inRoads
inRoads
S5 Ep12 Making the Bible EXCITING for Kids with Barry Britnell
Barry Britnell, Host and Researcher for Appian Media, joins us on the podcast to discuss the release of our latest children's series "Lessons From the Land: the Kings" and talks about what he believes is the most important thing that we can be doing for the next generation of Bible students.
"Lessons From the Land: the Kings" is out now! 13 new videos relating to the first kings of Israel, as well as a brand new printed workbook! Visit appianmedia.org to watch the videos and for the listeners of the Inroads podcast, you can take 20% off your next purchase on appianmedia.org using promo code “podcast20” at checkout that's 20% off your entire cart.
The inRoads podcast is a production of Appian Media, a non-profit video production company dedicated to using compelling media to re-engage people with the Bible. Learn more and support the mission at https://appianmedia.org
Our next children's workbook and video set is out now. Lessons from the Land of the Kings takes a look at the period of the United Kingdom of Israel. Today on the podcast, we have the host of our children's content, Barry Britnell. He sits down to discuss the series, what production was like and the value of quality study materials for our children. All of that and more. Next on Inroads. Welcome to Inroads, where we share real world examples of digital evangelism and provide tips on how you can use today's technology to spread the gospel. Learn more about us and watch our free video series at appianmedia.org for our listeners of the Inroads podcast, we've got an exclusive discount code for you so you can shop all the great products on our brand new website, including the recently released Lessons from the Land of the Kings, which we're going to be talking more about today on the episode. This material is excellent for your church or homeschool group. Of course, all of these materials make use of the free videos that we've been known for. We'll give that discount code out a little bit later in the podcast, but right now let's get into our conversation with Barry, or as my children like to call him, Uncle Barry. Uncle Barry, how are you, Barry? He's he's a man. I'm doing fine. How are the two of y'all? Oh, we are fantastic. Yeah. In fact, our family just got to stay the night over at Barry's house. We made a quick trip down to Athens, Alabama, and we got to stay at the Britnell Hotel. And it was. It was wonderful. It's always a special treat when you stay at Barry's house. But your house was struck by lightning recently. I don't know if that's a sign or what's going on there. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. Craig and his family actually had a interesting time because it wasn't until they actually arrived that we told them that we had no heater air in the house and so out. I would say that's right. It's a fault. We just directed them upstairs to the bedrooms and said, you know, have fun. Our kids loved it. They were just, you know, Ethan, I think his very first trip to Barry's house, which was I don't know, Barry, it's been six, seven years ago. He drew all of us a little map strands and whatever markers to make sure that we knew how to get to Barry's house. And that's handy. Yeah. We've never gotten lost since. That's perfect, right? It was. It was a perfect map because you made it with no trouble at all. That's. That's right. That's right. That's right. Well, we're talking lessons from the land. The Kings are so excited. You know, I think the tendency is going to be and we maybe we should keep a calendar of how many times we say lessons from the land, the gospels, because that has been our series of children's videos until now. It's getting bigger and bigger. How are you feeling about that? The lessons from the land, the Kings, It's finally out now. That's great. I'm looking forward to sharing this with all the people that the first volume that we did with the Gospels, as you mentioned, was very well received. And I'm anxious to get these these new lessons from the period of the United Kingdom out to everyone. So if you were to compare the first set to this next set, obviously it is a different period in Israel's history and in the gospel story. But what are your thoughts? How would you compare them? Maybe how would you contrast this next set? Well, I think with a lot of the stories that we read about and we used for the gospels, those stories are fairly well known. And so there's really no surprises. One of the things about the Kings is as as we've said, it covers the period of the United Kingdom. There are some stories during that time that are very well known. For instance, David and Goliath. Everyone knows that story, but there's a lot of stories that aren't as well known. And so part of what I've enjoyed about this series is the fact that we've been able to reach in and grab some of those stories and show how relevant they really are. And then, of course, we brought them into this this children's series as well, which has been very, very good. And I think, you know, we know that the the beginning of the Lessons in the Land series came about because we were hearing from parents who were using following the Messiah, searching for a king to teach their younger kids. And we knew that that was never really written for that audience. So we're like, Oh, maybe we need to do something specifically for that younger