Sample Message from Story: Parables of Jesus

This convertible series will work in a variety of settings.

It can be anything from a single message to an evening program to a weekend retreat or revival, Spiritual renewal series.
The point of this series is to look at the lessons in the stories Jesus told and how to use them to live a better story.

Messages include:

• What Kind of Soil Are You? The Parable of the Sower
• The Older Brother: The Prodigal Son
• Who’s Your Samaritan? The Good Samaritan
• Hurried, Buried and Worried: The Parable of the Talents
• What’s Your Story? The Sheep and the Goats, The Parable of the Lost Sheep

Evening Programs Include:

• The Gifted: Parable of the soils, The Good Samaritan and The Parable of the Talents
• Relationships: Parable of the Soils, The Prodigal Son and The Sheep and Goats

I can also work to your themes and use other parables. I want to help your congregation to live a better story. For more information, contact me, Dave Weiss, at AMOKArts@aol.com.

The Parable of the Talents or “Don’t Be Skippy!”

I know I have been a little lax in posting these last few days. I have a pretty good excuse, I’ve been running A.M.O.K. at my first home church. I’ve been preaching a series of messages based on the parables of Jesus called Story: Parables of Jesus. It’s been going really well and I’m also compiling them into a presentation by the same name. It’s been a lot of fun. Tonight’s message is based on what is probably my favorite of all the parables, the parable of the talents.

You know it, right (if not it’s found in Matthew 25:14-30) A master gives portions of money to his servants to invest while he goes off on journey. It says he gave these talents to them, “each according to his ability.” In other words he knows what they are capable of doing and gives them an amount he knows they can handle, kind of like God does with us and our talents. He doesn’t compare us with others, he knows what we’re capable of (how He made us) and entrusts accordingly.

The first two guys, take their sums and invest them, doubling the investment while the third (the one who received the least) buries his in the dirt. When the master returns he settles accounts he’s very pleased with the first two, tells them well done and essentially invites them to a party. He then turns to the servant who buried his talent (we’ll call him Skippy) and to me this is where it gets interesting. The first thing this servant does is blame the master for his own disobedience. He then goes on to impune the master’s character.

You know what I see in this third servant, Skippy? I see fear, essentially fear of failure. The other two guys go to work at once, investing the master’s money. They take a risk. There was the possibility they could have lost. Skippy decided not to take the risk but instead to play it safe, after all it wasn’t his money. What if he loses? What if the master gets angry? What if? What if? What if? Skippy gets so caught up in his fear that he makes the master a villain in his mind and buries his gift. Do you do that?

The difference between the first two servants and Skippy, I believe is trust. The first two guys trust that the master will be good if they fail and so they get to work at once. In the process they obey their master. Skippy’s fear turns into disobedience and wasted opportunities.

The point is this. Your talents represent God’s investment in you. He wants you to put them to work to build His Kingdom. If you do that, win or lose (in the eyes of the world) the Lord will be pleased. He’s only really displeased when we don’t place our trust in Him and bury our talents.

Don’t be Skippy!
To bring Story: Parables of Jesus to your church, contact Dave Weiss.

What I’ve been up to lately…

I’ve been hard at work generating the paintings for my new presentation Story: Parables of Jesus. These will be displayed in conjunction with the live paintings I do every night. I am excited to say I will be rolling out the extended presentation of Story as a revival/spiritual renewal series from tomorrow through Wednesday night at Mohrsville Church of the Brethren in Mohrsville, PA and the one hour version next Sunday at St. Thomas Independent Church of the Brethren in Mount Pleasant Mills, PA next Sunday. If you’re in PA. I’d love to see you there. Otherwise I’d love to bring it to you.

Another Creation Station Video

A lot of my creative time recently has been consumed in creating pieces of art for my Creation Station Vacation Bible School curriculum. Here’s how the program came about… Some church leader friends I know have decided to give their VBS teachers a little break this year, so they’re having me come in and do the opening, closing and tag team with the pastor to do the teaching station, the teachers will be working with the students and taking them from station to station. There will be a teaching station, a snack station, a craft station and a recreation station. I’m really excited about this project. The theme of the teaching for this evening is God made you special. Each session uses a different animal (one of God’s creations) to make the point and this one uses the Zebra. The video will show you why. The opening each night will include a live painting of that animal.

How would you teach a child about his or her own “specialness”? The memory verse for this night is Ephesians 2:10. That may be a good place to start.

I plan on doing this VBS as a presentation is churches on 2014. If you would like to bring me in to teach your VBS, contact me at amokarts@aol.com.

