Meaningful change is never easy. It has been said that the greatest precursor to change is pain. Meaning, we often only change when we experience some sort of pain and wish it to end. It doesn’t have to be that way. If we are honest and willing to examine our lives routinely, we will find many opportunities to change.
We are making some significant changes to our youth ministry calendar this year. It is our goal to be the best stewards of the responsibilities God has given us in youth ministry and we believe to do that we must pursue a balanced family ministry. First of all, we’ve moved our HS youth group to Sunday mornings in order to allow families to attend the 9AM service together (our most attended service), rather than separate families between services throughout the day. This means at our 9AM service there are classes for Jr. High, High School and Sunday School (ages 4-11). Secondly, we are adding midweek events for both Jr High (Ignite Tuesday’s @ 6PM) and High School (Amplify Thursday’s @ 6pm).
Our midweek events will be an adaptation of our midweek small group programs of the past. We will meet together in a large group setting, enjoy snacks and hangout until 7PM, then participate in a group activity (broom ball, power point trivia, etc), have a message presented and then break up into small groups to discuss the message. Our hope is to expand the gospel’s reach into the community while still offering a safe, fun place for our kids to share what it means to follow Jesus. Our prayer is that your family takes advantage of these nights and invite your kids friends, classmates, neighbors, teammates, etc.
Our midweek Jr High and HS groups will no longer require registration and can be attended by all who want to (age appropriate of course), at any time of the year. As for the schedule, we will mimmic the public school calendar. If the public school is out for holiday, so will we.
There are too many details to explain in a post that will be read on this site, so if you have any questions (and I hope you do), please feel free to ask me or any of the youth volunteer staff at Sierra. We’d be happy to share our vision and mission for the ministry any time you are available.
A good children’s/youth ministry is a balanced family ministry.
grace & peace,
Corbett
Corbett@scchurch.org