixth graders in here. They’re going to share the love of Christ through that tragedy, in a big part because of KiDs Beach Club®, I have no doubt.”

Pastor Alex Gonzales, whose church, Hickory Tree Baptist Church, sponsors the Beach Club at Hodges Elementary echoed Dr. Broadway’s sentiments.

“I can think of no better opportunity to share His love with the kids at Hodges Elementary who are a part of KiDs Beach Club® about (the boy’s) battle with cancer and more importantly, his love for Jesus,” Gonzales said. 

“Dr. Broadway's bold presence and assurance in sharing with the kids that day about the hope that is found in Christ is why we're incredibly grateful for the ministry of KiDs Beach Club®. Because it allows us a trust and platform to share with the kids we're reaching. In turn, our prayer is they will share with their friends.” 

So, for you, as parents, who allow your precious children to participate in Beach Club each week, who are sharing His love by inviting their friends, memorizing and sharing Bible verses each week, thank you.

For you, as one of thousands of volunteers, passionate about sharing His love by praying for each child and teaching them God’s word, thank you.

And for you, our donors, who are generously sharing His love with financial gifts to purchase Bibles for every one of our 10,000-plus children as well as all the expenses that go along with renting the school facilities, providing the funds for training, background checks, insurance and personnel, thank you. 

We all have an amazing opportunity to be part of sharing His love next week on Giving Tuesday, the international day of giving that brings non profits, donors, businesses, and communities together to celebrate generosity and the impact of giving back. If you feel led to give a financial gift to KiDs Beach Club®, please click here. We have already handed out nearly 8,000 of the 10,000 KBC Explorer’s Study Bibles we’ve ordered this year and will have several new clubs starting in the spring. Your gift will greatly help us purchase more Bibles for many children who don’t have a Bible.

You can also help us raise awareness about how KiDs Beach Club® is sharing His love. Please visit our social media page at kidsbeachclub.org/social-media, follow us and share our posts with your friends and family next week, all day long on Giving Tuesday. 

Together we are sharing His love and making Jesus Cool at School!

Sharing His Love - Natalie Daniel from KiDs Beach Club on Vimeo.

On Tuesday, November 29, KiDs Beach Club® is blessed to be among the thousands of organizations to be a part of Giving Tuesday, the international day of giving that brings non-profits, donors, businesses, and communities together to celebrate generosity and the impact of giving back.

This is a terrific day for many who haven’t heard of KiDs Beach Club® to learn about how we share God’s love in public schools throughout America on a weekly basis. You can help us get the word out to your friends and family. Please visit our social media page at kidsbeachclub.org/social-media, and if you haven’t done so, please follow us and share our posts with your friends and family next week, all day long on Giving Tuesday.

We are so encouraged to hear many powerful and impactful stories on a weekly basis of how the Lord is moving through the lives of the children, volunteers, teachers, administrators and donors involved in KiDs Beach Club® and will be spending the next several weeks emphasizing how being a part of this ministry by sharing His love in public schools is providing life-changing hope. 

Former elementary school music teacher Natalie Daniel recently moved to Hillsboro, Texas, and is now a stay-at-home mom and a volunteer in the Beach Club at Hillsboro Intermediate. She was very surprised to learn that she could be a part of sharing His love inside a public school and jumped at the opportunity to serve.

“I was very surprised,” said Daniel, who leads a surf team of, in her words “amazing, crazy and awesome” boys. I was a public school teacher for eight years before staying home with my little boy, so it was very exciting. It’s not something I’ve been a part of anywhere else so I thought, what a blessing that these kids get to do this.”

In the first few weeks of Beach Club, Daniel discovered that for several boys in her group, this was their first exposure to the gospel of Jesus Christ.

“I have at least three children in my group here that have no church affiliation whatsoever, not even once a year,” she said. “So I think this is a humongous opportunity for us to get to serve them and hopefully reach their families as well.”

One of the ways to do that is by giving these children a KBC Explorer’s Study Bible on Great Treasure Day, a day that Natalie and at least one of her boys was excited about since the start of Beach Club this year. 

“After we started club," she said. "I asked my boys who had a Bible? I had one little boy, never had a Bible in his whole life and it was all I could do not to go home and take one from my shelf and bring it and say, you just wait, couple of weeks and you’re going to have one.”

Daniel had the privilege of handing this boy his first ever Bible on Great Treasure Day and in her words, “he’s thrilled!” 

Another opportunity for Natalie to continue sharing His love in her Surf Team is by praying for each boy every day and letting them know that she is bringing their requests before our heavenly Father. One such request really touched her heart and, through tears, told this story.

“I had a kid this last week and he wrote on his card that his parents are getting divorced and he doesn’t know what to do and he doesn’t know where to turn and he’s one of mine who doesn’t have a church home, so mom and dad, there’s not a lot of hope there, so I’m blessed that I get to share some hope in that dark situation.”

We all have an amazing opportunity to be part of sharing His love November 29 on Giving Tuesday. If you feel led to give a financial gift to KiDs Beach Club®, please click here. We have already handed out nearly 8,000 of the 10,000 KBC Explorer’s Study Bibles we’ve ordered this year and will have several new clubs starting in the spring. Your gift will greatly help us purchase more Bibles for many children who don’t have a Bible.

Together we are sharing His love and making Jesus Cool at School!