grade, you know, second to fifth grade elementary school audience. And so that was lessons from the early in the gospels. That kind of was a nice accompaniment to following Messiah. This is the same thing to searching for a king, right? And that's kind of an exciting thing about that as well. But, you know, I think it's time to pull the curtain back a little bit if you don't know yet. When we film the stand ups with Barry, if you watch an episode, you see Barry at the beginning in the end and sometimes in the middle of these these videos, we're not in Israel, we're not on location, we're not on location. Don't let this ruin AP and media for you, right? This is the only instance where we actually do this. We don't we don't go around everywhere. We walk through the streets of Jerusalem. It really, really is Jerusalem. However you are correct. Yeah. So, Barry, what's the deal here? Where where have we taken? Well, actually, I think that's a credit to the production team because of for for most of our viewers, if we hadn't told them what we just told them, they may not have known that we were not in country. But no, for these, it was more it was more beneficial that we filmed these at a location that's a little closer to home. That's definitely cheaper to do. And for the purpose of what we were trying to accomplish, it wasn't entirely necessary that we were in-country to film these. And so for the Gospel series, we actually went to a location down in Lagrange, Georgia, and rented that facility for the entire day and were able to use that and filmed all of those there. For the Kings. We actually rented a facility out in Central Texas near the Capernaum studios out near Weatherford, Texas, and we were there for the entire day filming these from we, we came in on one day and we spent the night and then got up very early the next morning and really shot video the entire day until sundown to get all of these episodes in. And let me tell you, shooting in July in central Texas probably wasn't the wisest decision. But hey, it's when the space was available. It's when it was available. So you have to understand that Capernaum Syria has been used for many other larger productions than ours, right? That's right. If you if you're a chosen fan, that's one of them. But it was available in July, probably for good reason. Yeah. And Barry's kind of using this euphemism we shot all day. Well, all day meant 14 hours. Yes, it was from start to finish. And the team was just it was a really long day. Yeah, it was a really long day. And I really can't complain because you wanted you. Because I was on camera. You wanted me to look fresh in as little sweat as possible. And so in between every take, you would send me out to two literally the only air conditioned room on the entire property. And I would go hang out in the air for 20 minutes while I took down the cameras and the rigs and everything for over the last shoot and has got it all set up for the next next shoot. And so of all the members of the team, I had it the best because I could escape the heat for just a few minutes every now and then. And I'm sure you were diligently looking over the next script and not eating the snacks and drinking the water while you were in that air conditioned space. I say, I'm going to have to plead the Fifth for that question, because in the answer I may give may be criminal. Not good. We would send yeah, we would send Nolan who helped us out of the air and we, you know, go get Barry. We're ready for the next scene. And it would take Nolan 15 or 20 minutes each time to go that where we're like, where, where are you doing, buddy? Well, I'm just as beginning as I had an array of food and beverages ready for him when he came in. And so that was part of the deal that we kept, was that he allowed me to eat those that shared some with him and he wouldn't tell everybody what I was doing. Now the truth comes out really, right, Nolan And he's sweating bullets. Listen to this episode. So so let's talk a little bit about the importance of this lesson from the land content. You know, as we just mentioned, this is kind of an accompaniment to the the following Messiah in searching for a King series that we've done previously. Why is it so important that we create the content for this elementary grade school audience? Well, for for better or worse, our young children now are growing up in an age in which they learn from media and specifically video. If you talk to anyone, even at that age, that's a little higher than what we're intending for. These lessons from the land. A high school student, if you ask them to, to learn how to do something, they're probably going to go to a YouTube video and learn how to do it instead of picking up a book and reading it. There are pros and cons with that, but we're trying to capitalize on that. We know that these kids are watching videos and so let's give them something very productive to watch. And, you know, I'm honored to be working on this series. Literally 40 years ago, my mother wrote some children's material. It was a series of lessons called Rainbow Lessons, and they were covered the entire Bible. And so I grew up in a house that was used to producing materials for young children. And so I'm actually kind of happy to be working on this project because I'm kind of carrying the tradition my mother started on. And I think it's vitally important for our young people to have these