hsm weekend in review | More Than Dodgeball

Josh GriffinMore Posts HSM Weekend in Review: Volume 209

Weekend Teaching Series: You Own the Weekend: Mission Viejo High School (week 2 of 5)

Sermon in a Sentence: We’re all sinking.
Service Length: 63 minutes

Understandable Message: This weekend the students did an incredible job owning the service – every aspect was done by students from that high school and they did an absolutely incredible job. The theme was we’re all sinking and they talked about how we’re sinking in life without Christ and did a great job explaining the plan of salvation to the youth group. These weekends surge in attendance every year, so it was awesome for them to have such a clear, focused message with a clear presentation of the Gospel.

Element of Fun/Positive Environment: Killer decorations – they took a totally different approach and rather than going all out with their school mascots,logos and colors they themed it very aquatic – super creative and a nice change of pace from the typical You Own the Weekend. My favorite was the entry way with green streamers hanging from the ceiling, made it feel like you were walking through seaweed when you walked into the youth room. Hilarious videos, too!

Music Playlist: Under the Sea [Disney cover remix], The Earth is Yours, Always, 10,000 Reasons

Favorite Moment: After the service was over students pointed to leaders if someone had questions or had made a decision during the service. But more importantly, they offered themselves to talk to others. This is the essence of You Own the Weekend – students take the lead. Love it.

Up next: You Own the Weekend: Capo (week 3 of 5)

Add Comment April 9, 2013

Josh GriffinMore Posts HSM Weekend in Review: Volume 208

Weekend Teaching Series: You Are Here (What on Earth Am I Here For? church-wide campaign, series premiere, week 6 of 6)

Sermon in a Sentence:
Service Length: 63 minutes

Understandable Message: This week Parker Stech taugh about friendship evangelism.

Element of Fun/Positive Environment: We wanted to promote our Engage Spring Break mission trip – so brought a student up on stage who went on the trip last year and did a Q&A with her. We also had a couple fun videos. Lots of students involved in the program from the greeting to production as well.

Music Playlist: He Is Alive, Your Love Never Fails, One Thing Remains, We Shine, Here For You

Favorite Moment: After the service a couple of great youth workers were visiting from Indianapolis, IN. They were awesome – had a great time at Red Robin after the service talking about youth ministry, and some thoughts on where they were headed in the next season of ministry. So fun!

Up next: Worship Together Weekend (all-church, no HSM services)

Add Comment February 28, 2013

Josh GriffinMore Posts HSM Weekend in Review: Volume 207

Weekend Teaching Series: You Are Here (What on Earth Am I Here For? church-wide campaign, series premiere, week 1 of 6)
Service Length: 68 minutes

Understandable Message: You are not an accident! This weekend we kicked of Saddleback’s latest 40 Days campaign, What On Earth Am I Here For? We called it You Are Here and the first week was an overview of that focused on God having a purpose for your life and a specific calling on what He wants you to accomplish. My hope was that students walked away with a basic understanding of Psalm 139 and Ephesians 2. Students seemed to respond well to the talk, excited for what is ahead in the series!

Element of Fun/Positive Environment: This week we did “App Showdown” and had contestants go head-to-head to last the longest on the just-released Temple Run 2. It was a hit, although we stumbled with some technical difficulties for some reason all weekend as well. We also introduced our new intern Daniela, who did a fun bilingual bit on stage as well.

Music Playlist: Hall of Fame (The Script cover), He Is Alive, Here For You, 10,000 Reasons, Overcame

Favorite Moment: I loved a video from Right Now Ministries that Justin found that we dropped into the talk. It really helped students get the concept of turning their life from about them to about God, and asked a great question about what they would be willing to trade from the American Dream for God’s Plan in their life. I’ll post it later this week- good stuff!

Up next: You Are Here (week 2 of 6)

Add Comment January 23, 2013

Josh GriffinMore Posts 4 Strategies Behind My Blog Philosophy

Every once in a while someone asks me about strategies about blogging – to be honest I sort of made it up along the way but do have some pretty defined thoughts now having blogged nearly every day for 7 years. Thought I would take a moment and answer one of the more frequent ones: what is the strategy behind what you post, link to and point others toward? Here it is in what I would consider my as of yet unspoken 4 guiding principles:

Have content that is totally exclusive
People come to your blog for your voice – so give them what they want! The majority of the content and posts on your site should be from you and your ministry perspective. Stuff you’re learning, stuff you’re reading, stuff your failing at doing. Content from your context is the key – you want your site littered with content that you create people can’t get anywhere else.

Start a few blog “regulars”
I like to post a couple of regularly occurring volumes of posts that people can look forward to each week. I like to write about our weekend services with HSM’s Weekend in Review and posts polls weekly as well.

Point to stuff you wish you had written
Occasionally I’ll edit/paste an excerpt from a post that I read on another blog and point my readers that way. I try to do this a few times a week, it usually depends on the amount of content I have planned to go up on the site so that it feels balanced. My rule of thumb is that when something really resonates with me – it gets a nod on my blog so others can engage with that great content as well.

Endorse stuff you’re actually using in your ministryWrite reviews of products, tools and resource you are using in your ministry. Let other youth workers know what stuff is working and what isn’t. Help people that Google search for video curriculum know which ones they should choose, and which texting service is or isn’t worth the price of admission.