Decisions, Decisions

We’re in one of those places at the Weiss house. A time of decision. My faithful Chevy Trailblazer is getting up there in mileage and I have a decision to make. Do I stick some money into it and keep it or take that money and put it toward a newer vehicle? A van would work better for getting my presentations from place to place. On the other hand, not having a payment has been kind of nice. With a thousand mile weekend coming up, I’m leaning toward something new. We’re praying and would appreciate your prayers for this decision.

In other news, I am busily working on my new presentation, Story: Parables of Jesus. It will be ready to go in May. I am really liking where this is headed. The basic concept is to use the stories of Jesus to teach people to live a better story. This presentation should be about an hour long but I am also working it out into a five message series, perfect for retreats, revival/spiritual renewal series.

I’m also working on the vacation Bible School presentation Dr. Dave’s Creation Station. Which is all about God and His creation, His relationship with us and finding the purpose for which we were created.

I would love the opportunity to bring my ministry to your church. Please contact me at amokarts@aol.com I basically ask for a free will offering and a night’s lodging. For churches requiring extensive travel, please consider teaming up with a few churches in your community and make it a weekend “tour.”

Would You Bring This Guy Into Your Church?

Hi everyone, I could sure use your help. As many of you know, I am trying to build up my speaking ministry. My goal is to get ti minister in as many churches and at as many events as I possibly can, using my gifts to spread the Gospel and inspire others to find and use their gifts to the glory of God. To that end, I have designed a new flyer to send to churches. It is actually a two sided “rack card.” I would love to have you look it over and give me your feedback on it, before I print it. Does it give you enough information to get you to contact me? What could be better? Any feedback would be really helpful.

By the way, if you would like to bring me to your church for a presentation, I’ve tried to make it really easy. All I ask for is travel expenses, a free will offering and a night’s lodging. Contact me at AMOKArts@aol.com

Is Your Church Harnessing the Power of It’s God-given Creativity?

We live in a world where things are changing at an unprecendented pace with no sign of slowing down. How does the church respond to all this change. Very creatively. Let’s face it, no matter how much things change, the message of the Gospel remains the same and rightfully so, the Gospel is the hope of Christ to our broken world. So how do we take that unchanging message to an ever changing world? Again, very creatively!

I’m not saying change the message, it’s the Word of God and it’s good all by itself. I’m saying that God has empowered His people in the church to take the Gospel to the ends of the earth in a multitude of ways, designed by God Himself to reach a multitude of people. Is your church tapping into that creativity? Is it utilizing all of its people in all their glorious giftings? I’d like to help. You see I was one of those people. A new believer, struggling to find where I fit in the system. I’m not musical and I was terrified to speak in public. Those are the two main gifts we use in the church. Then one day something awesome happened. My pastor found a use for my gift and gave me permission to use it (art, in my case) to serve the Lord. It radically changed my life. Today I go to churches all over the US and preach and teach and use my gift of art to reach unbelievers and challenge believers to find and use their gifts.

That’s what I’d like to do for your church. I’d like to come in and share my gift and be used by the Lord to fire the imaginations of church members and churches alike. I’d like to share the Gospel with your community, but I’d also like to talk to the person who thinks his gift has no use in the Kingdom and I’d like to help the congregation to imagine what it would be like if all these diversely gifted people were putting their God-given gifts to serve the Lord in the church and community. How many people in your community could be reached if you just got a little creative?

I’m here to help. Contact me at amokarts@aol.com for more information.

The Power of Story: An Audio Preview from Story: Parables of Jesus

This is the introduction for my new A Night AMOK presentation Story: Parables of Jesus. Coming in March from http://AMOKArts.com For more information contact Dave Weiss at amokarts@aol.com

Pictures from the Indiana/Ohio Tour

I had a great time over the last few days doing art ministry.
My first stop was at the Church of the Brethren Church Planting Conference at Bethany Seminary in Richmond Indiana. I did a workshop on the concept of what it means to “Be the Body.”

I also did live worship paintings in each of the four worship gatherings.

The first piece was based on the passage referring to faith the size of a mustard seed moving mountains. I went off the idea of the faith that it takes to plant a church with it’s branches reaching to the heavens.

In Jeremiah 29 the Bible speaks of praying for the peace of the city. This simple piece was designed to be interactive. The bridge in the piece represents what we do when we plant a church. We’re not taking Jesus to a City. God is omnipresent. He’s already there. What we do is build a bridge to the Gospel. When the painting was finished, the attendees were invited to “tag” the city with the names and locations of their churches and plants as a reminder for the viewers to pray for them in their mission/planting work.

