youth group meetings | More Than Dodgeball

Josh GriffinMore Posts Weigh In: Volume 3 – YMCA Youth Group

Every so often we take a question, perhaps an unanswered one from the Simply Youth Ministry Podcast, and pose it to you the MTDB community to answer instead of our show’s panel. Here’s a great one that came in — if you have some wisdom I hope you’ll share in the comments!

I’m brand new to the youth ministry world and would love your ideas, tips and thoughts on how we’re doing youth ministry. We are going to start our youth group soon and will be meeting in the local YMCA. It has lots of potential – full access to the pool, gym, weight and more. The problem is I’m not sure how to program each night to use this amazing building/facilities wisely. Help me out!

Now — weigh in!

JG

8 View Comments November 2, 2010

Josh GriffinMore Posts HSM Weekend in Review: Volume 113

Weekend Teaching Series: Happily Ever After (week 2 of 3)
Sermon in a Sentence: Samson teaches a lot about how NOT to be a godly man and what to NOT look for in a guy as we work to live happily ever after.
Service Length: 64 minutes
Main passage: Judges 16

Understandable Message: This week was GUYS weekend in HSM during the Happily Ever After series – I wanted to help guys understand what not to become and girls what not to chase after. The message was the story of Samson and Delilah and was titled “How NOT to be a Stud.” The students seemed to really enjoy the change of pace in teaching style and this subject is totally a felt need for this age group. It was fun to see girls think a little more critically about the type of guy they have their eye on, and for guys to be challenged to rise above the sea of “Samsons” at their high school.

Element of Fun/Positive Environment: The team created several funny videos about AXE Body Spray that played well, and we had a couple of “scientists” come out and promise to help any guy student in the audience with a date. Of course, the student was planted, and we had set up a funny video of his date that everyone enjoyed, too. It was a unique element because the hosts on stage interacted with the video as if it were life, giving it a neat feeling like it was actually happening in real-time.

Music Playlist: I’ll Make a Man Out of You [Mulan cover], Glory to God, The Grateful, Take It All

Favorite Moment: A fun element we had this weekend happened after I described the typical man – how we’re in love with buffalo wings, man chairs, big screens and football. I asked for a student volunteer, then gave him that experience during the message. We had a Coke, Lazy-Boy, hot wings and a 60″ flat screen set up for him to watch the service. Fun – I checked in on him several times throughout the talk!

Up Next: Happily Ever After series finale (week 3 of 3)

Add Comment September 27, 2010

Josh GriffinMore Posts Teens Becoming Almost Christians

Josh Riffle pointed me to an article on CNN that seems to be an important read for youth workers about students being shallow in their faith and what strong students of faith have in common. Seems to get a bit on the USA Today bandwagon from earlier this month, but some good insight nonetheless:

No matter their background, Dean says committed Christian teens share four traits: They have a personal story about God they can share, a deep connection to a faith community, a sense of purpose and a sense of hope about their future.

“There are countless studies that show that religious teenagers do better in school, have better relationships with their parents and engage in less high-risk behavior,” she says. “They do a lot of things that parents pray for.”

Dean, a United Methodist Church minister who says parents are the most important influence on their children’s faith, places the ultimate blame for teens’ religious apathy on adults.

Some adults don’t expect much from youth pastors. They simply want them to keep their children off drugs and away from premarital sex.

Others practice a “gospel of niceness,” where faith is simply doing good and not ruffling feathers. The Christian call to take risks, witness and sacrifice for others is muted, she says.

JG

1 View Comments September 3, 2010

Josh GriffinMore Posts Successful Youth Ministry Summer Calendar

This summer we took some risks and planned a summer calendar for our high school youth group that looked pretty different than years past. I think for the most part it paid off – here are some of the new ideas (for us) and the results:

Summer camp moved to the beginning of the summer
This was the biggest game-changer for us – for years we’ve let camp be the “end of summer event” that catapulted us into Fall Kickoff and the new school year. I blogged about the Benefits of Early Summer Camp, not in an effort to justify the move but to make sure we took advantage of the strategy behind the move. Camp now kicks off the summer, and gives us momentum in a typical downtime for youth groups. COST: $299

