Pay Attention!!!!! Speak Up!!!!!

We all know about the children who were allegedly abused at Penn State . . . and sadly are hearing about similar situations in other colleges and universities. We in children's ministry, are around children all the time. We have to not only do everything we possibly can to insure the children in our ministries are safe, we also have to pay attention and speak up when we see or suspect a child is being harmed. 


Far too often we do not pay attention and do not speak up. It is not "just parental discipline" for a parent to abuse their child. Nowhere in the Bible does it tell us to strike our children. If children show up in our ministries with bruises, pay attention and speak up! If children who up in our ministries who are timid and who act as if they are afraid of being hit, pay attention and speak up!

For my other blog, grandma's cookie jar, I highlight one child each week from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Each day I receive email alerts about missing children - many of these are runaways. It breaks my heart to see these children. What must home be like if children who are only 13, 14 and 15 years old decide to run away? Wasn't there some person somewhere - a teacher at school, a leader at church, a neighbor, a relative . . . someone who noticed these children were being harmed and needed someone to pay attention and to speak up?


We MUST be the people who pay attention and who speak up. We MUST.