This painting looks a little sparse and with good reason. Once again, the attendees were invited to add something to the piece. In this case the passage was Acts 10 where Peter sees the vision of the sheet being lowered from heaven with all the unclean animals on it. The key part of this was God reminding Peter, “Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.” This passage is preparing Peter to reach out to a new people group. We used the painting to relate to the different perhaps non-traditional things we will bring to our work as church planters, bringing the Gospel to new populations. The name of this piece was “What’s On Your Sheet?”

The final gathering of the conference related to the faith it took Noah to set out in faith and build the ark which has it’s own parallels to church planting. The piece is a simple representation of the story and of God’s promise to us.

After the conference, I headed north. My first stop was Fort Wayne Indiana where I met with Sid Gauby, a church planter doing a marketplace ministry, a coffee house that also hosts a church called New Ground Coffee Company Sid and I chatted for some time about the ins and outs of church planting and shared some ideas back and forth. Unfortunately I had to leave fairly quickly, but I do hope to return.

Next I headed further North to Ashley, Indiana and Pleasant Chapel Church of the Brethren. Pastored by Val Kline, Pleasant Chapel is the other end of the church spectrum from church planting. They are celebrating their hundredth anniversary this year. They are a vibrant welcoming and loving congregation. I preached on the topic of what it means to be the Body of Christ and did a speed painting portrait of Christ as a reminder that He is the head of the body and also did my Many Parts One Body interactive art piece with the congregation.

The final stop of the “tour” Involved a drive south to Miamisburg, OH to visit with my friend and Interlinc co-conspirator, Todd Pearage. Todd and his family took ,me to dinner and put me up for the night. After Dinner, Todd and I went to Springboro Baptist Church and led a youth gathering. We spoke on the topic of unity and I painted this piece.

It looks like just another portrait of Jesus, but if you were to watch the piece come together, you would see the painting begins as two faces nose to nose and in conflict. I had done this piece for a video a few years back and Todd asked me to dust it off and try it again. Todd did such an amazing job speaking on this one that I was convinced to add this piece to my next A Night AMOK presentation, tentatively titled “Be the Body.” My hope is to begin booking that one in the fall.

It was good to get home after a long time away, but I was so blessed to get to do all these things and meet all these people. It’s amazing what can happen when people get together to “Be the Body” of Christ.

My New Presentation

Defeating the 20/80 Rule with Be the Body
• Does your church have enough people to get everything done?
• Does your church have a small group of people who do most of the work?
• Does your church have a large group of people on the fringes and barely connected?
When you call upon your congregation to do the kinds of service Jesus commanded do they look back at you with a look that says, “Isn’t that what we pay you for?”
There’s a rule in most human organizations including, unfortunately, the church, which states that on average about 20 percent of the people do 80% of the work. This leaves your most faithful servants doing many things for which they are neither called nor gifted and nearing burnout while the rest of the congregation is only slightly invested in the work of the Kingdom. This is not the church that God intended.
I was in danger of becoming one of those 80 percent people and then something amazing happened. I went from struggling new believer who could barely read scripture aloud with a profound fear of public speaking to ordained minister, pastor and speaker. It wasn’t all a smooth ride and it didn’t happen overnight but it happened and I can trace it all back to one event. My pastor found a Kingdom use for my unusual gift and it changed my life. I’m convinced that there are thousands (maybe millions) of people in the church of Jesus Christ who are in the same boat. They have tremendous, God-given potential to do great things—things that will tremendously expand the Kingdom and they’re just waiting for someone to find their gift, ignite their passion and show them how to be what they were created to be to the glory of God. We are all “God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works which God prepared in advance for us to do!”
That’s what my new presentation “Be the Body” is all about. Through the use of my story, artistic gifts, interactive projects and preaching the Word of God, I will challenge the “many parts” in your congregation to become fully invested members of the “one body” of Christ. Topics covered include:
• What it means to be the body of Christ? 

• How to do and be your part.

• What to lay down and what to take up.

• Maintaining unity and more.


This can be anywhere from a single message, a series of revival/Spiritual renewal services even a weekend retreat. I really feel a strong leading to go out into the church and call people into their God given calling. The guiding verse of this ministry is 1 Peter 4:10, Each one should use WHATEVER GIFTS he has received to serve others. I would love to come to your church or event and share with your congregation. Contact me, Dave Weiss at AMOKArts@aol.com
God bless,
Dave Weiss

www.amokarts.com