Nitro Kids Conference

Liquid Nitro, my first Nitro experience, and if I have my way not the last. Hundreds of kids packed the sanctuary of Overlake. Among them was me and the two boys from my church. They gave me a good idea on what was grasping their attention and what was not. It was especially easy to find myself lost in the activities there, I almost forgot Nitro was for the kids. Worship was definitely a key part of Nitro, and I realize that Nitro is aimed at a 5th grade boy level, but I could not help but wonder if those younger grew bored after a while. The first night of worship I was in the back with my boys and watched as the many children near us were either sitting, or playing hide and seek among the chairs. It seemed the worship was good, for those who could worship that long, but the younger kids could only handle it for so long, including my 2nd graders who kept asking, "is it done yet?" The skit spoke volumes to all languages. It was jam packed with humor, entertainment, and a healthy amount of Biblical teaching. The kids were glued to the actors every moment they moved and every time they uttered a sound. Never once were the kids around me disruptive, they hardly made a noise the whole performance unless they were prodded to answer. Even afterwards my boys were talking about the skit and how much they remembered from it. They may not have directly seen Frank as the Jesus character, but they understood when the time came that they were meant to put their trust in God. The skit simply put that in another perspective for them. When Kevin Geer came out to speak he was always prepared. Both times I watched him I was nearly moved to my own response. He used two objects when he told his stories to the kids, a pair of handcuffs, and a life vest. While he told his personal story about losing the key to his handcuffs, his voice inflection changed. What once sounded like a calm voice simply having fun changed to terror as he spoke about losing the key. As I looked around I could see the fearful looks children had on their faces. Kevin was drawing them in. Even better was a simple phrase Kevin used twice, "I need everyone to look at me, this is important." and then he paused. Powerful, every child around me hushed. I felt no need to try and get my boys to listen because they were already staring straight at Kevin. Nitro was a tiring experience for us, a lot of adults might just wonder, what is the point of us doing Nitro? The point was that we were able to empower a group of young kids to go out and tell their friends about Jesus, the point was we allowed them to offer up their struggles to God. The point was we allowed them to experience God like never before.