Midweek Bible Study replaces small groups
For the longest time our small groups (now Life Groups) have met only during the school year. But this year we decided to have a discipleship/worship/fellowship gathering call WE(MID)EK all summer long. The consistency was a win – students knew that every Tuesday night we gathered to sing, pray, learn and connect. And yes, I realize that Tuesday isn’t midweek but it was the last day available. Cost: FREE

Bible study just for girls
This year one of the ideas was to have a Bible study just for girls – not necessarily on girl’s issues (it was actually an Old Testament character study) but so girls could learn together away from the distractions of the boys. Bagels & Bibles was a great 8-week success – and the guys want one next summer, too! Donuts & Dudes, here we come! Cost: FREE

Fun and relational time every Friday
Every Friday we spent 2 hours at the park, and 2 hours at The Refinery hanging out and playing games. Athletic kids loved the outdoor games, and everyone loved the cold Cokes at lunch. Great opportunity to bring friends or have a surprisingly deep conversation. Cost: FREE

Lots of guest speakers over the summer at the weekend worship service
This summer I did a significant amount of teaching when our freshman we’re incoming, then turned it over to other voices in our youth ministry team. This past weekend, two volunteers spoke, which was incredible. It gave me a chance to go on vacation and for our students to hear from different personalities, styles and backgrounds. COST: FREE

Two service projects, no mission trips
This summer we didn’t go on any mission trips – saving that for our Spring trips to Kenya and Spring Break trip to New Mexico. But our students were involved in service projects in the community, we did a Pancake Breakfast for a needy area and helped pull off Operation: Backpack. COST: FREE

JG

Josh GriffinMore Posts Evaluating Your Summer Youth Ministry

Noticed that Doug and Matt’s YM Daily yesterday had some great thoughts about looking back and taking time to debrief, evaluate and celebrate the past season. They had some great questions to think about (which I think I’ll answer in a future blog post) that would be good to think about this week as you enter the new school year.

…| What happened during the summer that was great? What do we want to be sure to repeat in the future?
…| Where did God show up? What victories could we celebrate?
…| Where was I surprised? What last minute “audible” or changes was I forced to make?
…| What went wrong? What could have been better?

JG

Add Comment September 1, 2010

Josh GriffinMore Posts The Power of Story – Life Groups Testimony

A fantastic testimony shared during the Life Groups weekend of the LAUNCH series. Parker finished his story live on stage – talking about God changing his heart and encouraging students to join small group as well.

JG

Add Comment August 31, 2010

Josh GriffinMore Posts Life Groups for Students Highlight Video

A strong testimony using during the LAUNCH series to help encourage student to see the importance of joining and HSM Life Group this fall.

JG

Add Comment August 30, 2010

Josh GriffinMore Posts HSM Weekend in Review: Volume 109

Weekend Teaching Series: LAUNCH: Ready for Re-Entry (week 3 of 5)
Sermon in a Sentence: Launching into a successful school year includes getting accountability and community by being a part of an HSM Life Group.
Service Length: 73 minutes

Understandable Message: This week was all about Life Groups. Our small group year starts in just a few weeks, and registration for the big launch ends in 14 days. This weekend was taught by Life Group volunteers (Matt and Mel – Team M&M) and they hit on the importance reasons to be in one using an acrostic (L-I-F-E-G-R-O-U-P-S) and testimonies both live and on video. If a student wasn’t in a small group, they would sure want to be at the end of the hour.

Element of Fun/Positive Environment: Matt did a good job of bringing humor into his talk – he made references to Justin Bieber and Batman and made comparisons to the pop stars and comic books of his day. There was a very positive environment to the weekend – you could tell the community that they were teaching on was genuine in their group and a goal for all of HSM’s Life Groups.

Music Playlist: Rise and Sing, Beautiful Things, How He Loves, Burning Ones, With Everything

Favorite Moment: The power of story is always amazing to me – when a student gets up to speak the students listen intently to what they have to say. And it totally works both live or on video. I’m also so impressed by the strength of the students who got up to share their story this week. Epic stuff.

Up Next: LAUNCH week 4