What’s your blog strategy?

JG

1 View Comments January 2, 2013

Josh GriffinMore Posts HSM Weekend in Review: Volume 207

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Weekend Teaching Series: Be a Part of the Miracle (1-off between Christmas and New Year)
Service Length: 58 minutes

Understandable Message: This week our Student Ministry Worship Director Taffy spoke a simple but powerful message on Jesus feeding the 5,000. He used white bread, canned sardines and a brown paper sack to retell the story focusing on the little boy being willing to put what he had in Jesus’ hands. It was a great simple talk about what Jesus can do when we trust Him with our talents, gifts, abilites, time and life. Really good talk – loved the gross-out moment when he spread the sardines on the bread and took a big bite, too. Perfect!

Element of Fun/Positive Environment: We had a bunch of polleverywhere.com polls on the screen and let students share their worst gifts on stage (which we rewarded their storytelling by giving them a wrapped white ele[hant gift, too). We also did a fun gift card “trade-up” where we found the most unusual gift card, etc.

Music Playlist: Lift Him Up, He is Alive, Divine and Holy, Learn to Love, Your Love is Enough

Favorite Moment: It was so fun doing a combination weekend with our junior high. We are separated for 99% of the year, so it was great having the younger students all together this lower-attended holiday weekend. Their leaders are so awesome!

Up next: Worship Together Weekend: January

Add Comment December 31, 2012

Josh GriffinMore Posts HSM Weekend in Review: Volume 206

Weekend Teaching Series: Instalife (week 2 of 2)
Service Length: 75 minutes

Understandable Message: This weekend we wrapped up the incredible Instalife series. I Tweeted the other day about how much I had loves this series – for sure it was the most well-received series of the year. Didn’t mean it was soft or light, but the framework of Instagram really helped make it very relevant to their lives. This week we went after pretending and showing off on Instagram, and how pretty soon we start to get great at covering up. I walked students through some principles from Colossians 3 to help students deal with this destructive mindset. Really, really enjoyed this service.

Element of Fun/Positive Environment: We had a couple of great Christmas videos I can’t wait to show you. One was the classic “That’s Christmas” and a new video called A Very Colton and Travis Christmas special. We also played Who Wants to Be a Fraction of a Millionaire (Instagram edition). Lots of students involved, lots of laughs.

Music Playlist: He is Alive, Christ in Me, Mary Did You Know, We Are Saved, O Holy Night

Favorite Moment: At the end of the talk I decided to do an extended object lesson on stage where we built the “perfect Instagram” on stage, then deconstructed it to help teach the lesson. One of my favorites, such a powerful image that our students/leaders pulled off to help strengthen the lesson.

Up next: Christmas Services (all-church, 1-off)

3 View Comments December 19, 2012

Josh GriffinMore Posts HSM Weekend in Review: Volume 205

Weekend Teaching Series: Instalife (series premiere, week 1 of 2)
Service Length: 70 minutes

Understandable Message: This weekend we used the app Instagram as a backdrop for a new series in HSM. This week we focused on jealousy – how Instagram brings out the best and the worst in us in that area. We talked about jealousy from Jesus teachings in Matthew 6 and had lots of fun along the way. One of my favorite weekends in HSM in a very long time – I think a good message, great game, fun look/feel and super relevant and easy to connect with our student’s world.

Element of Fun/Positive Environment: We played a brand new game called InstaHack – where we bring someone on stage and have them log into their Instagram and then spin the wheel for us to various terrible things to their pictures, followers and feed. They could also win $5 Starbucks giftcards if they were extremely lucky. Super, super fun, crowd died at the right points, and the contestants were always a good sport. We also had lots of student greeters and a fun Christmas rap video.

Music Playlist: Silent Night (Taylor Swift version), Go, Joy to the World, 10,000 Reasons, Your Love is Strong

Favorite Moment: During one part of the talk I called out one of our students (I had his permission, more or less) and talked about #selfies. It was a great moment that I loved and

Up next: Instalife (week 2 of 2)

1 View Comments December 11, 2012

Josh GriffinMore Posts HSM Weekend in Review: Volume 204

Weekend Teaching Series: UFC Weekend w/Mark Munoz (1-off)
Service Length: 82 minutes

Understandable Message: This weekend we invited Mark Munoz, an incredible Ultimate Fighter, to come share his story and testimony for Christ with our students. He talked about his upbringing, how God used painful situations in his life to shape his journey into wrestling and how God is using him and his influence to further God’s Kingdom. Really fun stuff, spoke to a ton of students who came just to see him and left with a new relationship with Christ.

Element of Fun/Positive Environment: This weekend we had a fun musical opener, a couple of quick videos (one we ripped from YouTube and one promoting Winter Camp) some great songs and not much else to give time for the speaker.

Music Playlist: Survival Song, We Are the Free, Hosanna, With Everything

Favorite Moment: Mark Munoz did a good job speaking – but was INCREDIBLE doing question and answer and hanging with students afterwards. He is one of the most accomplished fighters in the UFC, and is humble and completely likeable. He isn’t on the “speaking circuit” but I promise you he will be because God used him in big ways in our ministry!

Up next: Worship Together Weekend: World AIDS Day (1-off)