resources. And of course, the videos that are produced along with the workbooks, you know, they kind of just merge and can be used in conjunction with each other. The videos are used to introduce the kids to the workbooks because that's what we want them to do. We want them to dig into the workbooks and dig into God's Word and learn these valuable lessons. Yeah, and I can speak my my kids are anxiously awaiting their own copy of the workbook, so Stu has actually brought it into the studio. Yeah, but I'm not going to show you until after. Yeah, you know, but this But my kids like they are so excited for this series and I'm thrilled Barry that that you're helping us create something that, that my kids can get excited about. They appreciate and they do. They appreciate the content that we create. They they've watched all of the feature length series that we've done. But man, when I put one of these, they're short videos. They're 4 to 6 minutes long, which is perfect timing. It's it's enough to get them invested. You've got some great applications at the end of every lesson where it just kind of here's one major takeaway and it talks on on their level. And I don't mean that we we've dumbed it down at all, but it's something that they can relate to that they understand. In fact, I just did this with my daughter. She was not feeling well the other day. We kept them home, kept our home from worship and threw in a few of these lessons and talked through them. And the conversations that these these lessons and the workbooks can can create and foster in our home. I'm thrilled. And I hope that it can be used that way for for other families as well. Yeah. And Barry, you were telling me earlier that your kids, they're grown up and so these weren't obviously available for them, but how much you would have loved to have something like this for them when they were younger? Yeah, that's, that's right. I of course, my children had other things that they could use. But, you know, my my youngest child is is almost 20 years old. And so they were were grown by the time these videos came out. And I can I wish they would have been available not to take anything away from the Bible classes that they had at church or from the teaching that Tabitha and I tried to give them when they were here at the house. But these would have been nice tools to have as they were growing up. I'm sure that they would have enjoyed them. And as I said, it's the difference in children as as we've as time passes and technology improves and changes, we need to be adapting to those changes. We need to use the tools that God is providing for us to teach his word to our children specifically. So let me ask you this question. When when you started leading tours, I think it wasn't even a glimmer in your eye that Craig would call one day and say, hey, we're doing some videos. And then when Craig did call and we started AP and Media, and you went on that first video production trip for following Messiah, it probably wasn't a glimmer in your eye that one day you would be the face of children's content for AP and media. How do you feel about being Uncle Barry? What do is asking, What were you thinking? What were you thinking? Yeah, I don't know what I was thinking, that maybe I should have never answered that phone call. But yes, I started leading tours probably about ten years ago to Israel, and a couple of years later, I got a phone call from from Craig with this crazy idea. And I love crazy ideas. And so that's how all this happened. And of course, when Craig first contacted me, he was more asking about logistics of traveling to Israel and things that we might be able to film and things and things like that. It wasn't until later when he asked, Hey, have you ever done anything on camera? And the answer that was no. And even though I have now, I'm still a rookie at it. Do you would for those of you who watched the videos and are impressed by them, what you don't know is that 95% is on the cutting room floor because of all the mistakes that I make. They're very, very patient with me as we do this. But I'm honored to be able to help in any way that I can with with AP and media and with this effort. Our children are the next generation of Christians, and it's our responsibility to prepare them because there'll be there will come a time in which we're no longer here, and they need to be willing and ready to step up to the plate and and do the things that they need to do in God's kingdom. Yeah, absolutely. Well, I want to show you this workbook really bad, but let's take a break first, okay? And then we'll unveil the workbook and then we got a couple more questions for Barry as well. So, So, Craig, I think we should give people free money. What are your thoughts about that? I like free money. I also like giving people free things. So how are we doing that? Are you paying for this? I'm paying for this. How does this work? Okay, how about a promo code instead for a nice discount off products on our brand new website? Yes. Yes, I love it. Now we are talking for the listeners of the Inroads podcast. You can take 20% off your next purchase on appianmedia.org using promo code “podcast20” at checkout that's 20% off your entire cart. So don't be afraid to fill it up. Yeah, fill that cart up. Appian Media has premium workbooks with QR codes and full color images that go along with our free documentaries. Or if you'd like, you can purchase the