June Newsletter

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.

Romans 15:13

Banquet Blessings!

By Kevin Bonnar

We hosted our annual Wisconsin Banquet on May 1st at the Omni Center in Onalaska, WI.  We packed the house with over 800+ Kicking Bear supporters in attendance!!  A fun night was had by all and we were able to raise significant funds to help keep the ministry on mission.  We celebrated our brother Mel Howe as the Cheerful Giver this year, Mel has been serving with us for over 25 years at serving at camps, mentoring kiddos and guiding hunts.  A strong man of God who is always willing to help pour into the next generation.  Thank you Mel!  We also celebrated Gary Mobley as our Full Circle award winner.  Gary has been connected with his mentor Chad Dutton and Kicking Bear for over 5 years now and has recently graduated out of our youth program and is turning around to help guide younger hunters and serve at events now.  Thank you Gary!  The night was just so incredible and we want to thank all our sponsors, supporters, volunteers and KB families.  God has been using Kicking Bear to reach kiddos with the Gospel and outdoor dreams for over 25 years and we know a huge part of that is all the great people like you that have been a part of Kicking Bear, so thank you all!

Check out the size of this marshmallow fight!  And this year’s banquet impact video!

Mathew’s website! https://mathewsinc.com/

Girls Going After Gobblers

By Kevin Bonnar

May brought around our chance to take the girls out turkey hunting in Minnesota.  We had 4 young hunters step up and thanks to our wonderful friend Jan we had a perfect set up tucked right outside Nodine, MN.  Brother Darren Grefe helped me get the spots picked and blinds set.  With a sweet little cabin for the girls and all the blinds placed we were ready for some turkey hunting!  Saturday morning started great off with gobbles in the trees, some deer spotted and one hen turkey struttin by.  There is nothing quite like when those birds fire up and you see the look on a new hunters face, it was fun,  but we just couldn’t get the toms out of the woods.  We got lots of practice calling though.  This trend continued for the afternoon sit as well, then things got real quiet as the sun set Saturday night.  We didn’t give up though! We had one hunter RaeLynn who was on her last hunt before aging out of the youth hunts and young hunters Jayla, Skylynne and Charlie were all working hard to harvest their first animal on a hunt ever.  We prayed hard and headed out Sunday morning. Guides Abbi, Dave, Jess and Kev were fired up to get some birds in for these girls, we knew they were out there.  The weather was perfect and we heard gobbles early, but once again we just couldn’t get them out of the woods.  We headed back to clean up camp a little bummed, but we also reflected on our time together as still pretty awesome.  Got to shoot the shotguns Friday night, share meals and giggles and time in the blinds, and just be together enjoying God’s beautiful creation.  All the girls agreed they had enough fun that they would be ready to go again and we will be back for them birds again too!

Brand new in Bandera, Back in Braymer and Closing it out in Kansas

By Kevin Bonnar

We didn’t waste any time firing up the summer evangelism camps as Ray and Krysta headed south to Bandera, TX right after the banquet to fire up a first year camp with friends from Church on the Hill. So much fun and always a little extra excitement for the first year camps, they never see the marshmallow fight coming and there are so many kiddos new to archery! We will never forget this one, so many smiles, memories and crawfish!! Really blessed and thankful to start the summer season sharing the Gospel in Texas with such great folks.

Next up was the Braymer, MO camp with Larry Shoe and his crew. This camp has been around for close to 20 years and it has been amazing to watch the kids who first showed up knee high to now be graduating school and volunteering at camp to help the next generation learn to shoot bows, catch fish and have fun! Fireworks, camping, great food, fishing and letting people know Jesus loves em, means we had a great camp in Missouri this year and we are so thankful for that!  

We closed out the month down in Medicine Lodge, KS at the Grant-Larson Family Ranch and Gypsum Hills Trail Rides, a beautiful slice of heaven right in the heart of Kansas. This was year twelve for this camp and it was awesome. We brought a Gaga ball pit into the mix and the DNR shared a virtual hunting game with us this year, these new things had the kiddos so fired up on Friday night! We got to worship together under the stars, talk about Joshua and how God calls us to be strong and courageous, had the best weather, and all the activities went great. Well, some pesky rattlesnakes did create a detour for our hike, but even that ended up being awesome! We didn’t stop from Friday night till church on Sunday, we even had a community church service outdoors together.  

Looking back at a very fast month of May we are so thankful. Great camps, friends that are truly family and just so thankful for a great month on mission, sharing the Gospel!

Also, check out Mission Archery at

https://missionarchery.com/

2025 KICKING BEAR CALENDAR GIVEAWAY

We have given away even more great prizes this month for the 2025 Kicking Bear Giveaway. Purchase your ticket/calendar now and have your number entered into June’s monthly drawing. The main drawing will be held on Friday, October 10th, live on our Kicking Bear YouTube channel. Our 50/50 Raffle is already over $6,600!! Our #1 seller is the Platinum Package ($125) that gets you into all drawings throughout the entire 2025 year. 100% of proceeds will go directly to the Kicking Bear Ministries and help us continue our mission. For more information or to purchase tickets please CLICK HERE (www.kickingbear.org).

Check out updates on our next events and catch pictures, videos and highlights of our past mission work on our social media platforms and website!!

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