digital version of the workbook for your church Bible class, homeschool group or small group study. We also have DVD's, Blu-ray's, and even some Appian media swag and gift cards. The products are high quality and we'll take your Bible study to the next level, so visit appianmedia.org and use promo code “podcast20” to get your 20% off today. Now back to our interview with Barry. But here we are. Boom. So it. There you go. Where you can see that. Yeah. Wow. Fantastic. As you can see it on camera there. This is the new workbook, you know, And the thing about it is it feels very similar here to get your hands on that just it feels very similar to lessons certainly in the Gospels. And that is by design, because we want them to be something that's seamless. When you finish one, you can go to the next one. Justin Dobbs is our editor for these workbooks and he's done a fantastic job with the activities in there and the lesson material. And I believe, Jeff, that he's created the illustrations that you can color. And I know that my son was asking, he saw a copy of that sitting on the table and he goes, Ooh, can I color that? And I was like, No, no, no, no, not yet. Not yet. But is these coloring pages actually? So my wife, Karen did the ones she did, the first one and the gospels. And she was so thrilled actually, to hand that responsibility off to Jeff, my brother, who will be on an upcoming episode of the podcast. Yeah. And so I'm so man, I'm so thrilled with these. These are really nice. And if your kids are already flipping through it and getting excited about it, I mean, went I don't know what kind of work, but I assume I know what kind of workbooks you all used when you were children. When I was children, like there was no color. No, there were no activities. There were true and false questions and fill in the blanks. And there's a there's a time and a place for both. You can do that. I did learn. You can't color all the time, but you can't color the time. That's right. But, man, when was the last time a child got excited about a Bible workbook? That's right. That's right. But and we need that. And we do because our children should be getting excited about the Bible. Yeah, right. They should be excited to dig into it and bury. That's one of the things I so appreciate about just your demeanor and your delivery of the content and your knowledge of the content. It's not that we're writing scripts and putting them in front of Barry and he's just telling it like, you know, this stuff and to see you get excited about it. That actually was the reason why my first phone call with Barry began as a logistics query. Like, I just wanted to know some information and it very quickly made sense to we need to get him on camera to say the things he already knows because you're enthusiasm is infectious. Speaking of which, Barry, Well, that hat behind. Right. Well, I, I, I appreciate that. It's it's as we've said over and over again, I'm excited these workbooks look the way they do, because we want children to be excited about them. We want children when they're looking at things to do in their downtime. We want them to pick up these books and as excited as we are about the videos, the whole point of the videos and the whole point of the workbooks are to get kids excited about God's Word. I mean, that's the whole point. If, if, if they watch the videos and they play with the workbooks, but they never pick up their Bible, then we have failed in our mission. And so our, our, our job, our goal here is to get children interested in God's Word and and because that's where real truth is. And so I'm thrilled to see this workbook. I can't wait, just as Craig did. I can't wait to hold one in my hand and actually kind of flip through it and take it take a few to the congregation where I worship and hand them out some of the small kids there and let them see them for the first time. Yeah. And I think this is a very big step for AP and media because this is this is the second installment of our Lessons from the Land series. And I think quickly people are going to go, Oh, I see what you're doing here. You're creating something bigger than just one workbook or one set of videos. This is something that is going to be a whole curriculum set, and we've talked about that before, and I think that's a really exciting thing and people are going to start to see the wheels turning and say, I can use this in my church group or my homeschool group or whatever the case is, and now they can start to connect it. And that's really an exciting thing. So so Mary, let me ask you this. These lessons from the Land series are different inherently than following the Messiah, searching for a King trial and triumph because this is very workbook driven. Talk about that for a minute. Well, that's right. When we first created the larger documentaries that following the Messiah as Searching for a King, our original intention was just to create the videos themselves. But then we we had a real interest in people in creating a workbook to kind of go along with that. And so the idea there was that the they kind of went hand in hand. You would spend probably spend more time with the videos than you would the workbooks. However, this is a little different. We want these videos, as Craig said, are only about 4 minutes long. They're meant to introduce a topic to the students and from there then they can open up the workbook and learn even more. And hopefully with a teacher, try to guide the discussion. They can more fully discuss the topics that are introduced by by the videos themselves. And so there's a little bit of different aspect in these videos as opposed to the longer documentaries that we've had, I mean, trial and trial. I mean, that was it. That was a two hour documentary. I mean, that's that's a that has a totally different place and effectiveness than these short four minute videos do. And so I think that's important to understand. And I think all videos have a place and these are, as we said, are used to introduce a topic to the children as they begin their study of God's word. Yeah. Okay. So let's talk about Future series. We we had been talking about on the podcast our trip to Egypt and Jordan and the Out of Egypt documentary. But we also were talking about lessons from Land, the Exodus. So that's coming up. And Lord willing, we will have that to release later this year. That's right. Work has already begun on that. Mary came with us right to to Egypt, and it was one that we filmed in country. We did yeah. So we we actually, you know, we got him there on the shore of the Nile River. We got him there and shot some episodes out in potentially the land of Goshen right. But we didn't get it. All right. And that was became necessary for a variety of reasons. You can watch our behind the scenes videos to get more insight on that. So there's still a few more episodes stand ups to shoot. Yes. And so that's coming up. Where are we going? What are we doing? Well, but even though we didn't get it all over there, I think we got the pieces that needed to be to be shot in Egypt. We got all of those taken care of. We went over there with it with a priority list of what we wanted to do, and we got all of those all of those done, but we still got a few things that we need to need to film to kind of put a put a bow on the box, as we say. So we started in Georgia and then we went to Texas. And so now we're in Utah. We're trying to, I guess, hit all 50 states eventually. But on our way west, way west eventually will end up in New Zealand and it'll be amazing. Now, there we go. good time. Make sure to pack your hat, in fact. Okay? Yeah, well, I've got it. I've got it over here on the. Let's get that away. Keep it nearby. Let's get. Let's get that hat on. Let's see that hat. And still wants to see the hat. I really want to see the hat. So if you're listening to the podcast, you're not seeing the hat right now. But if you're watching it on YouTube, here it is. Yeah, it's it's I think I typically as big of a character as Barry himself. Well, I typically I typically don't have my my hat or my passport very far from me. That's good. So I can grab them very quickly and and can be boarded a plane as quickly as I can. Do you just wear a hat around the house when you walk around, you just keep that thing on. Yeah. He actually plays the the theme music from Lessons for the Land any time he wants and any time he walks around, he comes out of comes out of his bedroom in the morning, he's dressed up and you know. Yeah, the music plays my wife Tabitha gets my wife to have. I get so tired of that so well, listen, man, we really appreciate what you've done for AP and media, what you're doing for this next generation. I mean, as as fathers of children, I can see it affecting our family in such positive ways. We have heard from from other viewers and other uses of this material that it's been helpful to them, especially. We've been talking more and more with the homeschool community. Yes. And that has been such a blessing to them. And and we're we're getting ready to to go to a couple more conventions this year and we're excited for that. And so thank you. Thank you for what you're doing and what you're continuing to do, getting people excited about the word. Yeah. And and I'm thrilled to see imaginations starting to get engaged in a way that that is exciting for this next generation. I think it's so important that they get excited and interested in this at such a young age. So that way, by the time they get to a middle school, high school level, they're just they're in it and they love it and it's their own faith. And it starts at a young age. That's right. Yeah, that's right. Thank you. Very well. It's a it's a thrill, an honor to work with not only the two of you, but the whole AP media team. And it's an honor to work on behalf of all the hundreds of people who donate money to so that we can do what we do. It's an honor to support them with with the donations that they make to do the work that they've asked us to do. okay. Well, that is going to wrap it up for this episode of the Inroads podcast. So if you haven't already jump on the website, watch the new series. There's a lot of great stuff happening. Get your hands on some of these workbooks and we'll plug the promo code again. We're excited about the new website, and so using that promo code “podcast20” hope that it's a benefit to your your small group study, your family, your homeschool group, perhaps to get some of this content and to watch it and and get excited about it. So thank you all for listening. Inroads is a production of Appian Media, where a nonprofit video production company that is 100% crowdfunded. If you're interested in learning more about how you can support Appian Media so we can continue to create more great free content, visit us and appianmedia.org.